Map of Frank Nicholas Meyer’s expeditions combined (From Box 3, Folder 120), 1905 - 1918

The Isabel Shipley Cunningham Collection on Frank Nicholas Meyer was created by Isabel Shipley Cunningham before and after publishing Frank N. Meyer Plant Hunter in Asia (1984). The collection covers Meyer's life, especially his four plant gathering expeditions in Asia, and his surviving plant introductions (plants Meyer brought back from his travels and planted by various people in the United States). Cunningham annotated items throughout the collection. The two and a half linear feet collection covers 1898-2005 with the bulk dates of 1906-1919 and 1980-1987. The collection is arranged into six series: Correspondence; Documents; Research Notes and Annotations; Photographs; Articles; and Maps. Some of the correspondence and articles are in Dutch, which have English translations.

Many items in the collection are reproductions from other repository collections that Cunningham gathered during her research. Some of these items include photocopies of Meyer's original correspondence from Arnold Arboretum at Harvard University; articles about Meyer from libraries in the Netherlands; Meyer's petition for naturalization from the United States Department of Immigration and Naturalization; Meyer's will from the Register of Wills in Washington, D.C.; and other documents from the National Archives and Records Administration's 'Records of Frank N. Meyer, Plant Explorer, 1902-18'. Copyright must be obtained from the institution that houses the original material.