National Park Service, 1917-1997

This series includes correspondence, diaries, reports, drafts, ephemera, clippings, autobiographical notes, publications, oral history transcripts, research notes, and bibliographies related to the historic sites where Rath was employed as a historian by the National Park Service (NPS) from 1937 to 1949. Items located under the heading "Early History and General" consist of clippings, publications, and correspondence pertaining to the NPS in general and sites where Rath did not work.

Subsequent sites, listed alphabetically by name, include Chalmette National Historic Park, New Orleans, Louisiana; Fort Pulaski National Monument, Savannah, Georgia; Morristown National Historic Site, Morristown, New Jersey; Roosevelt-Vanderbilt National Historic Sites, Hyde Park, New York (including the home of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the Vanderbilt Mansion, and the Eleanor Roosevelt home); and Vicksburg National Military Park, Vicksburg, Mississippi. Each section contains Rath's indexes and summaries, diaries, correspondence, administrative documents, drafts, reports, ephemera, publications, and notes that date to Rath's period of employment. Included in addition are clippings, writings, bibliographies, correspondence, and articles Rath gathered later in his life during research of these sites and their regional and historical contexts.

Also included in this series is one folder from 1938 and 1939 relating to Rath's employment at Prentice-Hall in New York City as an assistant editor. There is a chronological gap for the years 1942 to1945, when Rath went overseas during World War II. This period is covered in Series III: World War II.

Material under the "Roosevelt-Vanderbilt National Historic Sites" heading includes voluminous notes and writings relating to the preparation of the site and its earliest operations. Transcripts and project notes from the Roosevelt home oral history project are included, as well as a lengthy article Rath wrote about this project, published in 1993. Original drawings and drafts of the book Franklin D. Roosevelt's Hyde Park (1949) are also included under this heading, as well as a typescript of Roosevelt's own recollections of the home.

Much of Rath's correspondence is comprised of his own letters to family, friends, and colleagues. Prominent correspondents include Eleanor Roosevelt, Charles Hosmer, Ronald Lee, and Charles Peterson. Further information about the individuals and subjects in the National Park Service is located in Series VIII: Other Work.

Arrangement is alphabetical.