The collection includes stereoviews, mostly of Civil War-era or Civil War-related images. Items in the collection are individually described in the contents list of the finding aid.

Please note: Stereoviews can be viewed without equipment, but Special Collections does have a stereoscope available upon request.

This collection was donated as a research project on the personal significance of the historically segregated neighborhoods of Bluefield, West Virginia, and Bluefield, Virginia. Gregory Galford, Vonnia Davis, Micaela Appelbaum, and Jessica Taylor interviewed residents and former residents of these segregated neighborhoods to reconstruct a previously unrecorded history of how segregated space in this regional hub has changed over time.

This manuscript entitled "The 24th Corps" was likely written by General Edward O. C. Ord and his assistant Lieutenant Colonel Thomas G. Welles and accounts the troop movements of the 24th Corps of the Union Army during the American Civil War. The 24th Corps was formed in 1864 after the Army of the James separated white and Black troops into two units, the 24th and 25th Corps respectively, and the manuscript discusses this.

This letter was sent from G. C. Shippen, acting superintendent of the Virginia Manual Labor School of the Negro Reformatory Association of Virginia, to Mr. F. W. Whittaker of Lynchburg. This letter is a response to a request to commit a young man named Lucien Gilmore to the institution. Shippen writes that the institution is at capacity and that it will be six weeks before they can accept any new inmates.

This collection contains nineteenth century financial documents, including tax records for various Virginia residents. Also included are several hand-written receipts mentioning the sale or labor of enslaved people, including a Black child named Peter and a Black man named Bob.

The Virginia Republican Party Flyer lists the African American Republican candidates for Virginia elected offices in 1921 and includes Maggie L. Walker, the first American female bank president, as the candidate for Superintendent of Public Instruction and John Mitchell, Jr., the editor of the Richmond Planet, as the candidate for Governor.

The Virginia Tax Receipt includes a pre-printed tax receipt for Peter Logan, dated 1859, from Chesterfield, Virginia. There is a handwritten tax on one free person of color. Almost all printed categories execept "Clock" and "Furniture" have been crossed out.

The Black Organizations Council (BOC) was founded on the Virginia Tech campus in 1985, and is the umbrella and resource body for the Black student organizations. According to the organization, BOC serves to ensure the betterment of the Black community through providing a unified voice for the Black community in a university population where the Black community lacks adequate representation. The collection includes documents, photos, VHS tapes, and posters.

The Samuel Williams Ledger contains a "Memorandum of the amount Paid to Each of my Children Toward Their Legacies" with accompanying pages identifying ten children by name along with associated inheritance. The names of 18 men, women, and children enslaved by Williams are listed as well as property such as horses, cows, beds, and land.

This collection contains a deed of emancipation signed by enslaver Barbary Wilson of Bath County, Virginia, freeing Harry, identified as a Black man, on January 5, 1822. Harry was one of 14 people that Wilson had enslaved and manumitted in 1822.