Scope and Contents: This collection consists of over 100 boxes of correspondence and manuscripts, scrapbooks, photographs, tapes, audio recordings, and 46 books. In addition to incoming and outgoing letters, the correspondence files include notes, clippings, other types of printed material, some photographs, and a few early diaries. These materials relate to Lawson's time in prison, his film career, and personal relationships. The following are of particular interest and significance: correspondence from Edna St.Vincent Millay and Charles Chaplin, material concerning the Screenwriter's Guild and the blacklist, a folder on Cry, the Beloved Country, and audio recordings of some of his lectures, a Kathrine Hepburn address on behalf of the Hollywood Ten, and Lawson's appearance before the House Un-American Activities Committee in Washington, D.C., in 1947.