The collection consists of correspondence, articles, notes, drawings, photographs and ephemera concerning paddle steamers run by various companies, including the Caledonian Steam Packet Co Ltd; Cosens Co/Red Funnel Steamers; the General Steam Navigation Co (Eagle Steamers, Eagle & Queen Line and Queen Line); P & A Campbell Ltd/White Funnel Fleet; and Royal Mail Steam Packet Co Ltd/Red Funnel Steamers. There is also material re British Rail (Southern Region); services on the Clyde; Thames steamer launches; and pleasure sailings on the Danube, Lake Lucerne and the Rhine.

Administrative / biographical background
Mr E J Tyler was a professional writer who had been interested in paddle steamers since he was a child. In 1949, he undertook a detailed investigation into those steamers still remaining since the building of the last paddle Cunarders in 1862, which was an area of study that had been ignored by textbooks. He travelled on them extensively, taking copious notes and photographs, forming an extensvie collection of material including excursion bills issued by the various companies. Having given a talk to the Paddle Steamer Preservation Society in 1962, he decided that there was no public audience for the material that he had collected, and he carried on collecting without publishing it.