The William Weintraub fonds documents Weintraub's career in documentary film and literature covering the period between approximately 1950 to 2000. The fonds falls into four series: (1) literary correspondence, (2) literary activities, (3) documentary filmmaking, and (4) biographical materials, personal correspondence, and career ephemera, documenting Weintraub's early life as well as theatre programs, pamphlets, and other collected material. Weintraub's career as a documentary film maker both as a freelance and with the NFB (1965-1986) with some 150 films to his credit is well documented including his work in Africa. The material includes scripts, research notes and correspondence. In some cases copies of the films are included. Material related to the NFB also includes newsletters, office files, and correspondence. The material documenting Weintraub's literary career includes drafts, proofs, correspondence and reviews for his two novels Why Rock the Boat? (1961) and The Underdogs (1979). In addition, the former was made into a film and extensive files relate to this. The latter novel was adapted for the stage and drafts, publicity and material relating to the controversy it aroused are included. Weintraub's book on Montreal in 1940s and 1950s City Unique (1996) is documented with extensive research files, drafts, reviews and correspondence. The literary correspondence with Mavis Gallant (127 letters), Brian Moore (603 letters) and Mordecai Richler (210 letters) constitutes a major source for the study of three prominent Canadian writers in the last half of the twentieth century. In addition, there are copies of 280 letters from Weintraub to Moore and 123 copies of letters from Weintraub to Richler. While the Gallant correspondence dates primarily from the 1980s with only 8 letters from 1950-1951, the Moore and Richler correspondence is continuous from the 1950s. This latter correspondence reveals the close involvement of Weintraub in the development of the work of both Moore and Richler.

The collection consists of documents amassed by Roderick Mackenzie. Among the Masson manuscripts there are other series of letters; as well as journals kept by North-Westers and various business documents. Some of this material exists as originals; others are contemporary copies - the George Keith letters for example are contemporary copies on paper watermarked 1827. The collection also includes some duplicate texts - contemporary copies or later nineteenth-century copies that in some cases represent edited versions of the texts. Samuel Wilcocke's account of the death of Benjamin Frobisher exists in a draft original (or contemporary copy) and in a late nineteenth-century clean copy. Of course Benjamin Frobisher did not die in the dramatic circumstances as recorded by Wilcocke, but peacefully in Quebec City in 1821.

This series consists of research, writing, and correspondence files relating to Casey Wood's major and minor publications and unpublished works, as well as, others assisting in Wood's publications, research, or writing about Wood. The majority of the research and writing materials for Wood's published and unpublished works were created between 1920-1940, while other materials collected during Wood's life, those associated with his memoir and obituary, date from approximately 1850-1943.
Some prominent writings by Wood include “Introduction to the Literature of Vertebrate Zoology” (1921-1956), his unpublished memoir (ca. 1850-1939), “Fundus Oculi” (1911-1934), Wood family history (1920-1940), “Birds of Fiji” (1920-1928), “Through Forest and Jungle in Kashmir and North India” (1921-1934); Persian, Arabic and Hindustani manuscripts (1927-1934); and “The Art of Falconry” (1942).
The series consists of many volumes and files containing a number of record types including manuscripts, typescripts, proofs, publications, photographs, correspondence, clippings, printed material, postcards, journals, administrative and financial records, and artwork. Some of the volumes are scrapbooks containing many of these materials mounted within, while others include similar materials bound within. These volumes do not necessarily have a clear organization but are sometimes arranged chronologically or by correspondent.

There are 2230 incoming and outgoing pieces of correspondence including letters, postcards, notes, telegrams, and cards. Subseries 1) Introduction to the Literature of Vertebrate Zoology includes 1313 pieces of correspondence, the largest number of correspondence within the collection.

The collection consists of fifteen volumes, primarily manuscript with some printed, containing over 1,300 culinary and medical handwritten recipes, plus numerous loose recipes also mainly manuscript. The documents in the collection originated chiefly from the Doncaster area of South Yorkshire, centred on Hooten Pagnell Hall. Many of the manuscripts and notes are signed by or addressed to Sarah Anne Warde. Series 1 comprises the fifteen bound volumes, two of which are printed works by female authors, while the remaining thirteen are manuscript notebooks. Two of these manuscript notebooks are attributed to Sarah Anne Warde, while one is attributed to Eliza Smithson. The manuscript attributed to Eliza Smithson contains table setting riddles (also known as an enigmatical bill of fare). Loose recipes are found in Series 2. This series consists of approximately 300 culinary, medical, and household recipes dating from roughly the 1780s through the 1850s.

