These papers include correspondence concerning Steinberg's security clearance with the United States government and questions about his loyalty, a bibliography (16 p.), and a curriculum vitae (3 p.).

The Austrian biologist Paul Kammerer was an outspoken proponent of the theory of inheritance of acquired characteristics (Lamarckism) during the time in which Mendelian theory was becoming deeply entrenched in biology. His major research efforts, straddling the First World War, centered on experiments performed on salamanders and on the midwife toad, and seemed to provide empirical support for a Lamarckian mechanism in evolution. He also developed a monistic "law of seriality," in which he attempted to explain coincidence as the product of a higher order natural law. A Socialist, Kammerer was widely regarded as a brilliant scientist, but for scientific, personal, and political reasons, he engendered as much antagonism as support, preventing him from ever obtaining a regular university appointment. His career ended tragically in allegations of fraud, followed by his suicide. The Kammerer Papers is comprised of photocopies of materials that document the brief, but controversial career of a non-Darwinian evolutionary biologist. The bulk of the collection consists of photocopies of articles by Kammerer, often from obscure newspapers or periodicals, along with a small number of letters to his friend Hugo Iltis, the geneticist and biographer of Mendel. Nearly all of these pertain to the Kammerer's experiments with amphibians to test Lamarckian inheritance or to his other biological theories. The collection also includes a small number of items dating from after Kammerer's death, but relating to his life and work, including two letters from his former supervisor Hans Przibram, a letter from Hugh Iltis (Hugo's son) to Arthur Koestler and the reply, and a brief biographical reminiscence of Kammerer written by Hugo Iltis.

This collection consists of materials relating to Shull's work commissioned by the Carnegie Institution of Washington to collaborate with their grantee, Luther Burbank, with the aim of analyzing Burbank's data on plant breeding and hybridization and preparing it for publication in suitable scientific journals. Shull visited Burbank's plant-breeding farm in California eight times between 1906 and 1910. There are files for each plant genus involved in Burbank's work. These files contain notes, calculations, clippings from newspapers or periodicals, and an unpublished manuscript of Shull's final report to the Carnegie Institution. There is also a report by Edwin C. MacDowell, which gives background information about the collection.

In 1912, the University of California, Berkeley, became the first university in the nation to form a separate Department of Genetics. The first two appointments in the department went to plant geneticists Ernest Brown Babcock and Roy E. Clausen, and as the department grew slowly, shifting slightly away from its roots in agricultural science, it gained a strong reputation as an important center for research in several areas in genetics and evolutionary biology. The U.C. Berkeley Department of Genetics Collection contains a selective sampling of correspondence relating to the organization and early history of the nation's first Department of Genetics. Centered in the years 1912-1930, the collection consists primarily of correspondence to and from Babcock and Clausen, pertaining to their research, administrative matters, and the genetical community. Prominent among their correspondents are George H. Shull, Thomas Hunt Morgan, A. H. Sturtevant, and H. J. Muller.

The historian of science Robert C. Olby is a graduate of University College London and Oxford. Best known for his work on the history of genetics, especially the Bateson school, and for his study of the early history of molecular biology, Olby is currently a Research Professor in the History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh. He is the author of The Origins of Mendelism (1966), Charles Darwin (1967), The Path to the Double Helix (1974), and the Norton History of Biology. His current research is focused on the conceptual foundations of modern sensory neurophysiology and an intellectual biography of Francis Crick. The Olby Collection contains about 150 photocopies of correspondence and documents collected by Olby during research for The Path to the Double Helix. Among these is a copy of a manuscript by F. C. Crick and James D. Watson, "The Complementary Structure of Deoxyribonucleic Acid," prepared while Watson was at CalTech.

The American Eugenics Society Records is a small, selective collection offering information on various periods of the Society's development, including correspondence, membership records, and formal and informal material on its history. Of particular interest are the records of the Society's numerous committees, including the Executive Education, Population Genetics Research, Legislative, and local and state committees, and documentation of AES educational initiatives at state fairs and eugenic health exhibits and contests, especially the Fitter Family Contests. A scrapbook containing 97 images of Fitter Family and eugenic health exhibits, 1924-1926, provides valuable visual information of AES activities. One series in the collection relates to the numerous Princeton Conferences and to a genealogical survey of the populations of Shutesbury and Leverett, Massachusetts, and there is also material on the Population Council. The collection largely revolves around Frederick Osborn, the moving force in the Society for most of its later history, and it includes approximately 100 papers written or delivered by Osborn concerning eugenics, genetics, or population related topics. This note is currently under review for revision.

