Earl Clement Davis’ materials were preserved in a trunk for decades. Originally these materials must have been packed in the trunk after his death and the vacating of the Petersham parsonage. During the 1950s, 60s, 70s and 80s the trunk lived in the house I grew up in in Lexington, Massachusetts. After my mother died, it moved again, this time to my older sister Brinna’s home in Norwich Vermont. I took it in the early 1990s and have kept it since then, first in South Carolina and now in Massachusetts again, Worcester, not too far from Petersham where the trunk’s journey began.

Over this time, periodically the trunk would be opened and the materials “pawed through.” Stuff got moved around, added to, taken out, returned. The organization, such as it may have been, was largely lost.

Many of the materials are dated, or can be dated by clues, e.g., sermons given at “Unity Church” were from Earl Davis’ time as minister of the Unitarian Unity Church in Pittsfield, Massachusetts (1905-1919). Unfortunately, many of the manuscripts have no date. Yet they remain of interest. Here is a selection.