Scope and Content: In 1776 the Massachusetts General Court appointed a Committee of Sequestration to inventory, lease, and otherwise manage estates abandoned by Loyalists, primarily in Boston, and to forward their confiscated goods or proceeds from their auctioning to state authorities, until its charge was withdrawn in 1781.  Two prominent Boston loyalist merchants, Lewis Deblois and Edward Lyde, left Massachusetts in 1776 and were considered absentees. Deblois left Boston with the British evacuation on March 17, 1776 and went to London. Lyde, born in Boston in 1725, later returned from England to New York in 1789, where he died in 1812. Both had their property and large inventories of goods seized and sold by the state and were ultimately listed in the act of banishment, St 1778-79, c 24 (Oct. 16, 1778). Series lists goods by lots sold. –Vol. 1, Deblois sales, are in small lots numbered 1-280, sold Nov. 24, 1777 to Jan. 9, 1778. Items include snuff and tobacco boxes, knives, candlesticks, necklaces, tools, buttons, books, bellows, kettles, locks, and flatirons, with price of each indicated. Each lot sold is marked paid and/or delivered, with buyer’s signature or name, and in some cases the town. –Vol. 2, Lyde sales, are in lots 281-543, sold Jan. 10 to Feb. 27, 1778. Items include bedsteads, chairs, tables and other furniture, knives, forks, and buckles. –For records of additional auctions, June-July 1777 and Mar. 10, 1778-Mar. 29, 1780, see: Massachusetts. Office of the Secretary of State. Massachusetts archives collection ((M-Ar)45X), v. 280, p. 68 et seq. Here also are records of book sales held, Dec. 1777 and Mar. 1779, and receipts showing deposit of auction proceeds into the Treasury by the committee.
Arrangement: Arranged by estate
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Scope and Content: The Government Land Bank was established in 1975 as an independent Massachusetts state agency to finance development of blighted areas and land surplus to state and federal uses.  Its mandate had its origins in the work of a twenty-one member Joint Commission on Federal Base Conversion consisting of legislators and gubernatorial appointees established per Resolves 1973, c 19, to investigate long-term use of facilities and lands associated with federal installations at the Boston Naval Shipyard, Chelsea Naval Hospital, Otis Air Force Base, and Westover Air Force Base, in the event of their phase down or termination.  The commission was revived and continued by Resolves 1974, c 2; Resolves 1975, c 1; and Resolves 1976, c 1; its final report was issued in Jan. 1976.  The Government Land Bank established in the meantime was authorized to make use of commission staff (St 1975, c 212, s 16).  Series records the work of the commission as preserved and utilized by the Land Bank.
Arrangement: Arranged alphabetically by subject
Notes: Sample non-Massachusetts materials submitted by firms not retained
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Scope and Content: The Board of Registration of Nurses, established in 1910 to regulate nursing practice and education in Massachusetts, was renamed the Board of Registration in Nursing in 1941.  At that time was an Approving Authority for Schools for Nurses and School for Attendants (Practical Nurses as of 1953), with overlapping membership with the board. The authority was abolished and its functions passed to the board as of 1961.
Arrangement: Arranged chronologically
Notes: Contents: –Box 1–Approving Authority minutes, 1941-1960. Index to minutes, 1948-1960. Lists of survey and consultation visits, 1948-1960. Statistics for nursing schools (student enrollment, state board examination results), 1940-1965. Box 2–Board minutes, 1970-1979. Board meeting files, 1981-1982, 1985. Box 3–Board meeting files, 1986-1987 (Jan.-Apr.) Box 4–Board meeting files, 1987 (May-July, Sept.-Dec.), 1988. Box 5–Special files: Administrative and Legislative Committee, 1982. Complaint Committee, 1989-1991. Advisory Council on Continuing Education, 1978-1980. Nursing Education Committee, 1982. Continuing Education Advisory Council, 1982-1987. Board executive sessions, 1977-1985.  Nursing Practice Committee, 1982.  Nursing Practice Advisory Committee, 1991-1992. Task Force for Review of Regulations Governing Schools of Professional Nursing, 1978-1980. Regulation files, 1956-1980
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Scope and Content: Resolves 1732-33, c 125 provided for the appointment of a committee of the General Court of the Province of the Massachusetts Bay to survey lands at Paquoig (now Athol, Mass.) and on the upper and lower Ashuelot River (now Swanzey and Keene, N.H.), for the purpose of establishing towns on those sites.  An additional committee was to be appointed to admit settlers to the towns (Resolves 1733-34, c 125 and c 198).  Such settlers were to live on their land within three years of admission, to build a house according to specifications, to till or fit for mowing eight acres, and to give bond of twenty pounds to the committee to be paid in case of failure to perform these requirements.  Series consists of completed printed forms stating this obligation, and signed/sealed by the settler and signed by witnesses.  All three localities are represented.  All documents (19) are dated June 26, 1734.  For additional (4) bonds see: Massachusetts. Office of the Secretary of State. Massachusetts archives collection ((M-Ar)45X), v, 114, p. 99-102.  For additional legislation relating to these settlements see Resolves 1733-34, c 82, 182, 184, and 210.
