Arranged chronologically.

The accounts and receipts contains both personal and business records, and are arranged by year. There are financial records documenting bar iron sold to customers, freight costs and tolls, lawyers' fees, newspaper subscriptions and advertisements, bonds and notes, land sales, medical expenses, blacksmith fees, general merchandise purchased, such as oats, cornmeal, flour, bacon, butter, beef, and whiskey, timber and livestock, hardware, cloth and linens, clothing, shoes, and sewing expenses, lodging and meals, and tuition and books. There are also satisfied promissory notes included in this series.

There are receipts for pig iron delivered to the Confederate States iron yard, and the Nitre and Mining Bureau during the Civil War. Also included are accounts and receipts related to the hiring of hands, and the advertising and apprehending of runaway slaves.

Also in this series are receipts for saddle and harness supplies, pads, bits, rings, skirting, leather, rivets, collars, animal hair, pads and lining. There are some copies of Buena Vista Saddle and Harness Company customer invoices.

Arranged chronologically by year. Some years are also organized by first letter of customer or company name. Those particular records are mainly satisfied promissory notes and accounts of Jordan and Jordan.

The subject files relate to iron manufacturing, the Buena Vista Saddle and Harness Company, the Jordan Manufacturing Company, and other activities. They contain information relating to the Jordan family's iron manufacturing businesses including inventories, improvements, and expenses at Bath Forge, Buena Vista Furnace, Grace Furnace, Gibraltar Forge, Jane Furnace, Lydia Furnace, and Victoria Furnace. There are records of Amherst Furnace, including accounts, receipts, letters, orders, costs, property, and inventories. There are accounts of sales by various iron consignment merchants, including substantial correspondence with Crenshaw and Company and Kent, Paine, and Company of Richmond. The subject files also include slave hire bonds and receipts, and bills of sale for slaves purchased by Jordan.

There are several files of note relating to Samuel F. Jordan's iron manufacturing operations during the Civil War. These include conscript details of persons exempted from military duty and detailed to work at Buena Vista Furnace. There is information relating to the impressment of Jordan's iron, cattle, and crops. Also included is a good deal of correspondence with the Confederate States of America Nitre and Mining Bureau, detailing Jordan's contract with the Bureau to supply pig iron suitable for the manufacture of weapons, as well as nails supplied to the Bureau. There are also records of Jordan's dealings with the Old Dominion Iron and Nail Works Company in Richmond, and their contract for the sale of pig iron, as well as numerous accounts. Lastly, there are records relating to the destruction of Buena Vista Furnace by Union forces on 13 June 1864, including inventories and values of property destroyed or confiscated.

Subject files relating to the Buena Vista Saddle and Harness Company include assets and liabilities, inventories of equipment and supplies, lists of shareholders, minutes of directors and stockholders meetings, stock certificates and subscriptions, and Wilbourn patent transfer agreements.

Other topics included in this series are agreements, bank accounts and protests, bills of lading and shipping receipts, information from various commission merchants, dealers of woodworking equipment, machinery, tanners, and leather companies, coal dealers, automobile companies, and grocers and general merchandise dealers.

There are records relating to Samuel F. Jordan's contract work with the North River Navigation Company in 1851, and also his work in 1870 for the James River and Kanawha Company to repair and restore various North River canals and locks to their condition prior to the flood in September 1870.

There are building specifications for various Jordan family homes, deeds, fee bills, orders for payments or goods, photographs (mostly unidentified), Buena Vista post office records, promissory notes, Bible records of the Smith Family of Rockingham and Rockbridge Counties, and North Carolina, suit papers, tax tickets and receipts, a copy of the will of Samuel F. Jordan (1872), and papers of the Waesche family, including correspondence, autograph books, accounts and receipts, and miscellaneous items.

Arranged alphabetically.

There are ledgers, daybooks, time books, letter books, minute book, stock ledger, cash ledger, order books, and inventory ledgers. These volumes contain financial records for the following businesses or entities: Jordan and Jordan, Lexington Foundry, Buena Vista Furnace, Amherst Furnace, Buena Vista Saddle and Harness Company, Lexington Mill, North River Canal, Buena Vista Cannery, North River Insurance Company, Buena Vista Hotel, and hardware business records of George W. Waesche. There are also four boxes containing small ledgers, memorandum books, account books, receipt books, time books, bank books, and catalogs and price lists from various companies and supply houses. For preservation purposes, the minute book and letter books of the Buena Vista Saddle and Harness Company have been microfilmed (Misc. Reels 5399-5400).

The Joseph Gilmore Papers, 1752-1836, relate to the activities of Joseph Gilmore, Sr. (ca. 1758-1830) of Rockbridge County, Virginia. This series is arranged alphabetically. It includes accounts and receipts, agreements, bills of sale, bonds, correspondence, deeds, estate papers of Thomas Lang, information on the sale and purchase of Gilmore's plantation "Sydney Vale," executions, fee bills, memorandum books, promissory notes, suit papers, surveys and land courses, and tax tickets.

Some items of note in the collection include tax collector's instructions (1802), signed by Edward Carrington (1748-1810), circulars from the Grand State Lottery of Maryland (1821), Mutual Assurance Society printed laws, constitution, and rules and regulations (1795, 1805), rules and regulations of the Natural Bridge Light Dragoons (1836), and a small pox vaccination list (1820).

The correspondence contains letters from relatives in Pulaski County, Kentucky, including James Gilmore (d. 1820) and John Gilmore (d. 1812), mainly involving family estate matters and land disputes.

The oversize series contains many of the same topics as can be found in the Subject Files. There are accounts and receipts, architectural drawings and plans, Buena Vista post office letter registers (1855-1864), Grand State Lottery of Maryland circulars, estate papers of Samuel F. Jordan, a Freemason's certificate (1780), land grants, Mutual Assurance Society policy (1803), presidential pardon (1865), life insurance policies of the Waesche family, and tax and duty abstracts (1800-1802).

There is one small box of ephemera containing leather samples, coins, purses and wallets, and saddle hardware, such as buttons, buckles, and rivets, and other miscellaneous items.