This collection is comprised of papers pertaining to Admiral Lewis Lichtenstein Strauss, his career, and his community and organizational activities. He belonged to such groups as the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, Temple Emanu-El in New York, the American Jewish Committee, the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, the Jewish Agricultural Society, and the Union of Hebrew Congregations.

His papers include extensive correspondence, organizational and institutional records, photographs, and publications which document his personal and public life as well as American Jewish issues that he was involved with such as relief efforts for Jewish refugees from Central Europe, interest and involvement in the Reform movement, and endeavors to combat anti-Semitism, especially as propagated by Father Charles E. Coughlin and Henry Ford.

The Records of the Board of Delegates of American Israelites (1859-1878) documents the life cycle of the Board of Delegates, a Jewish civil rights organization located in New York City. The Board served in a two-fold function: acting as a central organization for American Jews and working on behalf of Jews abroad. To the latter end, the Delegates collaborated with the Committee of Deputies of British Jews and the French Alliance Israélite Universelle to provide for the relief and aid, civil, and religious rights of Jews throughout the Americas, Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East, particularly Romania, Ottoman Palestine including Jerusalem, and Morocco.

In the U.S., the Delegates were partially responsible for the appointment of the first Jewish Military Chaplain and surveyed member synagogues concerning the history and size of their congregation, the first organization to systematically record this type of information in the States. The Delegates merged with the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC) in 1878 and dissolved in 1925. Correspondents include Adolph Crémieux, Sir Moses Montefiore, Benjamin Franklin Peixotto, Isaacs S. Myer, the Rev. Dr. Arnold Fischel, and Maj. General Benjamin Butler. Documents include correspondence, minutes, committee reports, memorials, announcements, surveys, some printed material including clippings, and a 1932 Rabbinical thesis on the Delegates by Allan Tarshish.

This collection contains writings, minutes, financial records, correspondence, printed materials, newspaper clippings, and photographs relating to Broido's employment, investments, and Jewish and non-Jewish communal activities. It includes material regarding the department store, Gimbel Bros. (1934-1966), where he was associated with Bernard Gimbel, and where he served as Executive Vice President and as Chairman of the Advisory Committee (1953-1961); Temple Emanu-El (1957-1970), where he served as trustee and opposed secession from the Union of American Hebrew Congregations; the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (1944-1976), serving as President from 1965-1975, and where he was involved in the investigation of the Charles Jordan murder in Prague (1967); the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (1953-1972) where he served as trustee and played an active role in financial matters and relations with the Hebrew Union College; the United Jewish Appeal (1941-1972) where he served as President (1951-1952), trustee and member of the Board of Directors; the New York City Community College (1956-1972) where he served as trustee; and the Department of Commerce and Industrial Development of the City of New York (1961-1971) where he served as Commissioner (1961-1966).

The Papers of Max J. Kohler (1871-1934) document his life's work as lawyer, historian, writer, researcher, and defender of Jewish and immigrant rights. Correspondents include many of Kohler's contemporaries in the field of history and immigration law including Cyrus Adler; William Taft; John Bassett Moore; Mortimer Schiff; David Hunter Miller; Baron and Baroness de Hirsch; the Straus Family including Oscar Straus; Luigi Luzzatti; Leon Huhner; and Julian Mack. Subjects include U.S. immigration law, American-Jewish history, Col. Alfred Dreyfus, Haym Salomon, Ellis Island, Rabbi Kaufmann Kohler, the publication God in Freedom, international treaties, and the Peace Conference of 1919.