Diaries, research notes, photographs, personal papers. Includes handwritten notebooks; notes from the Archer family letters; material of Peter Fitzallen MacDonald; research material to her PhD (1986); correspondence, photographs, research notes, newspaper cuttings and/or reviews to her some of her publications including: Cattle Country (UQP, 1988), Rockhampton : a history of city and district (UQP, 1981), A Proud Name, Gladstone : city that waited (Boolarong Press, 1988), Letters of an Australian Pioneer Family, 1927-1880 (written with Graeme Bucknall), West of Matilda (CQU Press, 2001), Magic ships (CQU Press, 1997), Over earth and ocean (UQP, 1999), Treasures in a Tea Tin (privately published), Capricornia sketch book (CQUP, 2001). Also includes typescripts of speeches, talks and papers by Lorna on a variety of subjects; two letters from Elizabeth Gilmour (John Denis Fryer's sister) from 1976; and some correspondence from Judith Wright.

A collection of letters mainly from Australia, written between the years 1833 and 1855, for the most part to William and Julia Archer of Tolderodden, Laurvig, Norway, by those of their sons who emigrated within this period to New South Wales.