Alexander Hollaender was a leading researcher on the genetic effects of radiation. Born in Samter, Germany, in 1898 and arriving in the United States in 1921, Hollaender was educated at the University of Wisconsin, receiving his AB, MA, and Ph.D. there. He served on the faculty at the University of Tennessee and the University of Tennessee-Oak Ridge Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences. He was director of the division of biology at the Atomic Energy Commission's Oak Ridge National laboratory from 1946 until 1966. The 4 linear feet of the Alexander Hollaender Papers contain incoming and outgoing correspondence and reports relating to the genetic effects of radiation, specifically atomic radiation. Also included are documents of the International Conference on the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy; the NAS Committee on the Biological Effects of Atomic Energy, Genetics Panel; the United Nations Scientific Committee on Atomic Radiation; and the World Health Organization all of which Hollaender was closely involved with.

A modest Midwesterner who became one of the most influential geneticists of the first half of the 20th century, William E. Castle spent his career at Harvard and the University of California working on patterns of inheritance in mice, horses, and a variety of other mammalian taxa. An early proponent of Mendelian theory, Castle was director of the Bussey Institution at Harvard for almost thirty years, helping to train a number of important geneticists. The Castle Papers contain one linear foot of correspondence dating primarily from the period after Castle's "retirement" to Berkeley in 1936 until his death in 1962, dealing almost exclusively with his research on horse breeding and the inheritance of coat coloration in horses. Castle's correspondence with his former student L. C. Dunn is an exception, focusing on mouse genetics and ranging to a variety of topics from the conduct of scientific research during the Second World War to Castle's interests in the early history of genetics.

Founded in 1931, the Genetics Society of America works to facilitate communication among scientists with an interest in research and education in genetics and cognate fields. The GSA Records provide information on the history of the Genetics Society of America from the time of its founding in 1931. Included is correspondence between various officers, members, and outside individuals and organizations, files on standing and ad hoc committees, Records concerning accounts and finances, membership data, files relating to annual meetings, local meetings, and international meetings, and information on special commissions or ad hoc groups of the Society. Among the more noteworthy files are those for the Committee on Genetics, Race, and Intelligence, 1974-1975. This note is currently under review for revision.

This miscellaneous collection relates to numerous topics in genetics: cattle breeding (especially the American Jersey Cattle Club), longevity, radiation, International Congress of Genetics (the 10th, 11th, and 13th), Gregor Mendel, aid for refugee scientists, and the records of the Genetics Society of America (1947-1974). The photographs series accession # 1968 433pr, was added to the finding aid in 2016.

A botanist and historian of science at the University of Pennsylvania, Conway Zirkle published on the history of evolutionary thought and genetics, with a particular interest in the discipline as practiced in the Soviet Union. The Zirkle Papers consist of approximately one linear foot of materials accrued by Zirkle during research for his book on Lysenko-era biology in the Soviet Union, The Death of Science in Russia (1949). Among the miscellaneous materials in the collection are four volumes (0.5 linear feet) of pressed specimens of ferns and algae.

Frederick Henry Osborn was an administrator, humanist, and scientist. This collection includes letters, diaries, reports, speeches, drafts of articles and books, oral history interviews, and photographs. There are diaries and letters for his service in Europe with the American Red Cross during World War I. There are some letters and documents, such as patent applications and plans for inventions, from his "business career" period prior to 1928, after which he became a research associate at the American Museum of Natural History studying anthropology and population. This study led to his later important contributions to the redirection of eugenics study in the U.S. and the reorganization of the American Eugenics Society. His other related organizational work and publications relating to human and population genetics are also documented in this collection. There is significant material (letters, diaries, reports) related to Osborn's World War II contributions as the chairman of the Civilian Committee on Selective Service in 1940, and as head of the Morale Branch of the U.S. Army (later, the Information and Education Division of Special Services) in 1941. Also included are important documents, especially his diary, from his work as deputy representative on the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission and the U.N. Commission for Conventional Armaments. His letters, writings, and speeches relating to foreign policy are extensive, spanning the period from the 1940s until his death, much of it from the Vietnam War years. The correspondence with Kathleen Harris is particularly rich in this respect. There is family correspondence reflecting his dynamic philosophy of life, with long series of letters to his parents (1917-1945) and to his children and grandchildren. His later civic and regional interests, as a long-time resident of Garrison, N.Y., are evidenced in the work he did on the Palisades Interstate Park Commission.

Arthur J. Cain is an evolutionary biologist whose research interests have included genetics, natural selection, biogeography, and systematics. Based at Oxford University and, later, the University of Liverpool, much of Cain's research was field-based, focusing on terrestrial gatsropods. This collection contains correspondence, grant applications, reports, programs for scientific meetings, unpublished papers and lectures, research notes, charts, graphs, maps, and manuscript reviews of journal articles and books. The Cain Papers is divided into three series: I. Correspondence ; II. Subject Files ; and, III. Papers by Colleagues. Arrangement is alphabetical by folder title, and chronological within each folder.

