Collection includes material pertaining to Merritt's years at Cornell, including a student scrapbook of photographs, programs, and pamphlets; loose photographs of colleagues, laboratory equipment, and Cornell views; Merritt's notes on lectures concerning electricity, magnetism, thermodynamics, and theoretical mechanics; four volumes of notes taken by teaching assistant Ernest Blaker (Ph.D. 1901) at Merritt's lectures, as well as undated notes on advances in experimental physics; calculations and notes; Physics Department annual reports, 1917-33; resolutions, reports, minutes, and statements of various committees of the Graduate Faculty concerning Graduate School requirements, and elections and organization of the faculty; and correspondence and other papers concerning the Board of Trustees and the deanship of the College of Arts and Sciences. Also, correspondence, charts, reports, and a scrapbook of photographs pertaining to Merritt's work at the New London Naval Academy, 1917-20, including correspondence from R. A. Millikan; correspondence regarding colleagues in Germany, 1901-49, and an autographed portrait of Max Planck; correspondence and printed material on the history of the American Physical Society and other organizations; and correspondence and reports concerning submarine detection, 1941-42.

Also included are a diary, 1887; publications by Merritt (some in collaboration with Cornell Professor Edward L. Nichols) concerning luminescence and other subjects in physics; a letterpress copybook, 1896-1904, including letters concerning the Town and Gown Club, physics publications, and other topics; snapshots of family, friends, and Ithaca, New York views; and biographical materials relating to Edward L. Nichols.