Correspondence, manuscripts, lectures, notes, diaries, notebooks, reports, financial records, blueprints, photographs, and printed materials of Y.C. James Yen and the IIRR concerned with the development, sharing, and financing innovative methods of teaching, improving agriculture, health and family planning, and education in impoverished villages. Among the cataloged correspondents are: Pearl Buck, William O. Douglas, Nelson Rockefeller, and DeWitt Clinton.

The Shih-hui Hsiung (Shihui Xiong) papers consist of materials documenting Hsiung's life and political career from 1907 to 1974. The highlights of the papers are the manuscripts, which include six volumes of Hsiung's memoir, seven volumes of diaries over 43 years, and approximately 440 original handwritten speech scripts. The photographs and political and military affairs related documents focus on Hsiung's active involvement in the northeast region and abroad from 1930 to 1948. The papers overall consist of correspondence, calligraphy scrolls, diaries, a diploma, documents, letter books, manuscripts of published and unpublished works, maps, newspaper clippings, notes, oversize military notices, poems, photographs, photograph albums, reports, and other materials.