Fonds consists of materials created and accumulate by Dana Porter during his personal and professional career, as well as materials collected posthumously and created and accumulated by his wife and children. Includes photographs, correspondence, research notes, essays and other writings, ephemera, scrapbooks and clippings.

Fonds consists of one painting by Peter Etril Snyder of the Dana Porter Library. The work was commissioned in 1975 for the home of the then President of the University, Burt Matthews.