Arranged chronologically and then by author.

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Chiefly consists of letters that MacLaren wrote to her parents. In the letters from Pine Tree Camp written in July, 1919 she describes the food, her activities and expenses, and relationships with other girls. Letters written to her parents while she was a student at Mount Holyoke College from 1922-1926 frequently mentions College traditions such as Mountain Day celebrations, Faculty Show, Junior Show, Junior Prom, Founder's Day, visits to Senior Towne House, and singing competitions. She refers to social and political interests of members of the College Community, particularly those related to pacifism and women's rights. She discusses her posture exam as a freshman, her expenses, smoking and violations of rules by students, fire drill procedures, and dances and parties. She also mentions the visitors to campus, Chapel speakers, the aftermath of the fire that destroyed the Rockefeller Hall dormitory in 1922, room choosing, and the deaths of several students. There are also many references to a large group of friends. In addition there is a substantial number of letters from her mother, a few from her father, and a good many from her college friends, written mostly during holidays or after graduation. The letters from her parents mostly respond to what MacLaren was writing and provide her with news from home. Those from 1927-1929 and concern family matters, housekeeping advice, clothes, finances, and the family's new home in Canton, Ohio. Some of her frequent correspondents from College are Josephine Fellows, Class of 1924, Helen Wismer Thurber, Class of 1924, and Dorothy Pyle, Class of 1925. Of special interest is her correspondence with Anne A. Noble McKeachie, Class of 1928, who was MacLaren's "little sister;" and Margaret B. Ream, Class of 1924, who was one of MacLaren's closest friends. Of note is Ream's letter from July 12, 1924 in which she explains that she tried to keep at a distance to avoid a "possible crush" between the two women. She advised MacLaren to pick her best friends from her own class. Included is a collection of a letter and love poetry by Sam Bryant, Margaret B. Ream's brother. The poetry is compiled in handmade books which include small seascape paintings. Included is MacLaren's travel correspondence with family and friends from her European tour in the summer of 1926. Also contains letters from her future husband, Allan Booth MacLaren, dating from 1933-1935. They were written during his business trips and express mostly his feelings for her with brief descriptions of the places he was staying.

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Consists of MacLaren's college diary and a travel diary. Her college diary dates from 1922-1926 and reflects her life at Mount Holyoke College. It contains brief descriptions of her activities, references to her health, several notes and report cards, a snapshot (probably of MacLaren and her friends), a list of "Books I want" and "Useful books," and quotations from her readings. Also included are many references to smoking and other forms of misconduct by students, "crushes and smashes" among students, discussions of sexuality by MacLaren and her friends, her relationships with several men, and the decline of religious life at the College. Her travel diary depicts a student tour of Europe in the mid-1920s written by a buoyant and enterprising college student.

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MacLaren's scrapbook is very extensive. It contains numerous snapshots of MacLaren and college friends, a table of body measurements from her freshman year, class schedule cards, report cards, cartoons of her friends, two slides she prepared for a zoology class, Commencement greetings, notes and letters, programs, newspaper clippings, and a few documents sent to her by her friends after her graduation.

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Memorabilia includes cards, newspaper clippings, wedding announcements and invitations, MacLaren's Commencement announcement, some Mount Holyoke College publications and programs, and handouts and notes for her economics and statistics classes. The memorabilia from MacLaren's European trip in 1926 includes travel guides, programs, postcards, stamps, labels, and hotel stationary.

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Consists of a page mentioning MacLaren's death in 2002 from the "Nursing Magazine of The Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing" at Case Western Reserve University, from which she graduated in 1932.

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The photographs include a portrait and several group photographs from MacLaren's Mount Holyoke College years, photographs and negatives from her European trip in 1926, and a photograph of her with her children on her eighty-ninth birthday, 1994.