The collection includes biographical information; personal memorabilia; extensive correspondence with Mr. Zerk's family in Europe and America; correspondence, minutes of meetings, speeches, and other documentation relating to his interest in the Kenosha Symphony; information about his first three wives; extensive courtship correspondence between Oscar and Dorothy; personal papers of Dorothy Rynders Zerk, a former beauty queen and secretary to federal judge F. Ryan Duffy, including clippings, personal correspondence, wedding memorabilia, a folder concerning her 1928 Wauwatosa High School class, information about various trips she made between 1938 and 1953, and hate mail which she received when her engagement to Oscar was announced warning her of his alleged sexual proclivities. There are also files about Zerk's Kenosha estate, Dunmovin, that document its purchase from Henry Cooper in 1939; its restoration and development, including landscape plans developed by Jens Jensen; social galas held at the estate; and later plans to sell or develop the property. Photographs mainly document Oscar Zerk's participation in World War I, his family, Dunmovin, Dorothy's heyday as a beauty queen, Oscar's first company and home in Cleveland, Ohio, social events at Dunmovin, his natural history collections, and Oscar and Dorothy's 1954 wedding.
