Collections : [National Death Penalty Archive]

Watt Espy kept a series of index cards, grouped mainly by state, that records information about executions on American soil (colonies, states, territories) since the 1600s. Some cards contain lots of information, including name, place of execution, method, and details of the crime. Other cards have very little information aside from the fact that someone was executed. Sometimes there is not even a name—just "two slaves" or "pirate". There are additional categories for federal, military, and indigenous executions. There are two different card sizes; for the 3x5 inch cards, each state, territory, or other main division is identified with a manila tab. Subdivisions are marked with blue, unlined cards and are intended to mirror the arrangement of materials in Series #2 as closely as possible.

This series contains a file for every execution or sentence of death given to a woman or a juvenile that was known to Victor L. Streib. Some of the case study files are simply photocopies of Watt Espy's research cards, especially in cases where Espy's research is the sum total information available that particular execution. Many of these cards are from before 1976, when the death penalty was re-instated in America. Due to improved record-keeping in the modern era, case files from recent years, especially ones that Streib advised in some capacity, may contain significantly more information than others. Information pertinent to these cases vary greatly by individual depending on the state, the era, as well as media coverage of the case. The research collection is up-to-date as of 2012, so any executions, pardons, or reversals that went forward since that date will remain in the series they were in at the time these papers were acquired by the archives.

The NCADP collection is comprised mainly of case files. Files include newspaper clippings, publicity materials, and correspondence between the NCADP, inmates, lawyers, and family and friends. Some artwork, court transcripts, and death warrants are also present. Each folder represents a death penalty case that the organization was interested in or involved with.

This series contains legal records that are mostly official court proceedings of the Alvin Ford cases covering a period of seventeen years. These cases include State of Florida v. Ford: 1974, which covers the original trial court proceedings. Later cases that bear the same style relate to later attempts of Ford on a motion for post conviction relief and stay of execution in 1981 and a second attempt in 1987. Ford v. State of Florida:1975-1988, Ford v. Strickland et al.: 1981-1984, Ford v. Wainwright: 1981-1988, and Ford v. Dugger: 1986-1991 all represent the trial cases Ford's attorneys filed against a succession of superintendents of the Florida State Prison and secretaries of the Department of Corrections. Other proceedings include multiple trials, pleas, motions, hearings, testimonies, and appeals. Other legal records are background studies on Ford that include detailed psychiatric evaluations, medical and prison records, case summaries, and undated notes by Laurin Wollan.

This series comprises the bulk of Watt Espy's primary and secondary research and is therefore the largest in the collection. Initially, approximately half of these documentation of execution records were arranged in an organized fashion alphabetically by state, or by federal, military, tribal or international categories and then alphabetically by an individual's name. The others were not arranged in any discernable scheme with a significant amount of materials kept as unorganized loose documents in boxes. Espy marked some files as "not written up," but it was ultimately unclear how these differed from other records. After careful review, the archivists decided to combine all of the documentation of executions together, divided the records into five subseries for executions conducted by all 50 states and the District of Columbia, federal executions, military executions, indigenous executions, and international executions, and subsequently arranged and inter-filed all the loose materials.

This series contains newspaper and magazine articles, most of which are photocopied, about the Ford case. This series also contains a folder related to Ford's death and funeral. Also represented are a small collection of photographs of Ford at various ages and photographs of his attorneys. There is a short note from Connie Ford, Alvin's mother, to Attorney Wollan concerning a video of the Ford funeral, which is also contained in this collection. The most important resource in this series is the news clippings, which are very helpful in following the progression of the Ford case. The news clippings cover most major events in the Ford case. In addition to collecting news clippings, Laurin Wollan had an assistant visit Gainesville, Florida, where Ford was apprehended, and the assistant photocopied all articles from area papers that reported on the Ford story from 1974 to 1975.

This series consists exclusively of the annual reports on prison and jail conditions that the Prison Association/Correctional Association submitted to the New York State Assembly. The reports contain minutes of meetings, presidential addresses, committee reports, reports on individual prisons and prison conditions, prison reform campaigns in New York State, transcripts of testimony before the NYS legislature on pending policy measures, and lists of members and corresponding members of the Association. Reports published during the latter half of the nineteenth century chronicle the Association's role in establishing national and international prison reform organizations and conferences and furnish information about prison policies elsewhere in the United States and the world.

New York county court papers arranged by county of Murder Two indictments.