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The Elizabeth Gurney Taylor series includes twelve volumes of diaries (1854-1861, 1863, and 1865-1886) detailing her routine daily activities, people she met, school work, family affairs, church attendance, the weather, her health, and a few comments on current events. The diary entries are particularly concerned with Taylor's spiritual life. Elizabeth Gurney's diaries were written at the Gurney family home in Centreville, Mich. (1854-1857) and from the Michigan State Normal School in Ypsilanti, Mich. (1858-1861). An 1857 trip to the northeastern U.S. is described. After her marriage to Taylor the family moved quite often as Barton Taylor was sent to different churches. After a description of an 1863 trip from Detroit to Lake Superior, the diaries were written in Saginaw, Mich. (1865-1866), Houghton, Mich. (1866-1869), Mount Clemens, Mich. (1869-1872), Utica, Mich. (1872-1875), Corunna, Mich. (1875-1876), Dundee, Mich. (1876-1877), Mount Clemens once again (1877-1879), Houghton again (1879-1881), Escanaba, Mich. (1882-1883), and Albion, Mich. (1883-1886).