Edwin P. Kilroe papers
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Abstract
The collection holds the papers of Edwin P. Kilroe (1882-1953) representing his academic career (especially at Columbia University); athletics (especially wrestling at Columbia); family history and connections to Wayne County, Pennsylvania; involvement with a broad range of organizations, such as the Catholic Writers Guild, New York City Democratic Party clubs (i.e., Tammany Hall), historical societies, lawyer bar associations, and others; cattle breeding at the Kilroe Farm in Tanners Falls, Pennsylvania; and work in the Office of New York County District Attorney Edward Swann from 1916-24; and more. There are a small number of documents related to Kilroe's work as an attorney for Twentieth Century-Fox Films in the 1930s-40s, but with a rich set of scripts, photographs, posters, and publicity material for four of the studio's films: "Greenwich Village," "Sweet Rosie O'Grady," "When Irish Eyes Are Smiling," and "Wilson."
Biographical / Historical
Edwin Patrick Kilroe was born April 19, 1882, in Tanners Falls, Wayne County, Pennsylvania. (His birth year seems to be in some dispute. Columbia University uses 1880 for his collection there. Some newspaper accounts from the early 20th century refer to 1883. A biographical note written by Kilroe himself in 1911 in connection with his application for admission to the Pennsylvania bar refers to 1882.) Edwin's mother was Sarah Doherty Kilroe (1859-1928), who was born in County Sligo in Ireland and emigrated to the United States as an infant with her parents in 1861. Her parents settled at Tanners Falls, establishing a farm there (an online map from the time shows the family name as "Dougherty") that would remain in the family through Edwin's lifetime (it is now the site of a Himalayan Institute). Edwin's father was John Charles Kilroe (1853-1902), also an Irish immigrant. Sarah and John married in the late 1870s. They were both, apparently, Catholic, as was Edwin, who retained his connections to Catholicism and Catholic institutions throughout his life, including (to name just one example) as a member of the Catholic Writers Guild from the 1920s and an officer in the 1930s-1940s. Sarah and John had twelve children and Edwin seems to have been the eldest.
Edwin attended schools in Wayne County, graduating from Honesdale High School. In the late 1890s, Kilroe moved to Jersey City to live with his uncle while attending schools in New York, which included Packards Business College, Paine's Business College, New York Preparatory School, and Dwight School for Boys. Graduating from Dwight in 1900, he then entered Columbia College, receiving his A.B. degree in 1904. Continuing at Columbia, he earned a Masters in 1905 and his law degree in 1906. He received his Ph.D. in 1913 from Columbia for which he wrote a thesis on Tammany Hall ("Saint Tammany and the origin of the Society of Tammany, or Columbian order in the city of New York"). Kilroe was athletic, playing football in high school and wrestling (among other sports) at Columbia. Among many interests, Kilroe maintained connections throughout his life as an alumni of Columbia and its wrestling team, of which he was an organizer and coach during his student years.
Kilroe was admitted to the New York bar in 1906 and formed the partnership Kilroe & Swarts (likely Louis E. Swarts) in 1907, located at 5 Beekman Steet in New York City. During these years he became an active member of the Democratic Party, holding a seat on the New York County Committee and various offices for the Minnetonkah and Monangahela Democratic clubs. In 1911, it appears he considered relocating to Scranton, Pennsylvania, and applied for admission to that state's bar. Kilroe was eventually admitted in 1915 but he did not relocate, continuing to practice law from the Beekman Street address, though no longer in partnership with Swarts. In late 1915, he applied to Edward Swann, the New York County's Attorney General-elect, for a position, and he was hired as Deputy Assistant District Attorney. He held that position from January 1916 through 1917, when he was promoted to Assistant District Attorney.
In the D.A.'s Office, Kilroe was involved in the prosecution of many cases. Among them were investigations in 1918 into charities fraud, which would lead to hearings before the U.S. Senate, and into theatre ticket speculation. In late 1920, he faced charges of corruption for conspiring with Louis Swarts and others to decline to bring Napoleon Arthur Bourassa up on bigamy charges. Kilroe retained the support of his boss, Swann, in the matter and seems eventually to have been found not guilty of the charges. Kilroe's compiled list of cases show a gap for 1921-22, while he was on trial, but back on the job in 1923. He resigned from the District Attorney's Office in 1924, returning to private practice. At that time he assisted in the compilation of "A History of Tammany," published by the New York County Democratic Committee.
By 1929, Kilroe was hired into the legal department of Fox Film Corporation. In a 1935 merger, the company became known as Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation. Kilroe was briefly a director of the company in the early 1940s, but his overall role in the company seems to have been as an intellectual property rights attorney. He may have left the company in the mid-late 1940s, but remained at least an advisor to it.
In 1942, Kilroe donated over 100,000 documents he had amassed concerning Tammany to Columbia University. In 1944 and at various times afterward, he also donated much of his personal papers (the present collection) to New-York Historical Society (he was a member). Some of the documents in this collection bear Kilroe's "Tammaniana" collection label. (See box 15 for a list compiled by Kilroe of the institutions he donated material to, through 1948.) He retained his connections to the family farm and his youth in Honesdale, collecting historical materials about it, forming a Wayne County Society in New York City, and being engaged in cattle breeding. At least some of the related material is in the N-YHS collection. Edwin Kilroe died in 1953.
