Howard W. Hopkirk papers

The Howard W. Hopkirk papers document his work in and concern for child welfare. Prominent issues reflected in his papers are standards in child care; church-related child welfare programs; and the relative merits of placing children in institutions with cottage mothers supervising them versus providing foster homes and individualized attention. The are no personal papers which might reflect Hopkirk's relationships with family and colleagues.

The papers also contain Hopkirk's writings, most of which deal with child welfare as well as practices and standards in child care institutions. Included are: The Housemother's Guide(1946), written with Edith Stern for staff members in child care institutions; book reviews, personal notes, and annotations for a revision of Institutions Serving Children(1944); articles on child welfare, child labor, and child protective laws written for encyclopedias; and a defense of public welfare that was published in The Christian Century. Also included in the collection are papers and sermon outlines from his time as a student at Union Theological Seminary and notes from a lecture series on child welfare that he gave at Alabama College in 1927.