Adolph F. Herzog (1906-1997) was an aeronautical engineer who worked for the Pitcairn Aircraft Company, the Pitcairn-Cierva Autogiro Company, and later for the Platt-LePage Aircraft Company. The Platt-LePage Aircraft Company was a manufacturer of aircraft for the armed forces, including the first helicopter to be acquired by the U.S. Army. The collection contains several items related to the Platt-LePage Helicopter Company and Wynn Laurence LePage (1902-1989).

For what appears a brief moment in early aviation history, the Wright Brothers competed their airplanes in public demonstrations. The Curtiss Exhibition Co.'s Glenn Curtiss piloted one of his biplanes, and Walter Brookins piloted a Wright biplane. Three photos show the Curtiss biplane on the beach before take-off with a Boardwalk crowd nearby. Two others show the Curtiss and Wright airplanes separately in flight.

The collection consists of photographs taken during the first years of the United States Post Office Department air mail service. Many of these photographs are portraits of individual air mail service pilots. The first use of air mail in the United States occurred in September, 1911, while the first air mail route from Washington to New York via Philadelphia started in 1918. A transcontinental route was established by 1920. In 1925 the government transitioned out of the air mail business with the passage of the Kelly Air Mail Act, which called for commericial airlines to bid on air mail routes established by the Post Office.