Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans family papers, circa 1870-2012, bulk 1950s-2012

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This collection is currently being reprocessed to incorporate additional material before it becomes fully open to researchers in January 2027. This work is being funded by a grant from The Duke Endowment. For more information, please contact the Rubenstein Library.

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Restrictions:
Access to this material will be consistent with the 1991 agreement between Duke University Library, James H. Semans, and Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans. Access to any correspondence, legal papers,...
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Summary

Creator:
Semans, James H. and Semans, Mary Duke Biddle Trent
Abstract:
Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans (1920-2012) was the only daughter of Mary Duke and Anthony J. Drexel Biddle Jr. This collection documents her childhood in New York, NY, enrollment at Duke University, and marriages to Josiah C. Trent and James H. Semans. She continued her family's legacy of philanthropy, with a focus on the arts, education, and rehabilitation, and became civically and politically active beginning in the 1950s, espeically in Durham and NC.
Extent:
50 Linear Feet (Processed: 78 document boxes, eight half document boxes, 10 flat boxes, and one oversize folder. Surveyed: 363 boxes, six oversize folders, and five tubes.)
57.2 Gigabytes (Five sets.)
Language:
Material in English.
Collection ID:
RL.01167

Background

Scope and content:

This collection documents the philanthropic, political, and social activities of the Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans family and their relationships with other members of the Biddle, Duke, Semans, and Trent families, plus other wealthy families from NC, NY, and elsewhere. In particular, it documents the roles that MDBTS and her second husband played in the development and support of arts and education throughout NC in the 20th century. Types of material include correspondence, financial and legal papers, subject files, writings and speeches, scrapbooks and photographs, and audio and video recordings. To a lesser extent, there are awards and certificates, calendars and planners, and schoolwork.

Family members represented include Mary Lillian Duke Biddle, Anthony Joseph Drexel Biddle, Jr., Nicholas Benjamin Duke Biddle, Angier Biddle Duke, Angier Buchanan Duke, Benjamin Newton Duke, Sarah Pearson Angier Duke, Josiah Charles Trent, and James Hustead Semans, as well as baby nurse and close family friend Elizabeth Lucina Gotham. Leaders in the arts, education, and government are also represented, including Giorgio Ciompi, Archie K. Davis, Wilburt Cornell Davison, Vittorio Giannini, Iain Hamilton, Nancy Hanks, Deryl Hart, Marshall Ivey Pickens, Howard A. Rusk, and Mary Elizabeth Switzer.

Subjects include family life (specifically wealthy, white families in the US during the 20th century and their social life, legal affairs, and personal finances); higher education (especially Duke University and the North Carolina School of the Arts); the arts (primarily visual and performing); philanthropy, charities, and foundations (especially the Mary Duke Biddle Foundation and The Duke Endowment); genealogy of the four families; the political and social history of Durham, NC; and vocational rehabilitation.

Biographical / historical:

Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans (MDBTS; 1920-2012) was born on 21 February 1920 in New York, NY to Mary Lillian Duke Biddle (1887-1960) and Anthony Joseph Drexel Biddle, Jr. (1897-1961). A younger brother, Nicholas Benjamin Duke Biddle (1921-2004), and a baby nurse and "second mother," Elizabeth Lucina Gotham, joined her life within the next year. Her primary residence was 1009 5th Ave (first owned by her maternal grandfather Benjamin Newton Duke (1855-1929)) and she attended the Hewitt School, but like many families who could afford to, she spent summers outside the city--in Irvington, NY at "Linden Court"--and there were visits to Palm Beach, FL and "Sarmiento." After her parents' divorce in 1931, she moved to Durham, NC in 1934 to live with her maternal grandmother Sarah Pearson Angier Duke (1856-1936) at "Four Acres." Her mother bought what became known as "Pinecrest" in Durham in 1935 and split her time between NC and NY.

MDBTS enrolled in the Woman's College at Duke University in 1935 but left upon getting married (per university policy). However, she returned after her first husband's death and graduated in 1951 to set an example for her daughters. She donated his large rare book and manuscript collection on the history of medicine to the university library in 1956, then began donating her personal papers starting in the late 1960s. She was a trustee from 1961-1981 and active in administrative development and academic and artistic programs.

