Charles Walter Agard Collection

Charles Walter Agard was born in 1848, in Hartford, Connecticut, but he was raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He later worked for the Philadelphia & Reading Coal & Iron Co. in Philadelphia. In 1883, he became a new branch manager in New Bedford, Massachusetts.

During his time in New Bedford, he developed an interest in the whaling industry and was said to be acquainted with the whaling captains and sailors. Furthermore, he conducted research on the American Slave Trade, the Confederate Navy, the early history of Pennsylvania, the Quakers in America and The American West.

During the 1900s to 1913, Agard wrote nearly one hundred unpublished essays about different aspects of whaling, the slave trade, privateering, local religious disputes and other subjects, as well as several biographical sketches. These writings together are known as the "Spun Yarn Series," and were based on conversations with whaling captains and on his own research.

Source: New Bedford Whaling Museum, Charles W. Agard Papers (https://www.whalingmuseum.org/explore/library/finding-aids/mss2)

The Charles Walter Agard Collection (records and artifacts) was acquired by the Penn Museum from Charles Agard's brother, Frederick T. Agard on September 20th, 1918. The records; however, were not identified by the Penn Museum archives until 2010, after an inquiry from, the New Bedford Whaling Museum. Though housed in the Museum since 1918, their authorship had been forgotten.

Most of Agard's manuscripts are in the New Bedford Whaling Museum, Massachusetts, and the Penn Museum's Agard collection may contain duplicates of that material. Additional copies of Agard's essays are known to exist in the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, Massachusetts.

The collection consists of two series, "Spun Yarn Series" and booklets.

The "Spun Yarn Series" consists of two books, containing a large, typed collection of essays about slavery, the Confederate navy, missionaries in the Pacific Islands, the Quakers, whaling, whaling ships and their skippers, and other topics. Written in sections, the books also discuss artifacts that were collected by Agard, tattoos and how tattoos are used and portrayed among natives of the Pacific Islands, stories of whalers' experiences living with natives from the Pacific islands, extracts from the Shenandoah's log (1863-1872), and advice from Agard to explorers.

Agard's information came from observations, interviews, shipping lists, local newspapers, the library and a local seaman that he knew, and it contains drawings of paddles, tattoos and other artifacts. Agard writes in a preface, "The following compilation is the labor of many years on, and for my personal curiosity. Positively neither for publication nor circulation. Neither for profit, nor for notoriety…" It appears that the "Spun Yarn Series" was prepared for distribution to others but was never published.

The books have distinctive outside covers, made from carved wood, and woven inside covers. One is carved with the date 1904 and artifacts on the front and a mask on the back. The second is decorated with beautiful carved portraits of individuals, one on the front and the other on the back. The two books are almost identical in content, except for the inclusion of a one-page chronological list of select historical events, 1885-1896, towards the back of the dated book.

The booklets series consists of small handwritten notebooks (with some drawings) on various subjects, similar to the "Spun Yarn Series" though less complete. The only identified notebook is "Extracts from the 'Invincible Armada'" (1905). The titles of the other booklets were derived from the initial words in each booklet.

Publication Information: University of Pennsylvania: Penn Museum Archives,

Finding Aid Author:

Use Restrictions:

Personal Name(s)

• Agard, Charles, Walter