The records of the Wisconsin Federation of Business and Professional Women's Clubs (WFBPW) have been arranged into five groups: general correspondence, proceedings, projects, local club and membership files, and miscellany.

The PROCEEDINGS offers the most comprehensive documentation on the organization's history. During its early years, these records, which consist of minutes of board meetings and conventions, officer and committee reports, financial information, and occasional transcriptions of speeches and remarks, were filed together in one chronologically-arranged group. Beginning in the 1960s, however, BPW filed some of these types of records separately while still other types of records were combined into a new group of records entitled president's reports. The files for the period from the late 1960s through the 1980s were microfilmed by the federation, which fixed the papers in a somewhat inconsistent and haphazard order. In addition, the microfilming was done without the use of a counter for access and indexing purposes. The minutes for the period 1921-1929 were received in a deteriorated condition (possibly as the result of a microfilming project for which the film was not received by the Historical Society). These volumes were filmed by the Society to assure their preservation. Despite these obstacles to the use of the microfilmed material, the papers, together with the federation's publication Wisconsin Business Woman, which is available in the Society Library, remain an important source for studying the changing attitudes and interests of working women in Wisconsin.

GENERAL CORRESPONDENCE is primarily concerned with early conventions and other state matters. Some correspondence may be found scattered in the president's report files for the period 1969-1984, but other than this there are no files of officers' correspondence for the period 1950-1985.

The PROJECTS files reflect the organization's diverse interests in behalf of working women and conservation primarily during the 1930s and 1940s. Most extensive are the files on cooperation with Trees for Tomorrow. There are a few photographs related to this and other forestation projects.

LOCAL CLUB AND MEMBERSHIP FILES include applications for affiliation, membership statements, which list the occupations of all members, and other summary membership reports.

MISCELLANY contains citations received by the state organization, various written histories and Fifty Years of Progress, some material concerning conferences, legislative platforms, and a handbook of policies and procedures.