Series I. Birds of America contains material related to the original double Elephant folio publication of Birds of America, published in numbers from 1827 to 1838. Plates for this edition were aquatinted by Robert Havell, Jr., after drawings by Audubon, and were hand-colored both by Havell's studio staff and Audubon's wife and children. This series is arranged into three subseries: Pattern Proof Prints, Loose Plates, and Facsimiles and Reproductions.

The fifteen color proof prints were used as patterns for the colorists of the aquatints. These sheets give primary and detailed evidence about the coloring process; several have penciled color notations, and one has a notation for textual change. Eleven loose plates from the double Elephant Folio edition, all marked with Havell's name, are also included. One of these, the White-headed Eagle, appears in both uncolored and colored format. Several modern reprints of Audubon's birds can also be found in this series.

Prints are arranged by plate number, where known.

Series II. Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America was issued from 1845 to 1848. Six loose plates of small animals from that book are held here. All are hand colored lithographs by J. T. Bowen after drawings by John James Audubon.

These prints are housed flat in a map case.

Series III contains nineteenth century material that does not readily fit into the above two series. A lithograph of a "Marsh Hen," by the firm Childs and Inman of Philadelphia and published in 1832, is one of a very few known copies of this print; the only one of Audubon's birds to be separately printed in this format. Little documentary evidence exists of Audubon's foray into lithography, but the print is thought to have been drawn on stone by Albert Newsam in the summer of 1832.

Included in this series are four of John James Audubon's calling cards; all but one note his distinction as a "Fellow of the Royal Linnean Societies of London." A prospectus dated June 1834 announces the forthcoming publication of the double Elephant folio of Birds of America, and seeks subscribers. The series also includes a title page from and another prospectus for the 1860 double Elephant size reissue of Birds of America, with chromolithography by J. Bien, which was published by Roe, Lockwood, and Son, of New York.