The Frances Hawthorne papers date from 1906 to 2000 (with the bulk dating from 1950 to 1996) and measure 2 linear feet. The papers are arranged in five series: Iowa Humanities Board Grant, Oral Interviews, Research Materials, Outside In, and Black History in Iowa.

The Iowa Humanities Board Grant series contains the 1991 letter awarding the African American History Project a major grant and the June 6, 1992 progress report.

The Oral Interviews series consists of audiocassettes and transcripts for interviews Frances Hawthorne conducted in the spring and summer of 1992. The interviews were conducted in several Iowa communities and contain a record of what it was like to grow up black in Iowa during the twentieth century. Those interviewed include: Frances Brewton (Des Moines), Geraldine Brown (Burlington), Frances Carson (Des Moines), Betty Jean Furgerson (Waterloo), Gwendolene Barry Harris (Des Moines), Marjorie Marsh (Ft. Madison), Artice Maxwell (Marshalltown), Bessie Spencer (Marshalltown) and Paul Wilson, who shared his memories of the now defunct Buxton, Iowa. The series also contains handwritten notes Frances Hawthorne took during the interviews. The towns listed are where the interviews took place, but describe the shared experience of growing up in various Iowa communities. For example, Brewton attended schools in Estherville, Davenport, Cedar Rapids and Iowa City; while Carson lived in both Clarinda and Red Oak before moving to Des Moines.

The Research Materials series contains journal articles, newspaper clippings, flyers and pamphlets, memoirs, and secondary sources that Frances Hawthorne collected about African Americans in Iowa. The series maintains Hawthorne's original filing system. The series begins with general materials regarding black history in Iowa. These materials include articles about blacks in Iowa, Hawthorne's handwritten research notes, articles regarding the Underground Railroad in Iowa, copies of the 1937-1941 "Federal Papers" concerning blacks in Iowa county by county, and a videocassette produced by Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity, Inc., entitled James P. Thompson: 51 Years in the Bond, 1941-1992. Thompson discusses what it was like to attend the University of Iowa in Iowa City as a black man, the history of the Kappa Alpha Psi Fraternity in Iowa City, and how fraternity brothers in Des Moines and across the state carried on the chapter's goals in their professional lives following graduation from the university.

The bulk of the Research Materials series consists of newspaper articles, flyers, pamphlets and notes about various Iowa communities, particularly Buxton and Des Moines. The Buxton materials include articles, an audiocassette of the 1992 Buxton Reunion Banquet, a copy of Reuben Gaines' memoir of growing up in Buxton and the videocassette You Can't Go Back to Buxton, produced for public television in 1979 and narrated by Mary Jane Odell. The Des Moines materials include articles, flyers, pamphlets, and handwritten notes. The series also contains secondary articles from various Iowa history journals. A copy of Hawthorne's resulting research, African-American History in Iowa: A Chronicle of Contributions, 1830-1992, is shelved in IWA's printed works collection.

The Outside In series contains Hawthorne's research files for the chapter she contributed to Outside In: African American History in Iowa, 1838-1998 on Iowa's black churches. The planning meeting materials consist of agenda programs and notes on publication. The chronological files contain notes and research materials from these time periods, and correspond to the sections of Hawthorne's chapter. The additional research files contain primary source materials such as newspaper clippings, church publications and photographs; and secondary source materials such as published articles on Iowa black history and two master's theses by Iowa State University students, "The Negro Church in Iowa," by Hazel Smith (1926) and "The Bystander: A History of the First 25 Years," by Sally Stevens Cotton (1983). The series concludes with Hawthorne's drafts of the chapter (titled "Chapter 8") and her bibliography.

The Black History in Iowa series contains materials Hawthorne collected about Iowa's African American history. These include pamphlets and information about black history events in Iowa, newspaper clippings on African American women, research on the Underground Railroad in Iowa and general newspaper clippings. The series includes six issues of The African-American Journal, a publication of the Iowa Commission on the Status of African Americans. The series concludes with the program from the National Iowa Club (an organization for black Iowans living outside the state) Reunion Homecoming in 1996. This spiral bound book contains many photographs and historical documents from Center Street, the heart of the African American neighborhood in Des Moines until the 1960s.