Begun in 1927 by University of Oklahoma history professor Edward Everett Dale, the Western History Collections gathers and preserves rare research materials for scholars in anthropology, Native American studies, Oklahoma history, and the history of the American West. This guide has been compiled to make the photographs in the collections more accessible. The second edition adds descriptions of 165 new collections comprising 159,000 photographs.

The 826 photograph collections that this guide thus details encompass Native American culture; frontier and pioneer life in Oklahoma and Indian territories; Wild West shows; the range cattle industry; the petroleum industry; and gunfighters, outlaws, and lawmen. New additions include the Lucille Clough Collection of 1,800 prints, postcards, and stereograph cards of American Indians and Alaska Natives, and First Peoples of Canada.