University of Michigan-Flint
Frances Willson Thompson Library

Genesee Historical Collections Center

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Name of the collection: Robert Grayson Schafer
Inclusive years: 1940 (bulk 1952-)-1989
Quantity: 4 linear feet
Acquisition: The collection (donor number 001) was donated to the Genesee Historical Collections in five accessions between 1979 and 1989.
Access: There are no restrictions on access to this collection.
Photographs: 166 positive prints, approximately 250 slides, and 68 negatives were removed from the collection and cataloged separately.
Processed by: Paul Gifford, October 1990.

BIOGRAPHY

Robert Grayson Schafer was born on April 15, 1923, in Wenatchee, Washington. After graduation from Wenatchee High School, he served in the U. S. Army Air Force. He entered the University of Washington, graduating with a B. A. in history in 1947, and then attended the University of California-Berkeley, where he received his M. A., in 1950, and his Ph. D. in 1954. His field of study in graduate school was British history.

Schafer began his professional career as a lecturer in history at California Institute of Technology, from 1953 to 1954. He then taught at Stanford University in the 1955-1956 academic year. He accepted the position of assistant professor of history at the Flint College of the University of Michigan in 1956, the year the senior college was founded. He and Dorothea Wyatt taught all courses offered by the history department until 1965. Dr. Schafer was named associate professor in 1962 and professor in 1967. He retired in 1989 as professor emeritus and moved to San Clemente, California.

He was involved in all facets of university life. In addition to teaching, he served on numerous university committees, including the Executive Committee, and three times as chairman of the history department. During the school's early years, especially, he was an advisor to several student groups. One of his chief efforts was to bring speakers to talk about international understanding and foreign cultures. Towards the end of his career he organized the archives of the school and, in a large degree, was responsible for its funding.

His scholarly interests included the politics and industry of 17th-century England, roughly from the early 1950s to about 1973; computer-aided instruction, during the 1970s; and the history of Flint and Genesee County, from the late 1970s to about 1990. He spent several summers in England researching the career of James Brydges, 1st Duke of Chandos, and the history of the Foley ironworks, an important early industrial enterprise. He was also interested in East Asian history and was a guest lecturer at Hunan Normal University in April, 1985.

His most important community activity was his involvement with the International Institute of Flint. He served on its board of directors and as its president (1960-1962; 1971-1973), and on the board of directors of the American Council for Nationalities Service, from 1975 to 1981. He was an active member of the Genesee County Historical Society, the Sister Cities-Flint Committee, and the Flint Area Health Foundation.

SCOPE AND CONTENT

The papers of Robert G. Schafer have been divided into ten series: personal; research; University of Michigan-Flint; conferences and programs; International Institute; American Council for Nationalities Service; other organizations and activities; newspaper clippings; unpublished papers; and publications.

Under the personal series are included vitae and other items of relevance to his appointment; general correspondence, both in-coming and out-going, on a variety of topics which may or may not concern topics in the other series; and material relating to various community talks and presentations.

The research series covers discrete topics he investigated. There is a typescript transcript of the voluminous journal of James Brydges, later Duke of Chandos, from 1697 to 1702, the original of which is in the Huntington Library. Much of the material on computer-assisted instruction, which developed from a project to transfer the records of the Foley ironworks to machine-readable format, consists of grant applications and correspondence and conference programs. There is also some documentation on the computer programs, which were developed for undergraduates as exercises for history classes. The remainder of the series deals with topics in the history of Flint and Genesee County. Most of the research resulted in the publications of the University of Michigan-Flint Archives series, including Schafer's Michael A. Gorman: Flint's Super Booster (1982); Charles Stewart Mott of Applewood: A Memoir (1984); J. Dallas Dort: Citizen Compleat (1986); and Producing a Human Mosaic: Immigration and Economic Change in the Development of Genesee County's Population, 1820-1987 (1989). Some of the files contain interviews with and correspondence from individuals who knew the some of the subjects well, including Arthur G. Bishop (1851-1944), the leading banker of Flint in his day, and J. Dallas Dort, the automobile manufacturer. Thus there is material useful for future researchers interested in those individuals.

