These papers include letters, broadsides, and other documents pertaining to various branches of the Rittenhouse family, in particular, David Rittenhouse and his daughter Elizabeth "Betsey" Rittenhouse Sergeant. Included are references to Benjamin Smith Barton, and copies of documents concerning the Barton family, especially Thomas Barton, in Fanny Abbott's, "Family Records."

The family correspondence of Richard and Sarah Franklin Bache on a variety of topics including references to Benjamin Franklin and his estate. There is also a family genealogy.

The Scaliger Family Papers, when taken together, trace the history of a noble family that was originally from Italy but lived primarily in Agen, France from the mid-1500s through the mid-1800s. Beginning with the patriarch, Julius Caesar Scaliger (1484-1558), a celebrated Italian scholar and physician, the members of the Scaliger family upheld an illustrious reputation over the centuries as scholars, military leaders, and noblemen. Throughout their family's history, the Scaligers maintained that they were descended from the Della Scallas, Princes of Verona. It is as a result of the necessity to defend this claim as well as later attempts to prove their ties to their noble heritage that this collection of documents has remained so well intact. The Scaliger Family Papers is a collection that encompasses several different kinds of documents that span from 1539 to 1862 including letters, genealogical material, works by members of the Scaliger family, as well as military, legal, and financial documents.

An extensive family collection, the Vaux Family Papers center around the lives of George Vaux V (1721-1803), George Vaux VII (1779-1836), and George Vaux VIII (1832-1915), their business partners, siblings, wives, and children, and encompasses the extended Vaux family of Warders, Sansoms, Heads, Graffs, Morrises, Cressons, and Mayberrys. The collection includes correspondence, financial accounts, receipts, business records, journals, diaries, photographs, and legal documents.

The collection includes letters between Hutchinson and his uncle Israel Pemberton, written while Hutchinson was a student of medicine in London. There are also 12 tickets of admission to medical lectures in Philadelphia and London, including one given by William Hunter, and 3 unused cards of admission to Hutchinson's own lectures. Miscellaneous items include Hutchinson's marriage certificate; genealogical data on the Hutchinson, Hare, and Pemberton families; and stock certificates, 1857-1872, of the McKean and Elk Land and Improvement Company. Materials dated post-1793 are to and from Hutchinson family members.

The Peale family is best known as a family of artists; however, family interests and activities were much more wide-ranging. The best known Peale is Charles Willson Peale (1741-1827, APS 1786), who produced more than one thousand paintings, including hundreds of portraits of leading Americans during the colonial and early national periods. Peale was married three times, to Rachel Brewster (1744-1790), Elizabeth de Peyster (1765-1804), and Hannah More (1755-1821). He had eighteen children, eleven of whom reached adulthood. Three of Charles Willson Peale's sons became artists: Raphaelle Peale (1774-1825), Rembrandt Peale (1778-1860), and Rubens Peale (1784-1865). A fourth son, Titian Ramsay Peale (1799-1885, APS 1833), was a naturalist (who made drawings on the exploring expeditions he accompanied) and pioneer in photography, and another son, Benjamin Franklin Peale (1795-1870), became a naturalist and paleontologist. Peale's daughter Sophonisba Angusciola was married to Coleman Sellers (1781-1834), an inventor and manufacturer of machinery, including locomotives. Two of their sons, George Escol Sellers (1808-1899) and Coleman Sellers (1827-1907, APS 1872), were inventors and engineers. The latter served as director of the construction of the hydro-electric power development at Niagara Falls. He was married to Cornelia Wells Sellers (1831-1909). One of their grandsons was Charles Coleman Sellers (1903-1980, APS 1979), a librarian and historian and the author of several studies of the Peale family, including a Charles Willson Peale biography.