The Clayton Papers are a highly selective collection of Clayton's correspondence, research notes, and miscellaneous data, emphasizing her work on Drosophila. Her teaching and administrative commitments at the University of Arkansas are documented. Her work with Hampton L. Carson on the Hawaiian Drosophila Project is well represented with slides, notes, and specimens.

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 The Carson Papers (1921-1993) contain correspondence, subject files, manuscripts of published and unpublished works by Carson, papers by colleagues and students, research notes, course materials, photographs, and biographical information, which documents Carson's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.