Most of the general University of Michigan-Flint memoranda, committee minutes and reports, etc., which originally belonged to Schafer's records have been removed and integrated into the archives of the University. Those that remain relate to those official, largely individual, activities in which Schafer took a leading role or concerned him personally. Besides the files containing material on his many sabbaticals and trips abroad (primarily to England), the files relating to the establishment of the archives loom largest. Also of interest are the faculty and staff responses to questionnaires he circulated about 1978, which offer pointed opinions on the school's strengths and weaknesses as the faculty and staff felt them to be at that time.

The conferences and programs series has material concerning meetings he organized. These include several on international topics (United Nations Week, India Republic Day, the Middle East in Crisis) and several annual historic preservation conferences.

The International Institute series is particular useful for in documenting the activities of this organization, which existed to serve immigrants in the Flint area, in the 1960s and 1970s. Dr. Schafer first became associated with the Institute in 1957, but he collected its annual reports and certain other records from as early as 1940. There is considerable material concerning the fundraising and construction of a new building for the Institute. The American Council for Nationalities Service files consist of memoranda from the national office. This organization was an umbrella group and lobbying organization for International Institutes and other similar organizations around the country.

The remainder of the collection contains files from his activities in other organizations, newspaper clippings, unpublished papers and articles (some of which were later revised for publication), and offprints of journal articles.

Material which was removed from the collection includes duplicates; first drafts; letters of recommendation; letters concerning grades; current budget reports; and most routing slips. Dr. Schafer's university records form the basis of many of the archives' university records and are not treated as his personal papers. The records of the University of Michigan-Flint History Department are a closely related collection.

FOLDER LIST

BOX 1
PERSONAL
        Vitae and other personnel concerns, 1961-1989
        Correspondence
                General
                        1952-1969
                        1970-1983
                        1984-1989
                About publications, 1968-1989
                Laro, Joseph, 1982
        Talks and presentations, 1957-1989
        Awards

RESEARCH
        James Brydges. Journal, 1697-1702 (typescript copy, with 
          introduction)
        Foley iron works
                Administrative and grant applications, 1966-1973
        Computer-assisted instruction
                Manuals, description, paper
                Correspondence, 1972-1989
                Grant applications
                        1973-1976
                        National Endowment for the Humanities, 1979-1980
                Conferences
                        American Historical Association
                                1974
                                1976
                        Madison, Wisconsin, 1976
                        Community College Social Science Association, 1979
        Flint-Genesee County history
                Bishop, Arthur G.
                        (1 of 2)
                        (2 of 2)
                        Stock gift, 1941

BOX 2
                Dort, Dallas
                        Notes and correspondence
                                (1 of 2)
                                (2 of 2)
                        Photocopies
                        Durant-Dort Carriage Company minutes, 1910-1922 
                                (photocopy)
                Gorman, Michael
                        Notes
                        Interviews and correspondence, 1978-1979
                        Finding aid of papers at Sloan Museum
                Immigration to Genesee County
                        Administrative
                        Notes
                                (1 of 2)
                                (2 of 2)
                Mott, Charles Stewart
                        Correspondence and interviews
                        Miscellaneous
                Miscellaneous, 1980-1982

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN-FLINT
        Memoranda, 1970-1988
        Loving Fund, 1962
        Gilkey Gulch Review, 1964
        Students for Black Action, 1969
        Oral history transcripts, 1975, and faculty and staff 
          questionnaires, 1978
        Study abroad and sabbaticals
                England, 1966
                Proposals, 1966-1967
                England, 1967
                Sabbatical, 1969-1970
                Sabbatical, 1977
                Extension class: "Travelling in England," 1981
                England, 1981
                Sabbatical - China, 1983-1984
                Japan Center for Michigan Universities, 1989
        Library and Archives
                Crapo historical marker dedication, 1979, and Crapo Room, 
                        1982
                Library
                Archives
                        1975-1981
                        1982-1988
                Brownell Fund, 1980-1989
                Copeman exhibit/Archives opening, 1984
                Stockton gift and reception, 1983-1988