(The above note was based primarily on documents in the collection, and some on-line documents.)
Arrangement
The collection was inventoried in December 2021-January 2022 as it was removed from shelves and packed for offsite storage. Accordingly, the container list is presented as a list of contents by box. During the inventory and packing, an attempt was made to keep related materials together but this was not always possible because of the varying sizes of the content and difficulty in identifying related materials across the shelves in a compressed timeframe. Generally, bound volumes of documents appear first in the container list with accordion folders of documents later, but this was not consistently adhered to when the collection was inventoried and packed.
Scope and Contents
The Edwin P. Kilroe papers hold a sprawling array of scrapbooks, original correpondence, photostat copies of historical and family documents, ephemera, clippings, publications, photographs, and other materials related to the diverse career, life and interests of Kilroe. Several members of his family are also well-represented in the collection, perhaps especially his mother, Sarah Doherty Kilroe, and his brothers, who served in the military in World War I and World War II.
Edwin's student years and alumni connections, especially with Columbia College and University, are reflected in publications, school notes, photographs of his wrestling team, alumni support, and more. Kilroe's lifelong connection with his birthplace in Wayne County, Pennsylvania is found throughout the collection, in volumes of historical documents, letters with religious figures from the area, the maintenance of the family farm, cattlebreeding later in life, and more.
The collection holds several volumes of scrapbooks of Kilroe's mother, Sarah, labeled as holding "postcards." In addition to postcards, these often hold greeting cards and other ephemera and memorabilia. Edwin similarly maintained such scrapbooks or accordion folders of cards, ephemera, programs, and the like. Kilroe was a member of a large number of organizations (a list he compiled in 1944, found in box 43, goes on for 12 pages), and the collection includes ephemera, cards, programs, correspondence, etc., related to many of these organizations. These range from political to literary, from religious to legal, from historical societies to athletic, and more. A descendant of Irish immigrants, many documents reflect Kilroe's interest in Irish-American history.
Kilroe's career in the 1910s leading to his appointment as Assistant District Attorney for New York County is documented in a volume of letters and other material (see box 28). His career in the D.A's Office seems to be represented here mostly though scrapbooks and clippings of particular cases, such as the war charities investigation and a so-called "poison pen" matter. His trial on charges of conspiracy not to prosecute a bigamy case is well-documented, as is his resignation in 1924 as Assistant District Attorney.
Kilroe's later career as counsel for 20th Century Fox Film Corporation is only lightly represented. But there is a rich set of scripts, photographs, posters, and publicity material for four of the studio's films of the 1940s: Greenwich Village (featuring Carmen Miranda and Don Ameche), Sweet Rosie O'Grady (featuring Betty Grable and Robert Young), When Irish Eyes Are Smiling, and [Woodrow] Wilson.
The collection has not been processed and the above note and container list is based principally on the labels on the volumes and folders placed by the donor, with some direct observation by the archivist. Container list entries in "quotations" are taken from the labels. The volumes sometimes hold original documents, sometimes photostats, and sometimes a mix; which was present was noted at points by the archivist, but no comprehensive attempt was made to determine and document that here for the entirety of the collection.
Subjects
Organizations
Families
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Topics
Access Restrictions
Materials in this collection are stored offsite. For more information on making arrangements to consult them, please visit www.nyhistory.org/library/visit.
Use Restrictions
Taking images of documents from the library collections for reference purposes by using hand-held cameras and in accordance with the library's photography guidelines is encouraged. As an alternative, patrons may request up to 20 images per day from staff. Application to use images from this collection for publication should be made in writing to: Department of Rights and Reproductions, The New-York Historical Society, 170 Central Park West, New York, NY 10024-5194, rightsandrepro@nyhistory.org. Phone: (212) 873-3400 ext. 282.
Copyrights and other proprietary rights may subsist in individuals and entities other than the New-York Historical Society, in which case the patron is responsible for securing permission from those parties. For fuller information about rights and reproductions from N-YHS visit: https://www.nyhistory.org/about/rights-reproductions
Preferred Citation
The collection should be cited as: Edwin P. Kilroe papers, MS 3125, New-York Historical Society.
Location of Materials
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Gift of Edwin P. Kilroe in at least two accessions, 1944 and 1950. A small accession of certificates and bookplates given by Kilroe in 1940 to the Wayne County Historical Association was donated by that organization to N-YHS in August 2022 and added to this collection.
About this Guide
Processing Information
The collection was inventoried and a finding aid prepared by archivist Larry Weimer in December 2021-January 2022. The documents in the collection are housed in large part within bound volumes or original accordion folders, all of which were labeled or inscribed with their subject content and, often, dates by the donor. The container list relies principally on these outer labels, with limited direct observation by the archivist. Minimal physical processing was done with the collection. This is most noticeable in the accordion folders, which seem well-organized by subject by the donor but remain as received, often crammed thickly with correspondence and other documents. Several framed items in the collection were unframed and a few fragile artifacts were bubble-wrapped.