MDBTS met graduating senior Josiah Charles Trent (1914-1948) as part of a double date arranged at the request of her grandmother during her first campus visit to Duke University in May 1934, and they married on 24 June 1938 at Pinecrest after she turned 18 and he completed medical school at the University of Pennsylvania. They spent some time in Michigan while he interned in Detroit (1938-1939) and trained in Ann Arbor (1946), but he spent most of his career as resident then surgeon at Duke University Hospital. He died of lymphoma on 11 December 1948, but she remained in their Durham home "Les Terrasses" for the rest of her life. They had four children: Mary Duke Trent (born 1940), Sarah "Sally" Elizabeth Trent (born 1941), Rebecca Grey Trent (born 1942), and Barbara Biddle Trent (born 1944).

MDBTS met urologist James Hustead Semans (1910-2005) while he was in Durham to lecture at Duke University Hospital in May 1953, and they married that October at Linden Court. Over the next 52 years, they became known for their personal and financial support of the arts, education, and rehabilitation, primarily in Durham and NC. They had four children: Jenny Lillian Semans (1954-2016), an unnamed baby (1956-1956), James Duke Biddle Trent Semans (1957-2018), and Elizabeth Gotham Semans (born 1962).

Beginning in the 1950s, MDBTS served on the boards of numerous local and state civic, academic, and social welfare organizations, including: the Lincoln Community Hospital Board of Trustees (1948-1976), The Duke Endowment Board of Trustees (1960-; Vice Chair, 1971-1981; Chair, 1982-2001), Mary Duke Biddle Foundation Board of Trustees (founding Chair, 1960-1983; member 1983-2004), North Carolina Museum of Art Committee (1961-1983), Executive Mansion Fine Arts Committee (founding Chair, 1965-), and North Carolina Symphony Board of Trustees (1972-1983). She was one of the first two women elected to the City Council in 1951 before becoming Mayor Pro Tempore from 1953-1955, and she was President of Durham Homes, Inc. in 1968. She focused on civil rights, affordable housing, the arts and culture, and healthcare while in office, and although she left politics to focus on raising her growing family, she remained a supporter of the Democratic Party.

MDBTS also became involved with vocational rehabilitation in the 1950s after her second husband became involved with medical rehabilitation at Duke University Hospital. She served on the National Advisory Council on Vocational Rehabilitation (1961-1965), Citizens Advisory Committee on Vocational Rehabilitation (1966; appointed by President Lyndon Johnson), Governor's Study Committee on Vocational Rehabilitation (Chair, 1967-1969), and Special National Subcommittee on Vocational Rehabilitation (1968). This disability advocacy is contrasted by her service on the Human Better League of North Carolina Board of Directors (circa 1958-1975), a eugenics organization which originally promoted NC's sterilization law before switching to "family planning" then "genetic counseling."

MDBTS was a trustee of several colleges and universities besides Duke, including Louisburg (1959-1965), Shaw (1962-1974), Converse (1964-1967), and Davidson, and she was a member of various boards of visitors and committees of other educational institutions, including Wake Forest. She received several honorary degrees, including from: North Carolina Central (1963), Elon (1965), Campbell (1971), North Carolina at Chapel Hill (1977), Davidson (1980), Pfeiffer (1984), and North Carolina Wesleyan (1982).

MDBTS awards include the National Conference of Christians and Jews National Brotherhood Award (1969), North Carolina Award for significant contributions to the arts (1972), and North Carolina Society Award (1986), all of which she received jointly with her second husband. She also received the North Carolina Citizens for Business and Industry Citation for Distinguished Public Service (1984), North Carolina Distinguished Service Award for Women (1985), and John Tyler Caldwell Award for the Humanities. Duke University presented her with the Distinguished Alumni Award and the University Medal for Distinguished Meritorious Service in 1986. She was inducted into the North Carolina Women's Hall of Fame in 2009.