BOX 3
        Chinese visitors
                Lin Zengping, 1985-1989
                Shaobo Xie, 1986-1987
        Receptions, miscellaneous, 1984-1988
        Dorothea Wyatt Award, 1989

CONFERENCES AND PROGRAMS
        United Nations Week, 1959
        Anglo-American Conference of Historians, 1963
        India Republic Day, 1965
        Michigan International Week, 1971-1972
        "Victoria's World" (exhibit), 1972-1974
        Conference on Preservation and Restoration, 1983
        Carriage Town workshop, 1983
        Conference on Preservation and Restoration, 1984
        Flint Historic Preservation Conference, 1985
        The Middle East in Crisis, 1986
        Miscellaneous

INTERNATIONAL INSTITUTE
        Constitution and bylaws
        Board of Directors - minutes and agenda, 1960-1976
        Annual reports
                1940-1963
                1964-1985
        Annual meetings, 1959-1978
        Correspondence
                General, 1959-1985
                Red Feather Fund, 1960-1971
        Programs, bulletins, brochures, 1962-1989
        Operating statements, 1949-1975
        Friends of the International Institute, 1980-1981
        Building fund campaign, 1971-1976
        Auction, 1974-1975
        Board and committee membership rosters, 1957-1977
        Committees, 1961-1986
        Council of Social Agencies Workshop Committee, 1964

BOX 4
AMERICAN COUNCIL FOR NATIONALITIES SERVICE
        Correspondence, 1960-1976
        General
                1974
                1975-1976
                1978-1981

OTHER ORGANIZATIONS AND ACTIVITIES
        American Association of University Professors, 1972
        Flint Area Health Foundation, 1978-1979
        Michigan Association for Computer Users in Learning, 1978-1979
        Genesee County Historical Society
                General, 1981-1986
                Clarence H. Young Memorial Essay Contest, 1981-1985
        Whaley Historical House, 1980-1981
        Sister Cities-Flint, 1988-1989

NEWSPAPER CLIPPINGS
        Personal, 1966-1989
        General, 1976-1989

PAPERS
        In Search of Power: the Early Political Career of James Brydges, 
          Duke of Chandos
                (1 of 2)
                (2 of 2)
        Colonel Stewart's Silver
        Michael Gorman:  Flint's Super Booster
        The Man Who Made the Wheels Turn [about Arthur G. Bishop]
        The University of Michigan-Flint, 1971-1980

PUBLICATIONS
        "A By-Election in a Rotten Borough," Huntington Library 
          Quarterly 17 (August 1954): 397-405
        "The Making of a Tory," Huntington Library Quarterly 22
          (February 1960): 123-144
        "Cannons no Canon:  Pope's Epistle to Burlington," Papers of
          the Michigan Academy of Science, Arts, and Letters 45 
          (1960):  403-410
        "Mrs. Tofts Goes Abroad," Huntington Library Quarterly 25 
          (November 1961): 69-70
        "The Parliamentary Influence of the First Duke of Chandos," 
          English Historical Review 77 (April 1962): 318-320
        "A Visit to Cannons," Transactions of the Woolhope Naturalists' 
          Field Club of Herefordshire 38 (1965), pt. 2: 151
        "Robert Harley and the Weobley By-Election of 1691,"
          Transactions of the Woolhope Naturalists' Field Club 39
          (1969), pt. 3: 456-462
        "Genesis and Structure of the Foley `Ironworks in Partnership' of 
          1692," Business History 13 (January 1971): 19-38
        "Development of a Question Processing Subsystem," On-Line 
          5, no. 4 (July 1976): 4-6 (with T. W. Hertzog)
        "Michael A. Gorman:  Flint's Super Booster," Forward (Flint
          Area Chamber of Commerce Publication), vol. 3, no. 3