Professor Ralph C. (Tuffy) McGoun (AC 1927) is responsible for creating the Dramatic Activities Collections between 1978 and 1984. McGoun, who was professor of Dramatics and the lighting and technical director for College productions, had been responsible for ensuring much of the 20th century documentation was saved in Kirby Theater. After McGoun retired, he became a dedicated volunteer in the College Archives. McGoun facilitated the transfer of the material preserved in Kirby. He worked with the Theater Department to transfer appropriate material. He added many items he had personally saved during his more than 60 years at the College. McGoun identified 19th century material from what has been the College's memorabilia in the former Hitchcock Memorial Room and brought it together into the developing Dramatic Activities Collection. While arranging and describing the collection, McGoun searched contemporary accounts of productions in College and local and national publications and added those accounts to the collection. He searched scrapbooks, bound volumes and photograph albums kept by students and identified and added any items that chronicled the dramatic arts at the College. He also arranged for ongoing transfer of material documenting College productions from the Department of Theater and Dance. Thus the Dramatic Activities Collection is a growing collection.

Between 1978 and 1984, Professor McGoun collected, arranged and described the nucleus of this comprehensive collection. Since different items were received at various times from different sources and were pulled together to form a collection, there was no original order to maintain. Additional items are added regularly and the listing amended. The original guide to the collection was in the form of a card catalogue providing alphabetical access by title of production to a chronological arrangement of material. The original card catalogue also included access to material by format and by general subjects relating to dramatic activities at the College. In 2002, the original card file was transferred into machine readable format. The collection was organized into 14 series reflecting the different formats and subjects represented in the collection. Access to the primary series, Dramatic Productions, was expanded to three access points - author of the play, title of the production and date of the performances.