The papers of William Goodell provide partial documentation of Goodell's early business activities (1813-21) and of his mature writings on temperance and religion (1842-74). His numerous anti-slavery publications are not present in this collection. There is also some material here relating to the Goodell and Frost families and to Rhoda Lavinia Goodell, one of William Goodell's daughters.

The collection is organized into four records series: I. Goodell and Frost Family Papers; II. William Goodell Papers; III. Lavinia Goodell Papers; and IV. William Goodell Frost Papers. Within series, materials are arranged into subseries and thereunder chronologically or alphabetically by topic or type of material. The original folder headings, established by the archivist in 1969, are largely maintained.

With the exception of two letters (copies, 1833, 1836) to William Lloyd Garrison, William Goodell's correspondence does not document his anti-slavery, temperance, or religious activities. Instead, it reveals Goodell's devotion to his family. Correspondents include Clarissa, his wife, Josiah Cady, his father-in-law, Clarissa Maria, his daughter, Lewis P. Frost, his son-in-law, and Electa Goodell, his sister-in-law. Correspondence from William Goodell includes two letters to his wife (1845, 1847) and one letter (newspaper clipping, 1876) to the Rev. John Russell, Secretary of the National Prohibition Committee in Detroit.

Goodell's early mercantile venture (1813-14) with the Providence firm he co-founded, A. and W. Goodell, and his service aboard merchant ships as supercargo (1817-19) is documented by ms. contracts, invoices, bills, memoranda of cargo, and customer orders for such items as Chinese porcelain tea sets often accompanied by specifications for their decoration. Other documents indicate prevailing prices of goods at Pinang, Powshong, and Canton. Included among these papers are lists of Bengali, Malay, and Hindu words written phonetically, showing Goodell to have been engaged in linguistic study during his ocean voyages.

Goodell's writings (1842-74) consist of small ms. booklets tied together with string containing sermons and temperance tracts. The bulk of these appear to have been written for preaching to his congregation at Honeoye, New York, but many were written in Janesville, Wisconsin, at the home of his daughter, Clarissa Maria Frost. The papers of his other daughter, Rhoda Lavinia Goodell, include legal briefs and attached ms. documents relating to her legal work. Also present are letters she received (1879) from friends in response to a memorial to her father, prepared one year after his death in 1878. The correspondence includes one letter from Lavinia to her sister explaining the enclosed letters, one of which was written by Sarah Tappan, wife of Arthur Tappan.

This collection contains legal documents and correspondence relating to the Goodells (1737-1824) of Pomfret, Windham County, Connecticut and to the Frosts (1793-1861) of Riga, Monroe County, New York. Files include the wills, deeds, leases, and estate inventories of Zechariah and Hannah Goodell (parents of Samuel and Zechariah Goodell); Zechariah's wife, Lucinda, their children, Matilda, Mary, and Lucy, and Harvey; and Beacham Goodell. Goodell family correspondence (1811-22) mainly includes letters written to William Goodell from brothers Garnsey and Ezekiel, from Mary Goodell, and from Jonah and Josiah Cady. Letters touch upon family matters, the prospect of war in 1812, land and business dealings, and farming.

Documents pertaining to the Frosts of Riga, New York include the will (1859) of Nelson A. Frost, father-in-law of Clarissa Goodell Frost, the will (1828) of Nelson's father, Amasa Frost, and several land deeds.

The papers of Goodell's grandson William Goodell Frost include correspondence, speeches, and newspaper clippings. They document his campaign for Lieutenant Governor of Ohio (1884-85), political views, particularly with regard to temperence, his experiences at Oberlin College and Berea College (Kentuck), and his family genealogy.

Series I. Goodell and Frost Family Papers, 1737-1861, n.d. (0.2 l.f.)

Letters, wills, leases, deeds, inventories of personal estates, and military commissions, organized into two subseries by type of material: 1. Correspondence and 2. Legal Documents. Within subseries, materials are chronologically arranged.

Series II. William Goodell Papers, 1813-82, n.d. (0.8 l.f.)

Incoming and outgoing correspondence, invoices, receipts, customer lists, cashbooks, memoranda book, ms. writings, and miscellaneous papers, organized into subseries by type of material: 1. Correspondence; 2. Business papers; 3. Writings; and 4. Miscellany. Arrangement within subseries is chronological or alphabetical by topic or type of material.

Series III. Rhoda Lavinia Goodell Papers, 1874-80, n.d. (0.1 l.f.)

Letters (mainly incoming) and legal briefs and attached ms. documents. Materials are chronologically arranged.

Series IV. William Goodell Frost Papers, 1884-1933, n.d. (0.1 l.f.)

Six letters, incoming (1884-1885), to William Goodell Frost concerning his campaign for Lieutenant Governor; speeches concerning temperance; printed writings (1895, 1927, and 1933); newspaper clippings (1884-1888, n.d.) concerning political issues such as temperance, women's suffrage and antislavery , including speeches and letters by Frost, G.F. Wright, and E.A. Paddock; and circulars advertising Frost's speeches (n.d.). Also found here is a notebook of Frost family genealogy, believed to have been compiled by William Goodell Frost; this notebook was formerly filed in the Wesley Frost Papers (RG 30/30).

The papers of the William Goodell family were given to the Oberlin College Library by Wesley Frost, great grandson of William Goodell, in 1960. In 1969, they were transferred by the Library to the College Archives. Material relating to William Goodell Frost was received from the Oberlin College Library, Special Collections, in 1995.

Additional materials relating to William Goodell and to William Goodell Frost are held by the Archives of Berea College, Berea, Kentucky. For the papers of Wesley Frost, see RG 30/30. Also consult the student files of Wesley Frost, Clarissa Maria Goodell, and William Goodell Frost (RG 28). Consult the Biography Index (vol. 5) for further information about Rhoda Lavinia Goodell. See the Oberlin File (RG 21), I. Family Histories and Genealogies for "Family Stories for My Younger Relatives" (1910) by William Goodell Frost.