This journal was found among the papers of Benjamin Smith Barton, who was Pursh's patron, after his death in 1817. For provenance of manuscript see ms. notes in printed edition by Thomas P. James - 581.974:P97.

The approximately 3,700 color and black and white drawings were collected and drawn by John Lawrence LeConte, with two in the first volume are by Titian R. Peale, but most are likely by John Abbot. The previous description noted that there are some drawings by John Abbot, and that most were likely by John Lawrence Le Conte. However, John V. Calhoun has shown extensive evidence that most of the drawings are by John Abbot (John Abbot's "Lost" Drawings for John E. LeConte in the American Philosophical Society Library, Philadelphia. Journal of the Lepidopterists' Society 60(4), 2006, 211-217). The contents of the collection: 1. Coleoptera. 654 figures. 2. Diptera, Hemiptera, and Lepidoptera. 564 figures. 3. Coleoptera. 698 figures. 4. Coleoptera and Hymenoptera. 228 figures. 5. Coleoptera. 657 figures. 6. Hymenoptera and Diptera. 234 figures 7. Diptera. 304 figures. 8. Hemiptera, Araneina, Myripoda. 356 figures

There are botanical notebooks which concern Bunbury's study of fossil plants in general, with special studies on the fossil plants in the Geological Society in Richmond, Virginia, and at Aix-la-Chapelle, Cape Breton Island, and Pennsylvania. There is also a historical sketch of eminent English naturalists.

This diary records the travels of Loammi Baldwin in the Netherlands (then including Belgium), England, and France, with detailed observations and careful pen-and-ink sketches of canals and canal machinery.

This collection contains mostly entomological material, with much information on the description and identification of particular insects, entomological collections, and the study of entomology in Europe and the United States. In addition, there are materials on medicine and hospitals during the American Civil War, on the Corps of Topographical Engineers, the United States Army, on natural history in the United States, and on the LeConte's family. Some letters are written to President Rutherford B. Hayes and concern the Commissionership of Agriculture, for which LeConte was considered, but not appointed. Letters of John Eatton LeConte and Joseph LeConte are included.

Consists of material chiefly on natural history, shells, and insects, including miscellaneous notes on conchology by Say; photostats of 6 letters from Say to Jacob Gilliams, 1819-1829, from Morristown, New Jersey; and a biographical note on Say. The drawings and impressions of shells are by Mrs. Lucy Way Sistaire Say, prepared for W. G. Binney's edition of Say's complete works on conchology, 1858; also Mrs. Say's refutation of what she considered an unfair attack in George Ord's memoir of Say. Correspondents include André Etienne Férussac, Arthur F. Gray, John Lawrence LeConte, and Charles W. Short. An additional item is a memorial volume (ca. 150 pp.), including a family genealogy and land surveys in watercolor (B Sa95f).

Personal and professional correspondence of the chemist Robert Hare, including drafts of letters to editors of journals on such varied topics as fish guano, slaughterhouses, paper money, and the meaning of the term "Yankee annexations." The collection originally contained over 300 scrolls, since disbound, which contained drafts of letters, essays, and lectures, composed by Hare on ordinary sheets of paper, then pasted end to end, and rolled up. The essay and lecture topics include: chemistry, storms, slavery, currency, fire-fighting, capital punishment, railroads, the Smithsonian Institution, Michael Faraday, religion and Spiritualism, riots in Philadelphia, epidemics, underwater blasting, and Ralph W. Emerson; there is some verse. The collection also contains an account book of Hare and his wife, 1806-1829 (180 pp.; B/H22#3); a volume by Hare on Cyclones (tornadoes), n.d. (ca. 60 pp.; B/H22#4); and Samuel Powel, Jr.'s "Short notes on a course of antiquities at Rome... under M. Byre Antiquarian," 1764. (60 pp.).