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The advertising competition at the University of Michigan was created to promote students' interests in the growing field of advertising. The contest was administered by Fred Newton Scott of the Department of Rhetoric at the University of Michigan and anonymously sponsored by W. K. Kellogg. The collection consists of entries submitted by University of Michigan students in the years 1914 through 1917.

Because of the loose submission guidelines, competition entries came in a variety of formats. Within the typed pages of an essay there could exist, for example, hand-drawn illustrations of a sample advertisement, promotional booklets for a specific company or industry, newspaper clippings, or hand-drawn charts and graphs. Some entries contain a small envelope, in which is located the true identity of the entrant as well as his or her honor statement. Some entries were sent via letter to Professor Scott.

The records are divided into 4 main series based on the categories of the competition: Plans for Advertising Campaign, Drawings for Advertisement, Advertising Copy, and Essays. The folders contain one entry each and are arranged alphabetically by entry title. This collection may not contain every submission to the contest over its four-year run. There exist, in this collection, one entry from 1914, four from 1915, seven from 1916, and six from 1917. Because many of the entries were a composite of multiple submission categories, some did not clearly fit the established categories.

Any distinctions given to an entry are noted in parentheses after the title of the entry. First- and second-place prizes were awarded all four years, with the exception of 1916; in that year the judge of the competition felt that there was no clear second-place winner but did assign an honorable mention and awarded $50 to one entry instead.