The Elvira Gaston Platt papers date from 1853 to 1974 and measure 1 linear inch. The papers include biographical and genealogical information on the Platt family, correspondence, property deeds and titles, printed materials, and four photographs. The core of the collection is the correspondence, comprised of letters by Elvira Platt to local newspapers, and to relatives, mostly among herslf and her husband's sisters, Mrs. Charlotte Platt Ricketts, and Mrs. MaryA. Platt Darwin. The letters range from 1853 to 1894 (years in which Elvira Platt was, for the most part, living in Iowa), and include discussions of the politics of anti-slavery on the eve of the Civil War, a Theodore Tilton speech on women's suffrage, dress reform, temperance reform, and divorce. The printed materials are articles from the last twenty-five years of the Platts' teaching careers among the Pawnee Indians of eastern Nebraska, and their underground railroad work. There are also reminiscences by Platt relatives of how Lester Platt smuggled African-Americans through Civil Bend, Iowa, on his wagon.

Apart from the deeds, photographs and some newspaper clippings, the materials are photocopies of typewritten transcriptions.

Elvira Platt's reminiscences were published in the reports of the Nebraska State Historical Society, and in the Kansas Historical Collections of 1915 to 1918. Additional papers of Elivra Gaston Platt are held at the Nebraska State Historical Society (Lincoln, Nebraska) and in the Oberlin College Archives (Oberlin, Ohio).