After Joseph Smith (1805–1844), the founder of the Mormon faith, was killed by a mob in 1844, Brigham Young took over the leadership of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. To escape anti-Mormon persecution, he led a vanguard westward, reaching the Salt Lake Valley in July 1847. During the journey, he wrote this letter to his fourth wife, Harriet Cook Young (1824–1898), whom he had secretly married and left in Nauvoo, Illinois, urging her to come west. She arrived in Salt Lake City in September 1848. Gift of Edith Young Booth. Brigham Young Collection, Manuscripts Division.
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Daniel Gano was a county court clerk in Cincinnati. In 1849, his son Stephen joined the Gold Rush to California. Stephen’s letters to his father describe the perils of the overland crossing and the difficulties and excitement of mining for gold. Daniel saved his son’s letters in this scrapbook, along with newspaper clippings about the Gold Rush and this hand-colored lithograph published by Kellogg & Comstock depicting “California Gold Diggers” at work. Daniel Gano Gold Rush Scrapbook, Manuscripts Division.
Robert Fulton is widely credited with developing the first commercially successful steamboat in 1807, which revolutionized American transportation and commerce. He wrote this letter, with specifications for building a steamboat engine, to his partner Nicholas Roosevelt (1767–1854), a fellow inventor who introduced vertical paddle wheels for steamboats. Gift of Mrs. Marshall L. Brown in memory of Cyrus H. McCormick, Class of 1879. General Manuscripts Bound, no. 406, Manuscripts Division. 
As transportation improved in the 19th century, America became an increasingly attractive tourist destination. James Glennie was one such tourist, sailing from London on September 24, 1810, to travel through the Atlantic states. He kept this journal in the form of letters to his mother, in which he described visits with President James Madison (1751–1836) and other statesmen, and composed more than sixty drawings, including views of Boston, Charleston, and Washington, D.C. Gift of André de Coppet, Class of 1915. André de Coppet Collection, Manuscripts Division.
The first permanent English settlement in North America was Jamestown, Virginia, founded in 1607. William Strachey sailed to Jamestown in 1609 and became the Virginia Company’s secretary to the colony. This manuscript is a contemporary scribal copy of Strachey’s eyewitness account of the colony, with his handwritten corrections and signature. It was extra-illustrated with 27 hand-colored engravings made in 1590 by Theodor de Bry (1528–1598). Depicted here is the Algonquian village Secotan. The continent’s Native American population may have numbered in the tens of millions before European settlement. In 1612, Strachey presented the manuscript to Henry Percy (1564–1632), 9th earl of Northumberland, known as the “Wizard Earl” for his interest in science. Gift of Cyrus H. McCormick, Class of 1879. General Manuscripts Bound, no. 1416, Manuscripts Division.