Restrictions: Restricted as fragile; access by permission of state archivist or curator of Massachusetts Archives only
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Scope and Content: The Cambridge Bridge Commission was established in 1898 to administer construction of a bridge spanning the Charles River between Boston and Cambridge, to be known as the Cambridge (later Longfellow) Bridge.  Series was created to plan actual bridge construction.
Arrangement: Arranged by bridge part
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Scope and Content: The Massachusetts Geographic Board was established by the governor at the request of the United States Geographic Board to prepare an accurate listing of Massachusetts place names.  This card file is the result of the board’s compilation of 6,000 such names.
Arrangement: In two subseries: (1) Card file; arranged by type of physical feature, thereunder by country, and then alphabetically by name. (2) Commissioners’ report; arranged alphabetically by name
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Scope and Content: The Joint Committee on Human Services and Elderly Affairs, a standing committee of the General Court, considers all matters concerning public welfare, children, the elderly, the handicapped, mental health, drug rehabilitation and control, veterans benefits, alcoholism, the correction system (including administration, prisoners’ rights, furloughs, work release, probation, rehabilitation, and parole), other social service programs, and other matters referred.  It drafts, reviews, and holds hearings on proposed legislation.  Series is created by the committee chair to enable the committee to formulate human services budget proposals and to react to gubernatorial vetoes of portions thereof.
Arrangement: Arranged chronologically by fiscal year
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Scope and Content: Per St 1867 c 243, s 1, in Massachusetts every private society or institution for charitable purposes that was aided by a grant of money from the state treasury had to prepare and send to the Board of State Charities a report of all its proceedings, income, and expenditures. (Per St 1875, c 118, institutions for the instruction of the deaf and dumb and of the blind were to report instead to the Board of Education.)  The 1867 mandate extended to reporters to Board of State Charities successors, the State Board of Health, Lunacy, and Charity (1879-1886) (see PS 1882, s 16), the State Board of Lunacy and Charity (1886-1898), and the State Board of Charity (1898-1919) (RL 1902, c 84, s 13). It was apparently subsumed (per RL 1902-1908 supplement) under an omnibus provision for statewide annual reports (St 1905, c 211). –Meantime, per St 1899, c 259 , as amended by St 1901,  c 179 (RL c 1902, c 84, s 14 ), every charitable organization whose personal property was exempt from taxation by PS c 11 s 5 (RL 1902, c 12, s 5 per St 1903, c 402) was to transmit to the State Board of Charity an annual report showing property, receipts, expenditures, number of beneficiaries and other information. St 1901, c 405 made the board responsible for investigating the applicants and proposed purpose of those applying for charitable incorporation for illegal activity or unsuitable persons before the issuance of a certificate of incorporation by the state secretary. –St 1909, c 379, as amended by St 1913, c 82, required the board, upon the request or with the consent of a charitable corporation required to make an annual report, to visit and inspect the institution or investigate the work of the corporation.  St 1919, c 350, s 87 abolished the Board of State Charities, replacing it with a Dept. of Public Welfare, with responsibility for the same function (GL 1921, c 180, s 11),  successively through its Subdivision of Private Incorporated Charities and Bureau of Incorporated Charities. –Per St 1954, c 529, s 1 (MGLA c 12, ss 8A-M), the responsibilities for charitable corporations were passed to a newly established Division of Public Charities in the Attorney General’s Office. A public charity had to file with the division a copy of its charter and articles or certificates of incorporation, along with an annual fiscal year report in order to obtain official status as a charitable institution. Filings with the division include audits, probate files such as trust instruments, annual financial reports, wills, probate court pleadings and filed actions, and subsequent status reports.
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Scope and Content: The Dept. of Corporations and Taxation was established in 1919 by combining the offices of Tax Commissioner and Commissioner of Corporations.  It was replaced in 1978 by the Dept. of Revenue.
Arrangement: Arranged chronologically by year, thereunder by transaction
Notes: Box 1: 1966-1971 Box 2: 1972-1974
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Scope and Content: The attorney general of Massachusetts represented the Commonwealth before the Supreme Court of the United States regarding settlement of the estate of Colonel Edward Howland Robinson Green, son of Hetty Green and deceased in 1936, specifically to recover taxes allegedly owed the Commonwealth by Green.  At issue was determination of Green’s legal residence, as he maintained domiciles not only in Massachusetts, but in Florida, New York, and Texas.  The court ruled in favor of Massachusetts.
Notes: Boxes 1-2: Exhibits, Massachusetts witnesses, miscellany. Boxes 3-4: Texas v. Florida. Boxes 5-6: Texas v. Massachusetts. Boxes 7-8: Essex County (N.Y.) Surrogate’s Court photostats
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