The embryologist and historian of science Jane M. Oppenheimer was a graduate and long term member of the faculty at Bryn Mawr College. Her research centered on the early development of the killifish Fundulus heteroclitus and on the history of embryology. The Oppenheimer Papers are a small collection consisting of Oppenheimer's correspondence with a small number of colleagues regarding her publications in the history of science and medicine and various other topics. With one exception, all letters in the collection are addressed to Oppenheimer.

This collection is primarily correspondence and also notes on experiments concerning the cytology research of Lewis and his wife, Dr. Margaret Reed Lewis, at Johns Hopkins University, Carnegie Institution of Washington, and finally at the Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology in Philadelphia. There is significant material relating to his professional society activity in the American Association of Anatomists (President, 1934-1936) and the International Society for Experimental Cytology.