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Alma Williams, author of the 1975 book, Educating the Consumer: A Practical Guide, advocated for consumers around the world. Based in Great Britain, Williams was an active member of the International Organization of Consumers Unions (IOCU). Through her work with IOCU, she traveled extensively throughout Europe, Israel, Asia, and the Pacific Region to work with consumer advocacy organizations. Williams served as IOCU’s representative to UNESCO. Her collection includes numerous IOCU programs, proceedings, and reports as well as a questionnaire for consumer advocates and an outline of her tasks at an IOCU Regional Office.
Within Williams' collection, there is evidence of her work for IOCU’s Asia and Pacific Regional Workshop on Consumer Testing and Research. One organization she worked with was the Pacific Institute for Broadcasting Development. Materials from this group include scripts for programs targeting consumer products such as shampoo, detergent, and acne preparations.
Williams’ involvement in other international consumer organizations is represented through a variety of documents including conference proceedings, correspondence, papers, consumer education materials, and reports. Some of the organizations she had ties with are the Hong Kong Consumer Council, the Council of Europe, the International Congress on the Children of the Fourth World, Consumers Association, and Consumer Assembly (based in Great Britain).
Williams’ focus on educating consumers is evident in her papers. There is a booklet about adult education and television, a consumer education kit for teachers in Penang, and a paper titled Definition of Consumer Education from Consumer’s Association in London which, interestingly, quotes Dr. Richard L. D. Morse. Also of interest is correspondence from a House of Lords sub-committee member about her upcoming testimony to that group. On a lighter note, there is a caricature of Williams, as well as a handwritten score for a tune titled Consumer Rights, by Samuel Liew.
A letter in the donor file reveals that Williams remained active in the consumer movement in her later years continuing to represent IOCU at UNESCO, working with overseas consumer organizations, and developing a safety curriculum for the European Commission targeted at children in secondary schools. She noted the curriculum was for twelve countries and would be in nine languages.

Collection primarily contains amateur radio club QSLs, administrative/program materials, and station logs.

The American Council on Consumer Interests (ACCI) records document the activities of the group from its beginning in 1953 through 1983.
The first series contains incoming and outgoing correspondence of the executive directors, Edward Metzen (1973-1976), Karen Stein (1975-1978), Mel Zelenak (1978-1982), and Barbara Slusher (1984- 1986). The correspondence pertains mainly to payment of membership dues, a proposed site relocation, 1978, and publications.
The second series, the board of directors, consists of minutes from board meetings and annual reports to the board from the executive directors (1976-1982).
The third series, committees, is one of the largest comprising forty-three folders. The executive committee sub-series (1956- 1982) contains correspondence, agendas, annual reports, and documents concerning annual business meetings, meetings, conference calls, and miscellaneous matters.
The membership committee (1972-1977) is the second sub-series and contains correspondence regarding membership in ACCI and a promotional manual. Conferences is another sizable series in the records. It spans the years 1953-1978 and is housed in one box. In this series is information about each annual conference including registration, program, finances, and planning.
The fifth series contains financial documents. It is divided into three sub-series; financial documents (1955-1983), grants (1963- 1981), and Internal Revenue Service (1967-1979). The first sub-series includes monthly, budget, and accountants reports, financial projections, and miscellaneous items. The grants sub-series contain information on grants applied for and/or received from Consumer's Union and the Office of Consumer Education. The third sub-series, Internal Revenue Service, has information pertaining to tax status, employee withholding, and miscellaneous tax information.
The last series contains miscellaneous material for the years 1965-1982. It concerns the following; ACCI history (a history of ACCI written by Henry Harap in 1969 is found here), an internship program that began with the Conference of Consumer Organizations, a booklet on lobbying by public interest charities, National Consumers Week, and testimonies from the Consumer Federation of America.

