The National Congress of American Indian (NCAI), founded in 1944, is the oldest nation-wide American Indian advocacy organization in the United States. The NCAI records document the organization's work, particularly that of its office in Washington, DC, and the wide variety of issues faced by American Indians in the twentieth century. The collection is located in the Cultural Resource Center of the National Museum of the American Indian.

Collection primarily documents American folk art collected by Frederick Fried (1908-1994) and his wife Mary McKensie Hill Fried (1914-1988). It includes photographic materials, newspaper clippings, magazine articles, research files, lecture notes, unpublished manuscripts, brochures, drawings, printed advertisements, blueprints, books, patents, cor...

Collections consists of the records of both the Norcross Greeting Card Company founded in New York City in the 1920s and The Rust Craft Greeting Card Company, founded in Kansas City, Missouri, 1906. Both the Norcross and Rust Craft companies collected antique greeting cards. Also includes a small number of modern cards by other manufacturers, circa 1930-1980. Collection represents development of the greeting card industry, social trends in the United States and technology of the printing industry from 1924 through 1978.

The papers document the life and activism of Grayce Uyehara who was a pivotal figure within the Redress Movement and sought reparations for the incarceration of Japanese Americans during World War II.

The collection documents in photographs, scrapbooks, notebooks, correspondence, stock ledgers, annual reports, and financial records, the evolution of the telegraph, the development of the Western Union Telegraph Company, and the beginning of the communications revolution. The collection materials describe both the history of the company and of the telegraph industry in general, particularly its importance to the development of the technology in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The collection is useful for researchers interested in the development of technology, economic history, and the impact of technology on American social and cultural life.

Papers documenting the farming and family life of the Robinson family of Prince George's County and after 1975, Charles County, Maryland. Papers documenting the farming and family of the Via family of Greene County, Virginia, Washington, D.C., Prince George's and Calvert Counties, Maryland, by 1949.

The papers of painter, collector, and writer John Graham measure 11.2 linear feet and date from 1799 to 1988, with the bulk of materials dating from 1890 to 1961. Papers document the life of John Graham, born Ivan Dombrowsky, through personal documents related to military service and family history, passports, artifacts, correspondence, appointment books, financial records, inventories, wills, extensive writings and notes, books, clippings, exhibition catalogs, photographs of Graham and his family and friends, and artwork created and collected by Graham.

The records of the Downtown Gallery date from 1824 to 1974 (bulk 1926-1969) and measure 109.56 linear feet. The records present a comprehensive portrait of a significant commercial gallery that operated as a successful business for more than forty years, representing major contemporary American artists and engendering appreciation for early American folk art. There is an unprocessed addition to this collection dating circa 1970 of a single financial/legal document.

The papers document Leo H. Baekeland, a Belgian born chemist who invented Velox photographic paper (1893) and Bakelite (1907), an inexpensive, nonflammable, versatile plastic. The papers include student notebooks; private laboratory notebooks and journals; commercial laboratory notes; diaries; patents; technical papers; biographies; newspaper clippings; maps; graphs; blueprints; account books; batch books; formula books; order books; photographs; and correspondence regarding Baekeland, 1887-1943.

Approximately 11,000 images collected by Thomas Norrell consisting of original photographic prints and photographic postcards, original film and glass plate negatives, and duplicate/copy photographic prints and negatives. The majority are external views of single locomotive engines of North American railroad and industrial companies. Images of international railroad company locomotives and of representative locomotives from various locomotive works and builders are also included. The collection contains a small number of subject-specific images covering such topics as train wrecks, funeral trains, experimental locomotives, miniature trains, and locomotives at the 1933 and 1939 World's Fairs.