Jan Tinbergen Letters Sent

The archive of Jan Tinbergen came to the University Library Rotterdam shortly after his decease in June 1994 thanks to the efforts of Albert Jolink, Tinbergen Institute graduate and Board Member of the Stichting Wetenschappelijke Nalatenschap Jan Tinbergen, with additional files donated in the years 1995-2006.

During his active lifetime, which started in the mid 1920’s and lasted right up to his decease in 1994, Jan Tinbergen corresponded with hundreds of people about a myriad of topics related to his work as lecturer and researcher (from 1933 at the Nederlandsche Handels-Hoogeschool/ Nederlandsche Economische Hoogeschool), as economic advisor of the League of Nations in Geneva (1936-38) and later the United Nations, as first director of the Central Planning Bureau of the Netherlands (1945-1955), as active member of the Dutch Labour Party (SDAP/PvdA), and after his final retirement from academia in 1975, as engaged citizen in matters such as world peace, environmental pollution and North-South inequality.

Within the archive the correspondence was divided into two parts: the letters from roughly up to 1956 were kept together and organized alphabetically (correspondent name). These letters – almost 10,000 in total – were digitized in a project that ran from 2012-2016. The letters from 1956-1994 were not stored together but kept within topical files and therefore had to be hand-selected in a second digitization project that ran 2017-2021 (almost 1,300 letters). The corresponding topical files have not been digitized and are held, like the original letters, in the climatized closed stacks of the University Library.

The letters sent by Jan Tinbergen can be viewed and downloaded without restrictions. The letters he received are not available online due to copyright restrictions. The metadata of the letters is available though, including an indication if there are mathematical calculations and/or formulas written on the letter or its annexes.

The University Library has also digitized all Tinbergen’s manuscripts found in the archive, both the clustered manuscripts as well as those which are annexes to letters. The manuscripts consist of a wide array of writings: notes, texts of lectures and speeches, manuscript versions of scholarly and popular publications, interviews, et cetera. All manuscripts are accessible for online viewing and can be downloaded for offline consultation.

Tinbergen’s personal academic library (10 meter, 2865 titles) can be browsed via our library search engine sEURch. The books can only be consulted within the library building. For more information, please see this page.