Collectors' Gallery: Harlan Crow Library

Private collectors are integral to the preservation of history. Their dedication to collecting historical maps, documents, artifacts, and works of art ensures that the material evidence of the past is safeguarded for future generations. The Collectors' Gallery showcases the passion behind privately owned collections in Texas, featuring some of the finest treasures in the state. 

The Harlan Crow Library

The Harlan Crow Library, located in Dallas, is a collection of rare books, manuscripts, paintings, statues, and other artistic treasures focusing on the history of the United States. Its creation, springing from Harlan Crow’s lifelong interest in history, began in the early 1970s. The holdings now consist of approximately 14,000 books and 8,500 manuscripts and span five centuries of exploration and discovery, politics, conflict, science, intellectual thought, and the arts. Its strengths include the colonial settlements in North America by European nations, the American Revolution, the American Civil War, the Presidency, the Supreme Court, and the development of the United States west of the Mississippi River in the 19^th century. 

Harlan Crow is the Chairman of Crow Holdings, a private family business holding company.  He received a bachelor’s degree in business administration in 1974 from the University of Texas at Austin.  In addition to being a member of the American Antiquarian Society and The Philosophical Society of Texas, Mr. Crow serves on the boards of the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, The George W. Bush Foundation, and the Supreme Court Historical Society. 

The artifacts on display represent a sampling of Mr. Crow's collection, including European exploration of the Americas in the 1500s, English settlement in the 1600s–1800s, and the abolition movement of the 1850s.

Select Artifacts On View in the Exhibition

• Melancholy Lincoln, an oil on canvas by President Dwight D. Eisenhower
• Abraham Lincoln's handwritten notes for a debate
• Signed letter from Thomas Jefferson to Henry Dearborn 
• Signed letter from Juan Ponce León, one of the earliest surviving letters from the Americas

Support for the Bullock Museum's exhibitions and education programs is provided by the Texas State History Museum Foundation.