The maize geneticist Barbara McClintock (1902-1992) is credited with the discovery of "jumping genes," that is chromosomal "crossing over" and translocation. She received the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1983. The collection is organized into six series: I. Correspondence, 1931-1991; II. Subject files, 1938-1989; III. Works by McClintock, 1944-1989; IV. Works by others, 1927-1991; V. Research notes, notebooks, and card files, 1930s-1990s ; VI. Photographs, 1928-1991.

The population geneticist Hampton L. Carson spent the major part of his career at Washington University (1949-1963) and the University of Hawaii (1963-1985) investigating the cytogenetics and evolution of Drosophila. As one of the major figures in the Hawaii Drosophila project, he made particularly important contributions to the study of speciation and selective and non-selective evolutionary mechanisms. The Carson Papers (1921-1993) contain correspondence, subject files, manuscripts of published and unpublished works by Carson, papers by colleagues and students, research notes, course materials, photographs, and biographical information, which documents Carson's career as an evolutionary geneticist. The collection is organized into nine series.

Mostly concerned with Blakeslee's studies on beans, blood groups, colchicine, Datura, embryo cultures, and horticulture. Many letters relate to the support and direction of the Smith College Genetics Experiment Station, which he headed. Other letters are about the Carnegie Institution of Washington, "Biological Abstracts," American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Philosophical Society, Institut de France, University of Connecticut. Also contains travel letters from Germany and miscellaneous lectures.

A biochemist at Columbia University, Erwin Chargaff discovered the base-pairing regularities or "complementarity relationships" of nucleic acids that provided one of the key steps in developing a structural model for DNA. During his long career, Chargaff is credited with conclusively falsifying the tetranucleotide hypothesis; demonstrating the existence of a large number of DNA species; and creating the first descriptions of hypochromicity, hyperchromicity, and the denaturation of a DNA. In addition, Chargaff conducted important research on blood coagulation, lipids and lipoproteins, the metabolism of amino acids and inositol, and the biosynthesis of phosphotransferases. He retired to emeritus status in 1974 and remained active in research almost to the time of his death in June 2002. The Chargaff Papers are organized into ten series: I. Correspondence, 1931-1992; Ia. Correspondence, 1949-2002; IIa. Grants, 1930-1982; IIb. Subject Files, 1940-1984; IIc. Subject Files, 1946-2002; III. Works by Chargaff, 1929-1989; IIIa. Works by Chargaff, 1923-2002; IIIb. Reprints, 1977-1999; IV. Works by Others, 1936-1985; IVa. Works by Others, 1976-2002; V. Research Notes and Notebooks, 1929-1951 ; VI. Photographs, 1935-1977; VIa. Photographs, 1928-2002; VII. Audiovisual Materials; VIII. Awards and Certificates, 1958-2001; IX. Lecture Notes, 1942-1985; X. Personal Papers, [1880]-1985.

One of the four horsemen of the evolutionary synthesis of the 1940s, Theodosius Dobzhansky played a crucial role in bridging the gap between theoretical and empirical approaches in genetics and in promoting the Neo-Darwinian synthesis. His contributions to the biological species concept and to an understanding the evolutionary dynamics of wild populations of Drosophila were fundamental to the development of modern population genetics and evolutionary thought. The Dobzhansky Papers are a remnant of the correspondence and writings of the geneticist and evolutionary biologist, Theodosius Dobzhansky. The correspondence (7.5 linear feet) provides insight into Dobzhansky's scientific, philosophical, and social views, particularly during the last decade of his life. Equally valuable are the 54 notebooks (ca.1917-1975) which comprise an almost uninterrupted self-commentary on Dobzhansky's career, replete with typescripts of personal letters and short essays sent to colleagues and friends. The collection also contains two unbound volumes of annotated "reminiscences" from the Columbia Oral History Project, 1962; two bound volumes of papers dedicated to him on his 70th birthday; and 1.5 linear feet of photographs.

The correspondence in this collection concerns behavior genetics, evolution, heredity, etc. There is material relating to the congresses of the Permanent International Committee on Genetics, and the IXth (Bellagio, 1953), Xth (Montreal, 1958), and XIth (The Hague, 1963) International Congress of Genetics. There is also correspondence pertaining to the Cold Spring Harbor Symposium on Quantitative Biology (1955), the Mendel Semi-Centennial Symposium (1950), the Soviet geneticists' visit to the U.S. in 1967, and to Anton R. Zhebrak.