These papers comprise a fair copy, for the press, of "Gale on Redeemable Annuities", 1816, as well as copies of letters to his son concerning the supplement to his "Treatise on the Nature and Principles of Redeemable Annuities", 1817. Apparently neither treatise was published.

The fonds documents Ken Norris’s academic, professional and personal activities and career as an English literature teacher, Canadian writer and poet. There are also materials related to his university student life in Montreal. The records contains a wide variety of personal and professional correspondence between 1972-1990 with correspondents such as Endre Farkas, Margaret Atwood, Leonard Cohen, David McFadden, Cynthia Lapp, George Bowering, and James Polk. Manuscripts and notebooks document his writing activities and include rough drafts, edited drafts, final drafts, completed manuscripts, as well as published books, articles and his academic dissertations.

The collection consists of four early Irish manuscripts assembled by the Montreal collector Edward Murphy as part of his private library. The manuscripts include a copy of The Midnight Court (Cúirt an mheán oíche) by Brian Merriman, the Life of St. Patrick by John Chambers, Tri Biorghaoithe an Bhais (Three shafts of death) by Geoffrey Keating, and a fragment of an Irish vocabulary (Nuadhfoclóir bogcruaideach).

This subseries consists of 11 volumes, correspondence files, and a box of notecards dated from 1921-1956 relating to Wood's publication “An Introduction to the Literature of Vertebrate Zoology” published in 1931 and collection development within the Emma Shearer Wood and Blacker Libraries at McGill University. The volumes and files contain correspondence, handwritten and typed annotated manuscripts, proof sheets, the publication, notecards listing recipients of the publication, prints, printed ephemera, clippings, financial and administrative records, book reviews, and McGill Library catalogue listings related to the works within “An Introduction to the Literature of Vertebrate Zoology.” Additional professional projects are also represented in the subseries including “Coloured Plates of the Birds of Ceylon,” the Passing of John III, and Wood’s translation of Benevenutus Grassus’ de Oculis.
There are 1313 incoming and outgoing correspondence letters, telegrams, and cards; the largest volume in the collection. The correspondents are located internationally and include public, academic, government, and army libraries; museums, clubs and societies, literary journals, publishers, etc.. Some individuals and companies addressed include Lillian Bates, William Henry Mousley, Gerhard R. Lomer, W. W. Francis, Robert de Resillac Roese, S. R. Burrell, Robert Blacker, Miss Hanington, Elizabeth E. Abbott, John and Edward Bumpus Ltd., Oxford University Press, Sun Engraving Co., Parker & Sons Ltd., Herbert Putnam, George Iles, Colonel F. H. Garrison, Dr. Melville Black, W. J. Belcher, Smithsonian Institute, Dr. Maude Abbott, Dr. A. D. Blackader, R. R. James, Pierpont Morgan Library, Humphrey Milford, Basil H. Soulsby, William F. Petersen, University of Illinois College of Medicine, Natural History Museum, Dr. Robert A. Millikan, Douglas H. Campbell, A. J. Swann, Sir Arthur W. Currie, Alexander Wetmore, E. Cowles Andrus, and John Johnson.

Fonds consists of a late seventeenth-century manuscript containing a critical commentary on Machiavelli's The Price, created for the use of Agostino Cerretari.

The fonds documents Dorothy Duncan’s personal and professional activities as an American-born Canadian writer and painter, primarily between 1930 and her death in 1957. Duncan’s career as a writer is represented by scrapbooks, clippings, and photographs related to her published works, two unpublished manuscripts, and contracts and correspondence with publishers and her literary agent in New York. Her activities as a painter are documented in clippings, lists of paintings, and contracts with art galleries. The fonds also contains personal correspondence, including letters from friends, family, fans, and a significant number of letters from her husband, Hugh MacLennan. Duncan’s notebooks and diaries also attest to her personal and professional activities. They document her early adulthood in Illinois and her later life in Montreal, and include notes, agendas, and a ledger. The fonds also contains two albums of personal photographs.