Purchased by the library in the late 1970s, this collection consists of bills of sale, bonds, writs, promissory notes, summons, wills of slave owners, and inventories of slaves. It also includes some criminal cases involving slaves and an anonymously authored play with characters who are slaves. Well over half the documents concern the state of Alabama with Lawrence County particularly well represented. The documents are organized by state and arranged by counties.

The Lehman Family Papers include a marriage license and baptismal record from Salems Evangelical Church, a German church in Los Angeles, California.

During World War II, Lewis worked as the chief electrician and supervisor for the Marine Electrical Department at California Shipbuilding Company on Terminal Island, Long Beach. Lewis supervised work on ships for the US Army Transport Service and War Shipping Administration Transport vessels. Lewis’s personal collection documents the history of Naval construction of the Liberty Ship fleet during World War II.

The Library of the Institute for the Study of Women in Music was established in the Music Department by Jeannie Poole, Head of the Music Library and Professor Beverly Grigsby in 1985 to collect the music of women composers. The collection is devoted to the musical works of women composers both published and unpublished. While predominately printed and manuscript music scores, it also contains some biographical information and correspondence.

Joel Harold Lieb worked as an engineer at Rocketdyne Division of Rockwell International from 1956 to 1989. The collection documents Lieb's career working at Rocketdyne on both the Apollo program and the Space Shuttle program for NASA.