Search

Correspondence, manuscripts, memorabilia, photographs, phonograph and tape recordings, and printed files. Included are Cerf's personal correspondence files, 1929-1945, and the diaries and scrapbooks which he maintained from his school days throughout his active career. The diaries, in date-book format, contain terse notes on Cerf's meetings with authors and friends, on his travels and publishing activities; the scrapbooks contain correspondence and photographs, as well as memorabilia and printed items, and were annotated by Cerf and his wife, Phyllis Fraser Cerf Wagner. Also in the collection are manuscripts and proofs for Cerf's books including "The Laugh's on Me""Treasury of Atrocious Puns""The Sound of Laughter""Stories to Make You Feel Better", and "At Random: the Reminiscences of Bennett Cerf", which was edited by Phyllis Cerf Wagner and Albert Erskine, 1977. The papers also include condolence letters written at the time of Cerf's death, photographs and photo albums,certificates and awards, and miscellaneous printed material, including Random House and Modern Library catalogues. Among the major correspondents are: Truman Capote, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Edna Ferber, Moss Hart, J. Edgar Hoover, Hubert Humphrey, Lyndon B. Johnson, John Lindsay, Joshua Logan, John O'Hara, Jacqueline Onassis, Richard Rodgers, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Gertrude Stein, Adlai Stevenson, Harry Truman, and Robert Penn Warren

Correspondence, manuscripts, documents, oral histories, photographs, audio cassettes, and printed material. Family and personal correspondence; materials related to his secondary, college, and university education; materials related to his tenure at the National Council of the Protestant Church; business correspondence of St. Philip's Episcopal Church and the St. Philip's Community Service Council; bulletins of church services; drafts of sermons and speeches, as well as numerous audio-tapes; manuscripts and publications; correspondence related to the construction and on-going maintenance of several senior-citizen and other community housing; correspondence related to various community redevelopment initives and campaigns for affordable housing; materials related to college courses including oral histories for his Black Family Research project; photographs of St. Philip's Church and of activities of the St. Philip's Community Service Council.