Correspondence and letter books, 1845-1889, of Charlemagne Tower, as well as legal and business papers related to real estate transactions, coal and iron lands in Pennsylvania, and the family affairs of the Tower family.

The surviving files of official correspondence, reports, documents, and printed materials of King's College from 1750 to 1784 and Columbia College from 1785 to 1890, as well as Columbia University up to 1964. The King's College era materials include grants, deeds, indentures, lists of governors, leases, accounts, etc. The Columbia College era papers commence with documentation regarding the attempts to revive the college at the end of the American Revolution. In the later period these papers primarily supplement and document the minutes of the meetings of the Board of Governors and the Board of Trustees. Much material was destroyed and scattered in the late 19th century leaving this collection quite incomplete.

The Pierrepont family papers (1761-1918) document the intersection of commercial, civic and personal interests across three generations of one of the most prominent and influential families of nineteenth century Brooklyn, New York. The bulk of the collection concerns the business dealings of Henry Evelyn Pierrepont from 1838 to his death in 1888. This especially includes an extensive set of accounting and transactional records concerning the Pierrepont Stores, the family's warehouse on Brooklyn's East River waterfront; these include records of ships arriving at the Stores and their cargoes delivered. Additionally, there are substantive correspondence, legal documents and other materials concerning the Union Ferry Company, of which Henry was an officer. In addition to commerce and shipping, a major theme of the collection is that of land acquisition in Brooklyn Heights and at the adjacent waterfront in the early nineteenth century, and the development of that property over the course of the century. Included in the collection are correspondence, deeds, indentures, leases, accounting records, diaries, maps, invoices, receipts, business proposals, legal filings, clippings, and historical and genealogical manuscripts.