The Americans for Fairness in Lending (AFFIL) records (2000-2010) consists primarily of memos, reports, web data administration, research correspondence (emails and letters), artifacts, and publicity (print and electronic) generated by a non-profit organization (NPO) underwritten primally by large grants from the Beldon Russonello & Stewart, Ford, and the Annie Casey Foundation to advocate for changes in state and federal laws governing business lending practice.
The records, collected into seven boxes, have been arranged to reflect the organization's multifaceted public relations campaign against unfair lending practices in tandem with consumer state and national-level events, including the release of independent film documentaries, the rise of social media programs, the 2008 presidential election, the 2009 Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure (CARD) Act and the 2010 passage of the Dodd-Frank Bill, which created the federal Consumer Protection Bureau.
The Administrative Files Series (2004-2010) consists of two boxes of correspondence (print and email), handbooks, grant applications, meeting minutes, letters of agreement, and employee notes relating to organizational growth. They are arranged in alphabetical order by subject. Some noteworthy items relating to the internal structure of the organization, including the "All About AFFIL" handbook, the search for outside funders, notes relating to conference calls with consumer movement experts, and the organization's strategic plan for the 2008 election cycle. Another key feature of this series includes AFFIL's agreements with the Ford Foundation, the public relations firm of Benesen Jansen Advertizing, the National Consumer Law Center, and Public Interest Research Group (PIRG) project agreements.
Finally, researchers of social media, such as Youtube and blogs, will also find several topics in this series of special interest, including the development of the organization's website, the tracking of web statistics, the creation of electronic contented targeting internet users, and the on-line outreach initiatives.
The Meetings Series (2005-2010) spans two boxes arranged in alphabetical order by subject and by date, containing correspondence, notes, and annotated research utilized in the planning and execution of discussions concerning different issues concerning the organization. The majority of the files in this series concern the formulation and execution of AFFIL's public interest policies.
Several folders relate to the division of administrative tasks and the formation of business policies for committee assignments, partners, contractors, consultants, the press, and the general consumer movement community, including AFFIL's general principles, field outreach strategy sessions as well as staff meetings and periodic discussions with the National Consumer Law Center. Other files contain documentation related to the organization's periodic updates to funders concerning their ongoing activities, including the Ford Foundation and the Annie Casey Foundation. Still, other files concern conversations between the organization and Magnolia Studios in trying to create a public relations campaign to promote AFFIL issues through the release of their documentary on American predatory lending business practices, Maxed Out.
Other sections of this series include files relating to conversations between employees and the Federal Reserve Board, whistle-blowers, lending victims, and members of the military. Finally, this series also collects material and advice provided in conversations with outside firms, such as Benesen Jensen, focus groups reviewing advertising campaigns, the National Council of La Raza, and web-based providers.
The Research Series encompasses two boxes of reports, newsletters, internet data, court documents, whistleblower, witness, and victim case files, government documents, and internally generated public relations campaign data.
Arranged in alphabetical order by date, these files comprise the heart of the collection, revealing the sources, data, and political focus of the Americans for Fairness in Lending. Some folders contain information generated by the United States government, including the Federal Reserve Board, National Usury Cap Legislation, S.500, 2009, and the California Reinvestment Act.
Other folders collect documents relating to different aspects of credit card and intermediary lending company operations, including Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, medical debt, the Navy Federal Credit Union, the case files of a whistleblower, witnesses, and victims, Ritzen v Chase court files, and a brief history of the practice of usury. Still, other folders collect lending information generated by the entertainment industry, consumer groups, and noted AFFIL associates, including the television show Boston Legal, ACORN, AARP, the Legal Aid Society, the NAACP, the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, and the Consumer Federation of American.
Several folders also contain information collected by AFFIL contractors, including focus group data, Kansas district voting patterns, marketing statistics, and targeted population demographics. Finally, this series also contains accumulated consumer lessons from different sources on a wide variety of topics, including Christmas holiday tips, lending and collection abuse guides, mortgage advise, student loans, and payday provisions.
The Publicity Series spans three boxes, collecting the artifacts, posters, and media related to the organization's public relations campaigns. Several folders collect documents generated for Maxed Out Screenings, including fliers, questionnaires, house party lists. Other files hold fact cards, business cards, fliers, press kits, and reports, which AFFIL distributed at consumer conferences.
Some of the artifacts collected in this series also include promotional folders, hats, and visors. The strength of this series, however, remains the collection of DVD, CD, microcassette, VHS recordings of AFFIL videos and advocate interviews on several news magazine programs, including Nightline, Fox Business, and 60 Minutes. Finally, a number of small and large posters depicting lending and mortgage horror stories featured as part of AFFIL's on-going campaigns have been retained for preservation in this series. P. Thomsen April 6, 2011 Rev. April 11, 2011

These materials are the A. Q. Miller School of Journalism and Mass Communication's accreditation self-study report and re-accreditation recommendation from 2013-2014.

The materials within this collection relate mostly with Consumer Financial Archives and Office of Financial Accounts. Within those two categories, the materials include: historical documents, meeting minutes, assembly information, and information on the board of directors, correspondence, committee information and financial records. This information ranges from 1963 to 1983.

Items in the collection span 1961–1986 and include informative pamphlets, leaflets, guidebooks, and research relating to consumer interests and consumer behavior. Illustrated pamphlets published by the Bay Area Neighborhood Development address consumer issues such as signing contracts, buying food and appliances, and paying rent. Several pamphlets are in Spanish. Booklets offer advice to co-ops on campaigning, organizing, running, and reporting to owners, and include three authored by Mr. Danforth. One file labeled Center for Consumer Research contains flyers, research materials, newsletters, and correspondence. A publication titled "To Tell the Truth," published by the Cooperative League of the United States, provides an “illustrated outline of some of the consumer information and protection activities of American cooperatives.” Copies of KONSUM, the League’s newsletter, span 1972–1977. A newsletter towards the end of the run noted a lack of adequate funding for the League and stated budget cuts would limit the number of newsletters distributed. The collection has publications from Frontier Cooperative Herbs and Midland Cooperatives, Inc. as well as a copy of the Golden Jubilee Journal and Kazan Memorial publication from the Amalgamated Housing Corporation (also listed as the Amalgamated Housing Cooperative). The Journal contains historical and biographical information about the co-op from 1951–1977, as well as congratulatory letters from Presidents Carter and Ford. Interestingly, there is a 1979 research paper about growth in consumer cooperatives from 1960–1980 by Ann Hoyt, an instructor in the Department of Family Economics at Kansas State University, in the collection. No tie to K-State is evident.