Jacques Judah Lyons, hazzan, rabbi and community leader, was born in Surinam and emigrated to Philadelphia in the early 1800s. Minister of the New York Congregation Shearith Israel for 38 years, he gathered extensive materials on early Jewish history in the United States, Canada and the West Indies. His papers include manuscripts, newspaper clippings, scrapbooks, notebooks, photographs and a Sansom ship's log book. Contains material relating to Jews in North and South America generally and more specifically to Congregation Shearith Israel and the Jews in New York, the Touro Synagogue and cemetery and the Jews in Newport, Rhode Island, Philadelphia and the West Indies. Also contains material relating to Jews in the wars of the United States, correspondence of the Jews with George Washington and items relating to Haym Salomon. Collection consists of manuscript material and five notebooks and three scrapbooks of Lyons. Contains also material not listed in calendar consisting of sermons by Lyons, a manuscript prayer book used in Surinam and a guide for religious ceremonies at Congregation Shearith Israel, as well as letters written during the Civil War period and correspondence relating to the personal life and career of Lyons.

Materials concerning campus unrest during the 1960s and 1970s, particularly surrounding the Vietnam War.

The Ta-Chun Hsu papers (徐大春檔案) document his personal life and provide a glimpse of his career in China and in the United States. The bulk of the papers consist of correspondence related to his family and his personal life as a Chinese-American and an immigrant living in New York. The correspondence also highlights his relation to a prominent Chinese educator and philosopher, Hu Shih (胡適) and his family. There are also materials related to his father, Hsu Singloh (徐新六), who was a major finance and banking leader during the Second Sino-Japanese War. Also included are immigration and travel documents of T.C. Hsu. Other materials also include news clippings, articles, financial records, printed materials, portraits and photographs, maps and postcards.

Correspondence, manuscripts, documents, photographs, subject files, printed materials, and memorabilia of historian George Vernadsky (Georgii Vladimirovich Vernadskii; 1887-1973). Most of the collection consists of his personal and professional papers, circa 1918-1973. Sizable groups of materials also concern members of his family, especially his wife Nina (1884-1971); his father, scientist Vladimir I. Vernadskii (1863-1945); his mother Nataliia E. Vernadskaia (1860-1943); and his sister Nina V. Toll' (1898-circa 1976).

John R. Huizenga co-chaired a Department of Energy/Energy Research Advisory Board panel charged with investigating cold fusion. This collection includes correspondence, articles, conference materials, photographs, emails, and press releases collected by Huizenga during this time. Boxes are grouped according to topic, but individual folders remain as Professor Huizenga organized them.

The Leslie H. Dingyan Chen's Collection of Historiographic Materials for a Biography of Chen Chiung-Ming is a typescript publication published in 1988 documenting the life of Chen Jiongming as a revolutionary figure in the Guangdong province before and during the Republican period in China.

The Bradley Commission on History in Schools Records contain the commission's administrative records and materials related to the process of creating and sharing guidelines for elementary and secondary school history education in the United States from 1982-1992. Many of these materials were created by Elaine Wrisley Reed, administrative director, Kenneth Jackson, chair, and the sixteen members of the commission. They include files related to the planning, staffing, and funding of the commission as well as correspondence and meeting minutes. The papers also contain surveys the commission drafted and distributed to teachers to collect data for the project. Teachers were surveyed on the history requirements at their school, the obstacles they faced, and recommendations to improve their field. The results of those surveys and the commission's conclusions are documented with drafts and final versions of two publications, as well as videos and other materials from two associated conferences.

The Tom Blandy Papers document the group Concerned Citizens for the Environment's legal and political opposition to the proposed Green Island Solid Waste Incinerator

The Lawrence S. Wittner Papers document Dr. Wittner's activism in politics and his work with United University Professions, the Albany County Central Federation of Labor, the Solidarity Committee of the Capital District, the Albany Chapter of Democratic Socialists of America, Upper Hudson Peace Action, and various other social justice and peace organizations in the Capital Region.

Elisabeth Semel's papers primarily consist of articles published from the 1990s to early 2000s used by Semel in her research and work concerning the death penalty.