This collection houses research files, data, publications (usually describing the use of the stelometer, arealometer, and fibrograph or referencing the lab's achievements in developing more precise versions of these tools), reference materials, and patent files documenting the activities of the University of Tennessee's Cotton Fiber Research Laboratory. The collection also contains records of various conferences where the scientists presented their research, including manuscript and final drafts of these papers.

Series I, by far the largest division of the collection, consists primarily of research and data files generated by the lab or received from other sources. Some correspondence is present as well. Most of the material dates from Hertel's tenure (approximately 1938-1975), but there is some material from later years.

Series II includes notes on conferences that the Lab's researchers attended and information from other sources (including the USDA, UT's Agricultural Experiment Station, and UT's Center for Materials Processing) that the lab collected. Series III houses draft, manuscript, and final copies of scholarly publications produced by the lab. Series IV consists of reprints and theses used as reference material. Series V contains documents produced in cooperation with Cotton Incorporated in the mid-1990's. Series VI houses the lab's patent materials.