Erwin Raisz was born in Slovakia, March of 1893. Raisz attended Columbia University and taught at Harvard University. Raisz was a cartographer, geographer, and professor. He died in Bangkok, Thailand, in 1968.
The collection contains several documents and maps from the professional and personal life of Erwin Raisz. These materials were collected or sent to Roxanne and Franklin Stern. Included are: maps depicting the outline of continents according to the projection of Raisz, yearly letters from Raisz and his wife to family and friends, abstracts of papers from Raisz’s time at Harvard, pages from Raisz’s textbooks, an advertisement of Raisz’s maps with prices, and a text of Raisz’s life. The collection also includes business cards for Marika Raisz’s antiques store in Boston, annual holiday letters from the Raisz family, a letter to Franklin Stern from Pat Gilman asking Stern to write about Raisz, and an obituary for Raisz.
Researchers are advised to contact Rhode Island College Special Collections for questions regarding permissions to reproduce, distribute, or otherwise publish material from this collection. Although Rhode Island College has physical ownership of the collection, it does not necessarily hold literary rights. It is up to the researcher to determine the owners of the literary rights and to obtain any necessary permissions from them.
The collection is open for research.
Erwin Raisz file, MSS-0141, Special Collections, James P. Adams Library, Rhode Island College.
Arranged in the order in which it arrived in Special Collections.
The collection was accumulated by Franklin R. Stern (former Rhode Island College professor) and donated to Special Collections by Franklin Stern's wife, Roxanne Stern, in 2007 after Ranklin's death.
The collection was described by Special Collections intern Hailey-Rose Coulter Brown in 2024 under the supervision of Digital Archivist and Special Collections Librarian, Veronica L. Denison.
The collection has not been digitized and is not available online.