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Title: Evander McIver (E.M.) Sweet, Jr.
papers
Dates: ca.
1885-1975
Bulk Dates: 1894-1947
Collection number: MSS 303
Collector:
Sweet, Evander McIver, Jr.
1870-1947
Collection Size: 6 linear feet
Repository:
University of the Pacific. Library. Holt-Atherton Dept. of
Special Collections
Stockton, California 95211
Abstract: This collection contains family
correspondence.
Physical location: For current information on the location
of these materials, please consult the library's online catalog.
Languages: Languages represented in the collection:
English
Collection open for research.
Permission for publication is given on behalf of Special Collections as
the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply
permission of the copyright holder, which must also be obtained by the
researcher.
Evander McIver (E.M.) Sweet, Jr. papers. MSS 303. Holt-Atherton
Department of Special Collections, University of the Pacific Library.
Biography / Administrative History
Evander McIver Sweet, Jr. was born in Sexton, Sabine County, Texas on
June 3, 1870, the son of a pioneering Methodist Minster. Sweet attended
Waxahachie College in Waxahachie, Texas, and Southwestern University in
Georgetown, Texas, and graduated in 1894, with an A.B. (classical studies). In
1892 he married Blaxie Sanford and in 1893, while Sweet was a junior, their
first of five children was born. After graduation Sweet was the private
secretary to United States Senator Horace Chilton (TX) in Washington D.C. from
1895-1897. In 1898 Sweet worked for the War Department, and was transferred in
1901 to the Department of Interior, Bureau of Education. In 1903 Sweet started
a new career as a minister for the Indian Mission Conference and was appointed
to Muskogee, Tulsa, Lawton, and Ada Districts in the Indian Territory
(Oklahoma). Later he was appointed presiding elder of the Vinita District in
the Indian Territory. While in the Indian Territory Sweet and his colleagues
were concerned about the sale of liquor on the Indian Reservations. The
Five-Civilized Tribes were promised by the Federal Government that liquor would
be not be sold to the Indians. However, the United States Supreme Court ruled
that sale of liquor to Indians is a police regulation and therefore did not
apply to Indians who were citizens in the Indian Territory. In 1904, to
prohibit the sale of liquor in the Indian Territory, Sweet organized the Indian
Territory Church Federation for Prohibition Statehood, which elected him
executive secretary, and was instrumental in writing prohibition into the
Oklahoma Constitution.
In 1915, Sweet was hired as an Inspector for the Department of Interior,
Office of Indian Affairs. Sweet was terminated by the Office of Indian Affairs
in 1921 and became an agent for Pacific Mutual Life in Phoenix, Arizona. In
1925 Sweet moved his family to Stockton, CA and became a General Agent for
Pacific Mutual Life Insurance, and retired in 1935. After his retirement Sweet
traveled to the World Mission Fields with Bishop Arthur J. Moore, at the
Bishop's invitation. They traveled to China, Japan, Africa, and Europe,
visiting over twenty countries. During their travels Sweet took pictures and
movies of the countries that he visited. Sweet returned to the United States in
1936 and lectured throughout the United States with his missionary movies,
channeling thousands of dollars into the foreign missions. Later he became a
lay delegate to the Annual Conference of the Methodist Church, South,
1937-1939. In addition to these activities Sweet also wrote articles for the
Ladies Home Journal, The Saturday Evening Post, American Illustrated Methodist
Magazine, The Christian Advocate, and The World Today. At the time of his death
he was on his way to Vancouver, Canada to spend his summer writing a book
entitled "The Hand of God in a Democracy." E.M. Sweet, Jr. died on November 14,
1947.
Scope and Content of Collection
This collection contains family correspondence, personal correspondence,
business correspondence, correspondence about the Oklahoma Prohibition
Statehood, miscellaneous correspondence; writings by E.M. Sweet, Sr. and E.M
Sweet, Jr.; job recommendations for E.M. Sweet, Jr.; letters of introduction
for E.M. Sweet, Jr.; blueprints of E.M. Sweet, Jr.'s inventions; journals;
scrapbooks of E.M. Sweet, Jr.'s trip to the Middle East, Africa, Asia, and
Europe; photographs; newspaper clippings, and ephemera.
The following terms have been used to index the description of this
collection in the library's online public access catalog.
Sweet, Evander McIver, Sr.
Prohibition - United States -
History.
Prohibition - Oklahoma.
Indians of North America - Alcohol use
- Oklahoma
Liquor laws - Oklahoma
MSS 47: E.M. Sweet, Jr.: Bureau of Indian Affairs Papers. MSS 252: Pearl
Shaffer Sweet Papers