The Woman's Christian Temperance Union of Iowa records date from 1874 to 2006 and measure 18.75 linear feet. The records are arranged in twelve series: History, Administration, Annual conventions, County files, Local branches, Youth divisions, Newspaper clippings, Benedict Home, Education, Topical files, and Artifacts. The WCTU of Iowa Records document the growth and development of one of the largest women's groups in Iowa.

The History series (1887-2006) includes timelines, unpublished reports, and correspondence regarding the history of the WCTU as well as biographical writings on important figures in the WCTU of Iowa, the national WCTU, and the temperance movement in general. Most of the documents were organized in binders when the collection was donated to the IWA. A majority of the materials have been removed from binders and placed into folders. The organizational history records consist of the articles of incorporation, newspaper clippings, and lists of officers. The biographical profiles include a scrapbook maintained by Gertrude Walton of Earlham, Iowa, from the 1910s until the 1930s, tributes to Frances Willard, and pictures of WCTU members from national conventions.

The Administration series (1891-1998) consists of meeting minutes, financial records, and legal documents. The records of the Board of Trustees are both written and typed, which accounts for a duplication of some records. Some of the notebooks include minutes from both the Board of Trustees and the General Board, some minutes appear to be in the wrong notebook, and some minutes appear to pertain to the Board of Trustees of the Benedict House. Researchers should look through all of the minutes to find information pertinent to each administrative arm of the WCTU of Iowa. The "general officers" meetings seem to be the same as "general board meetings."

The legal documents include briefs, petitions, judicial orders and accompanying documents of WCTU's lawsuits, many of them related to property owned by the WCTU. The "wills" files contain letters, judicial notices, and notes from attorneys regarding wills that included WCTU as a legatee.

The Annual conventions series (1874-2005) consists of programs and proceedings for annual state, national, and international meetings of the WCTU. The convention records of the WCTU of Iowa (1874-1990) include proceedings from the first state convention in 1874 until 1990. They include lists of officers and department directors, the state president's annual address, officers' and departments' reports, convention resolutions, minutes of the board and general meetings of the convention, bylaws, district reports, and a directory of local clubs with contact information. The state organization split in two in 1890, when the WCTU of the State of Iowa was formed. This organization existed until 1906 when the two branches reunited. Proceedings of the WCTU of the State of Iowa are separated into their own subseries.

The contents of the national booklets (1889-2005) usually include a listing of all national officers and department [committee] members, the president's address, reports of officers and department chairs, minutes of the annual meeting, and lists of lifetime members. Older booklets also include extensive reports from all national committees, a copy of the by-laws, and quantitative membership information by state. For some years there are also programs, which were distributed ahead of the meeting, and separate pamphlets containing the president's address. Many booklets from national conventions that occurred prior to the mid-1930s are missing.

The County files (1886-2006) are arranged alphabetically by county. The amount, type, and dates of the information within each folder vary considerably. Information within each folder is often organized by city. Folders generally include membership lists and may also include brief chapter histories, pamphlets, photographs, programs, reports, and correspondence.

The Local branches series (1878-1995) is the largest series in the collection. The records are arranged alphabetically by county, then by city within each county. The bulk of records pertain to the WCTU of Le Mars and chapters located in Des Moines, Iowa. This series consists primarily of handwritten books that include meeting minutes and financial records. Many local branch records include membership lists and donation records; a few books include newspaper clippings and photographs of members. A record book maintained during the late nineteenth century by the Total Abstinence Union of Denison, Iowa, which was not a branch of the WCTU, completes this series.

The Youth divisions series (1930-1996) consists of scrapbooks and photo albums maintained by the Youth Temperance Council (YTC) and the Loyal Temperance League (LTL). The scrapbooks of the YTC include photographs of national officers, club advisors, and prominent authors of books about temperance from the 1930s until the 1950s. They also include itineraries from the annual YTC camp, held at Lake Ahquabi, in Indianola, Iowa, and from national conventions. The records of the LTL include temperance pledges, photographs, and handwritten minutes.

The Newsletters series (1891-2004) consists primarily of the WCTU Champion, the official monthly newsletter of the WCTU of Iowa. The original title of the monthly newsletter was the WCTU Bulletin, but it changed to the Champion in November 1906. The newsletters include presidential and treasurer reports, information about the Benedict Home, and summaries of legislative and educational initiatives. This collection is missing copies of the Champion published between 1909 and 1926. Issues from 1924 and 1925 are available at the State Historical Society of Iowa in Iowa City. Newsletters from the National WCTU and the White Ribbons branch of the WCTU, as well as temperance newsletters from organizations not affiliated with the WCTU complete the series.

The Newspaper clippings series (1884-1972) includes articles published in state and national newspapers that pertain to temperance, WCTU leaders, and crimes and accidents attributable to drugs or alcohol. A bound scrapbook of poetry completes the series.

The Benedict Home series (1879-1995) includes records pertaining to the administration of the Benedict Home in Des Moines, Iowa. It includes a handwritten account of the unmarried women who gave birth at the Benedict Home in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The bulk of the series consists of financial records, including donations, treasurers' reports, and endowment fund records.

The Education series (1889-1994) consists primarily of scrapbooks filled with newspaper clippings, brochures, and form letters that warn of the dangers of alcohol, drugs, tobacco, and gambling. Songbooks from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries complete the series.

The Topical files series (1879-1991) includes newspaper clippings, legal documents, correspondence, and photographs related to the WCTU of Iowa's work on a variety of issues. The largest topic in the series is prohibition. Records in the prohibition folders pertain primarily to Iowa WCTU initiatives, though a number of national WCTU efforts are addressed. The World War I folder includes photographs of US soldiers.

The Artifacts consist of small cloth bags labeled with city and county WCTUs of Iowa and a large cloth wall hanging with Sunday School temperance pledges from Exline, Iowa.