In addition to its geographical significance, the collection also represents an early example of the kinds of books that would have been collected by a missionary. Naturally, the collection is especially valuable to Washington State University history students and because some of the books in the collection have been identified as the property of Mrs. Walker, it is weighted with even greater significance to students of women's studies and women's history. It also contains the complete diaries of Mrs. Walker from 1833-1878 (two of those years are photocopies of texts that are the property of the Huntington Library). Further, the collection is a window that reveals the possessions of early nineteenth-century pioneers and educated persons of the territorial period.

To Bond, an interesting and innovative use of the collection is for the research of authors of children's books sporting a pioneer motif. The collection contains photographs, pencil drawings, and oil paintings of the Walkers, their family, and surroundings. Another important aspect of the materials is that they serve to "illuminate the region" as they provide "links to historical persons" who made the acquaintance of the Walkers. For instance, the collection includes the couples' autograph book.

Bond takes particular pleasure in the very complete information that is available as regards the provenance of the Walker books. "We know which books were owned by Rev. Walker, which by his wife, and we have a record of how they were passed down through the family from generation to generation" until finding a final resting place in the WSU libraries. As many such private libraries have been scattered over time, it is remarkable and significant that the Walker books made it to the Twenty-First-Century intact. In fact, it is an essential part of the MASC promise and mission to keep such collections together.

The Web site being constructed provides an attractive venue for access. It will include "more powerful tools for sorting and accessing the information in the collection," said Bond. As the collection will now be available on the Internet, researchers will be able to do a lot of work from their homes in preparation for viewing the materials firsthand. Bond doesn't know how use of this collection will compare to others in MASC as it is "hard to determine use patterns with any special collection." The individual use often varies from "reading a couple of letters to doing exhaustive research for the purposes of writing a book."

The first processing of the collection occurred, of course, with its acquisition by the libraries of the State College of Washington, WSU's predecessor, in the 1930s. The work currently being done with the materials is, in Bond's opinion, "reflective of current developments in information technology." The work is funded through an endowment MASC received from Pauline Thompson which allowed MASC to hire a part-time, professional cataloger, Randy Smith, for the task.