The materials that comprise the Historical Biographical Files have been collected and added to from a variety of sources over the years by current and previous staff. The files consist of materials related to people who have a connection to the University whether as student, alumni, administrator, faculty, staff, guest lecturer, or honorary degree recipient. Materials generally consist of newspaper and magazine clippings, press releases, programs, ephemera, printed matter, lists, reports, and pamphlets.

The Lionel Trilling Papers document the life of author, professor, and literary critic, Lionel Trilling. This collection contains his writings, extensive correspondence with other New York intellectuals, personal documents, and other records concerning his professional activities.

The correspondence, research, and teaching files of French-American cultural historian and Columbia University professor emeritus Jacques Barzun (1907-2012).

Ginsberg's papers are mostly the manuscripts and clippings of his poetry and prose writings, class notes for his courses at Rutgers, clippings of interviews and other publicity materials for his joint poetry readings with Allen Ginsberg, and many books from his library. Also included are ten letters from Ginsberg to Louis Untermeyer regarding Ginsberg's poetry; and four letters from Gisnberg to Stanley Wertheim.

The collection consists of the editorial and production archives of Random House, Inc. from its founding in 1925 to the 1990s. The correspondence and editorial files include many of the prominent novelists and short story writers from 20th-century American and European literature: Saul Bellow; Erskine Caldwell; Truman Capote; William Faulkner; Sinclair Lewis; André Malraux; Gertrude Stein and Thornton Wilder. Among the poets there are files for W. H. Auden; Allen Ginsberg; Robinson Jeffers; Robert Lowell; and Stephen Spender. In the area of theater there are files for Maxwell Anderson; Moss Hart; Lillian Hellman; Eugene O'Neill; and Tennessee Williams. Random House transacted business with many fine presses and noted typographers and the archives contain files for Nonesuch Press, Grabhorn Press and Golden Cockerel Press, as wll as for Bruce Rogers, Valenti Angelo, and Edwin, Jane, and Robert Grabhorn.

Papers of Philip Whalen, American poet, novelist, and Zen Buddhist associated with the Beat Generation and the San Francisco Renaissance.

Papers of Allen Ginsberg, American poet and one of the founders of the beat generation. The collection contains correspondence, manuscripts, and publications created by Ginsberg and his associates. Note that the main body of Ginsberg's papers is found at Stanford University.

Novelist and member of the Beat Generation. The collection includes a small amount of correspondence, manuscript material and ephemera by and relating to Jack Kerouac.

Correspondence of Brown with other contemporary writers including Bernard Citroën, Malcolm Cowley, William Eastlake, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Jean Malaquais, Charles Olson, Gary Snyder, Philip Whalen, Jonathan Williams, and William Carlos Williams. Much of the correspondence is informal and deals with the writing and publishing of Brown's novel THE WAY TO THE UNCLE SAM HOTEL, and with other literary interests.

Writer, counter-culture figure and associate of Beat Generation writers such as Allen Ginsberg, Peter Orlovksy, and Jack Kerouac.