The collection consists of black-and-white photographic prints, working files, and correspondence of Marc Gaede, including materials created in collaboration with Marnie Walker Gaede and Robert Sundance, largely related to book projects between the mid 1970s and the late 1990s. Photographic materials include over 250 mounted prints of landscapes and portraits that appeared in photography books published under the Gaedes' Chaco Press, which include Images from the Southwest (1986), Bordertowns (1988), and Images from the Great West (1990), as well as several portraits of friends and family and other images. Working files exist for the same books as well as for Camera, Spade and Pen (1980), The Hopi Photographs (1988), and other published works on archaeology and conservation. These files are comprised of correspondence, publishing contracts and agreements, drafts, image lists, publicity materials, legal and financial documents, sound recordings, and other related materials.

A large portion of the collection consists of working files for Sundance: The Robert Sundance Story (1994), a biography of Lakota Sioux activist Robert Sundance written collaboratively by Sundance and Marc Gaede and edited by Marnie Gaede. The book tells the story of Sundance's struggle with and recovery from alcoholism, his famous court battle against the city and county of Los Angeles to improve the treatment of alcoholics on Skid Row, and his later work as an American Indian rights activist. Working files for this project include sound recordings and transcriptions of Sundance's oral narration, drafts of chapters and the full book in both paper and digital form, as well as publishing correspondence, agreements, and related documents. Also present are extensive research, legal, and publicity files Sundance kept regarding his legal case and other cases involving tribal sovereignty and American Indian rights, as well as personal writings, family documents, photographs, and correspondence of Sundance provided to Gaede as source material.

A small amount of additional correspondence pertains to publishing, as well as to courses Gaede taught on environmentalism, participation in the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, and other professional activities.