To whom it may concern:

My name is Kirstin Hill, and I am a senior at Harvard University currently writing a senior history thesis on the racial integration of Levittown Long Island, PA and NJ. I would be extraordinarily grateful for any help the Bucks County Courier Times might be able to give me in accessing primary sources, such as archival editions of the Times written about integration in the mid fifties through the early sixties. I am at school in Cambridge, so if there is some method by which I can access the archives, electronically or through an index, without actually having to come to Pennsylvania, it would be ideal. However, if this is not possible, I would appreciate details of where I would need to go and whom I would need to contact. I would also appreciate information regarding access around Thanksgiving (eg which days the archives would be closed).

I have also included a list of questions regarding sources, which I understand you might not be able to answer. However, if you can point me in the right direction, give me any contact names or number, and any suggestions/information you might have, I would really appreciate it.

I was hoping that you might be able to tell me where I might be able to find a copy of the original ownership agreement in which Levitt articulated the restrictive covenant (which I am not sure he did in the Pennsylvania Levittown).

All sources I read speak of the Levittown Betterment Association, and the Levittown Citizens Comittee as the two opposing sides in the difficult time of integration. Does anyone know where I might find the papares of these two groups?

I also know that the Bucks County Council of Churches was eventually involved in trying to deal with integration. Again, does anyone know of contact information or possible archival sources for this group? The same question for the Society of Friends (Quaker Group) that I know was active in promoting integration before and after integration in PA.

Any other suggestions, possible sources that anyone can think of would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,

Kirstin Hill

-- Kirstin Hill (khill@fas.harvard.edu), October 27, 1998