MDBTS died on 25 January 2012 in Durham, after which a memorial service was held in Duke University Chapel. She is buried in Maplewood Cemetery next to her two husbands, three of her children, Gotham, and chef Gary Wein.

Acquisition information:
The Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans family papers were received by the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library as gifts from James H. and Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans between 1969-2010, their children between 2013-2018 and in 2021, and Margaret Rich in 2019.
Processing information:

This collection was originally a series in the former Semans family papers, which were processed by Madeleine Bagwell Perez and Donna Longo DiMichele, April 1991; encoded by Alvin Pollock; and updated by staff, 2009, 2010, 2016, 2017, Paula Jeannet, 2018, and Leah Tams, December 2021.

The Semans family papers were separated by series into four collections by Zachary Tumlin, February 2024, as part of a project funded by The Duke Endowment.

Material described in the Semans family papers collection guide came from almost two dozen accessions from 1969-1990. Almost three dozen additional accessions to the Semans family papers were received between 1992-2021. This collection guide could describe material from any of those accessions.

Arrangement:

The Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans family papers are arranged into eight series: Correspondence, Financial, Legal, Subject Files, Writings and Speeches, Visual Material, Audio and Video Recordings, and Personal.

Rules or conventions:
Describing Archives: A Content Standard

Subjects

Click on terms below to find related finding aids on this site. For other related materials in the Duke University Libraries, search for these terms in the Catalog.

Subjects:
Arts -- North Carolina
Charities -- North Carolina
Education -- North Carolina
Endowments -- North Carolina
Methodist Church -- North Carolina
Upper class families -- New York (State) -- History -- 20th century
Upper class families -- North Carolina -- History -- 20th century
Universities and colleges -- North Carolina
Vocational rehabilitation -- North Carolina -- History -- 20th century
Women -- Political activity -- North Carolina -- History -- 20th century
Women in public life -- North Carolina -- History -- 20th century
Women millionaires -- North Carolina -- Correspondence
Women philanthropists -- North Carolina -- Correspondence
Format:
16mm (photographic film size)
Audiocassettes
Carbon prints
Color slides
Gelatin silver prints
Home movies
Open reel audiotapes
Photograph albums
Photographic prints
Platinum prints
Scrapbooks
Videotapes
Names:
Duke Endowment
Duke University. Board of Trustees
Duke University. Medical Center
Mary Duke Biddle Foundation
North Carolina Museum of Art
North Carolina School of the Arts
Duke family
Biddle, Anthony Joseph Drexel, 1896-1961
Biddle, Mary Duke, 1887-1960
Biddle, Nicholas Duke, 1921-2004
Duke, Benjamin N. (Benjamin Newton), 1855-1929
Duke, Sarah P., 1856-1936
Gotham, Elizabeth, 1887-1968
Semans, James H.
Semans, Mary Duke Biddle Trent
Trent, Josiah C. (Josiah Charles), 1914-1948
Places:
Durham (N.C.) -- Politics and government -- History -- 20th century
Durham (N.C.) -- Social conditions -- History -- 20th century
Durham (N.C.) -- Social life and customs -- History -- 20th century

Contents

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Restrictions:

Access to this material will be consistent with the 1991 agreement between Duke University Library, James H. Semans, and Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans. Access to any correspondence, legal papers, and financial papers is restricted and will be permitted only with prior written permission, which should be sought from the chair of the board of the Mary Duke Biddle Foundation. This restriction shall be in place until 1 January 2027, after which all material shall be considered open for research.

Access note. Some materials in this collection are fragile audiovisual/photographic formats that may need to be reformatted before use. Contact Research Services for access.

Access note. Some materials in this collection are electronic records that require special equipment. Contact Research Services with questions.

This collection is currently being reprocessed to incorporate additional material before it becomes fully open to researchers in January 2027. This work is being funded by a grant from The Duke Endowment. For more information, please contact the Rubenstein Library.

Terms of access:

The copyright interests in this collection have not been transferred to Duke University. For more information, consult the copyright section of the Regulations and Procedures of the David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library.

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Preferred citation:

[Identification of item], Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans family papers, David M. Rubenstein Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Duke University.