Scope and Content of the Collection From the Collection: The collection contains seven farm diaries documenting the Roberts’ lives from the time they moved to Illinois in 1830 until 1858. The first diary, written in 1830 by John Roberts, includes extensive notes relating to lithography. Before moving to Illinois, Roberts trained as a lithographer’s apprentice. In this notebook, he wrote instructions on how to create prints, crayons, various types of ink, paper, and varnish. Additionally, Roberts included notes pertaining to his new...