Comprises correspondence, genealogies, personal papers, ephemera, business records, legal records, property records, photographs, motion picture films, and artifacts documenting the personal and professional activities of the Burr-Allyne family in San Francisco and California from 1839 to the early 2000s. Papers include significant holdings of correspondence by John Winslow Allyne, Mary Newell Burr Allyne, Lucy Helen Allyne, Edith Winslow Allyne, Ephraim Willard Burr, Edmund Coffin Burr, Anna Barnard Burr, Elsie Burr Overstreet, Marian Barnard Burr, Alice Burr and Harry Allen Overstreet and others, documenting family relations, travels, and historic events; ancestral charts, notes, and obituaries; diaries, journals, and sketchbooks recording the world travels of Elsie, Marian, and Alice Burr and Lucy and Edith Allyne; and last wills and testaments, estate records, marriage certificates, and land deeds. The collection also includes business records related to the commercial and real estate ventures of Ephraim Willard Burr, Edmund Coffin Burr, and John Allyne in Alameda, Mariposa, Monterey, Placer, San Francisco, and San Mateo counties; among these are records for the Savings and Loan Society (San Francisco), Alameda Sugar Company (Alvarado), and Baden Company (San Francisco). Photographic prints, daguerreotypes, ambrotypes, autochromes, negatives, glass plate negatives, photograph albums and motion picture films depict the Burr-Allyne family, their homes, gardens, and travels, and the growth of San Francisco at the turn of the century. Highlights include images of the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire, the San Francisco chapter of the American Red Cross, Spanish-American War volunteers at Camp Merritt, San Francisco deploying to and returning from Manila, Philippines, and the 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition. Also included are portraits and other photographs by the Pictorialist woman photographer Alice Burr, primarily depicting San Francisco scenes, nature scenes, and portraiture of families, women, and children in the 1910s and 1920s.

Ephraim Willard Burr (E. W. Burr) was born in Warren, Rhode Island on March 7, 1809. He began a family with his wife Abby Miller Child, having five children between the years of 1836 and 1846. In 1849 E. W. Burr was working in the whaling industry managing four whaling ships, when one of his ships, the Niantic, went missing. E. W. Burr sailed to California, arriving in San Francisco in the early months of 1850 to find the ship had been grounded and abandoned, its crew lured by gold in the California foothills and mountains. Recognizing commercial opportunities in Gold Rush era San Francisco, E. W. Burr decided to stay in the city. By April of 1850 E. W. Burr had formed Burr, Mattoon and Company, which operated a general store and grocery. Once successfully established Burr sent for his wife and children and built a home for them at Filbert and Van Ness streets.

47.5 Linear feet

All requests to reproduce, publish, quote from or otherwise use collection materials must be submitted in writing to the Director of Library and Archives, North Baker Research Library, California Historical Society, 678 Mission Street, San Francisco, CA 94105. Consent is given on behalf of the California Historical Society as the owner of the physical items and is not intended to include or imply permission from the copyright owner. Such permission must be obtained from the copyright owner. Restrictions also apply to digital representations of the original materials. Use of digital files is restricted to research and educational purposes.

Collection is open for research, with the following exceptions: original home movies are unavailable for paging and viewing. Use digitized copies, available on DVD.