This collection represents materials collected by Cyrus J. Sharer for his research on the iron and steel industry and particularly the world iron ore trade. The main emphasis is on the iron ore trade of the Great Lakes. The period covered, mid-1960s to mid-1980s, was one of crisis and reorganization in the American steel industry and in the lake ore trade, and this is reflected in the records.

George Bowen (1799-1879) founded a ship chandler's business in Newport, Rhode Island, around 1829, as the George Bowen & Company. The fragmentary records consist of sixteen volumes of account books, which describe the mechanics of the business and the retail trade in coal and wood, giving names of customers, quantities of goods bought and sold, and operating expenses.

The Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company was a mining and transportation company headquartered in present day Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania. The company was established in 1818, after merging the Lehigh Coal Company and the Lehigh Navigation company. The Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company continued to provide coal to mills and factories along the Schuylkill River until its dissolution in 1964. This collection includes one Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company stock certificate for two shares of capital stock.

Peter Arnold Karthaus (1765-1840) established a mercantile business in Baltimore trading with Germany, Holland, France, and the Caribbean. The receipt book was kept by a member of P.A. Karthaus & Company at Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and mostly deals with payments to individuals, pilots, and other laborers, engaged in Karthaus's arking business, typically wages, meals, boarding costs, and transportation back upstream.

Ice and coal companies delivered ice in summer and coal in winter to meet the growing demands of consumers and businesses for refrigeration and heat. The collection consists of trade cards from seventy-one companies that were used as advertisements and as order tickets for ice and coal.