# My Secret Autobiography: The Letters of Ballad Scholar Francis James Child to William Ellery Sedgwick

Folklorist Michael Bell discussed ballad scholar Francis James Child. Beginning in 1846, soon after his graduation from Harvard College, Child -- a Harvard professor, eventual first president of the American Folklore Society and the greatest ballad scholar of the 19th century -- began what would become a 20-year correspondence with his closest college friend and future brother-in-law, William Ellery Sedgwick. Based on this cache of letters contained among the Sedgwick family papers deposited at the Massachusetts Historical Society, Bell's presentation examined this "secret autobiography" for what it reveals about Child the man; his hopes, dreams and frustrations and his growing involvement in the intellectual and social cultures of late antebellum Cambridge.

- Kind: Talk
- Year: 2018
- By: Library Of Congress
- Genres: History
- Archive: [Library of Congress](https://www.loc.gov/item/2021692370/)
- Licence or status: Rights statement at the Library of Congress (as the archive states it)
- Credit: Library of Congress
- Who can watch: Tweens profiles and older (the archive gives no rating; placed by Invisible Network from its collection and subjects)

[Watch now](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/watch/archive/loc/2021692370?play=1)