William Jewell College purchased the collection of Charles Haddon Spurgeon in 1907, while Mertins was a student, and the collection made a significant impression on him. In giving his materials to William Jewell, he envisioned the two collections becoming the nucleus for a major resource, particularly for manuscripts--it was to have been "a library of volumes comparable with those of the Huntington Library at Pasadena, California."

Mertins confessed that he was a hero worshipper and the collection is certainly wide ranging. He apparently was an energetic meeter of people--a networker par excellence. From 1916 to 1926 he was a poetry reader and lecturer with the Chautauqua Circuit and made many acquaintances there, and he diligently kept up his quest for signatures and manuscripts. His usual procedure was to send a letter to an author asking the person to sign a poem which had been published previously and which Mertins had typed out for the convenience of the author, or to send one of the person’s books for the author to sign the flyleaf, and then to ask the author if she had any manuscripts she would like to contribute to the manuscript collection.

A. J. Armstrong, who by 1938 had drawn together the largest Browning collection in the world at Baylor University, expressed surprise at the positive responses Mertins had received: "I don’t see how on earth you ever got together all the material" (MC IV 27). In fact he was skeptical of the hyperbolic description of the collection, though impressed by Mertins’ boldness: "I sort of believe that this article must be a tremendous exaggeration. Most of us are tremendously grateful if we can get such famous people to autograph a book for us. That is, if he is as important as Bernard Shaw and J. M. Barrie; and you have the courage to ask them for a manuscript of a play."

Many were gracious to sign, few had original materials to part with. Edgar Lee Masters said that he had no manuscript to send, but that he did have three manuscripts he would be interested in selling (MC III, 59). He then hand-copied his own poem "Ann Rutledge" and signed it. Edna St. Vincent Millay sent a gracious note, the front of which is unavailable in a scrapbook, but indicated some reluctance since she considered herself to be "the target of every literary archer in London" (II, 5).

George Bernard Shaw is represented at three places in the collection. He signed a typescript of The Dark Lady of the Sonnets (MC III, 95). He made three changes to the passage "George Bernard Shaw’s Genealogy" which he had received, and wrote, "I believe I did write something like the above somewhere sometime. It is roughly true" He then signed and dated it, "11/6/35" (MC III, 3). He also signed a silhouette, to which we will return. William Allen White added to the passage which had been sent to him. The text referred to laws needing the support of the values of the people to be effective and ended, "No law will make men moral who need a law. No law will prevent corruption unless the people are vigilant. He that is filthy will be filthy still." White added in his own hand, "Yes--and after all political Democracy is only an opportunity. Someone will grab it, the wise or the dumb, the good or the greedy; it is the survival of the fittest" (MC II, 70).

Robinson Jeffers, one of the few who gave an original work, sent along a manuscript of "The Cruel Falcon" (MC I, 65). Brigadier General H. H. Whitney sent three original sketches of the harbor of Ponce he had made spying in Puerto Rico before the American invasion of l898 (II, 72-73).

Those who received silhouettes to be signed occasionally commented that they were not good likenesses. Senator Harry Truman in 1944 signed his, adding USS Mo, but wrote separately that he could not find anyone who said the silhouette looked like him (MC III, 102). Mrs. Will Durant said that her husband was ill and couldn’t sign. "Besides it in no way looks like him, and should not pass for him" (IV, 87). T. S. Eliot protested, "I hope this is not a good likeness," but signed it. Theodore Dreiser protested, "If this looks like me so does a wooden indian," but signed it. One who approved of the image was W. Velenovsky, who wrote, "I would like to look as handsome as this." Most just signed them without comment.

The list of luminaries contains some names which have dimmed and some which never were particularly bright in the first place. Ezra Pound complained bluntly of the company he was being put in:

William Allen White noted that his silhouette had been made from a photograph taken forty years before it was autographed in 1942, and wrote a poem below the silhouette:

And years to spare

I looked like this

But now alack

When I look back--

How strange it is!

The silhouette for George Bernard Shaw has a figure in green collars and a tan tie. Shaw signed it on 5 January 1940, but not before noting some errors.

I am a long headed man with no occiput.

But I do wear green collars, though with a tie to match.

Pardon my alterations.

The collection is clearly the work of someone who enjoyed collecting autographs, some of which he put beneath silhouettes, as if the person had signed the silhouette, such as A. Lincoln. Mertins was imaginative in pursuing the autographs. He apparently asked Einstein to recommend explanations of the theory of relativity available in German, which Einstein happily did. In 1928 he wrote a note of congratulations to Herbert Hoover on his general management of the country, to which Hoover gratefully replied. But his quest of manuscripts fell short. Authors knew the value of their materials and did not easily part with them. On a good day, Mertins could hope that a typescript of a poem sent to an author or the silhouette sent to a famous person would return, with a signature. On a very good day he would discover he had briefly engaged a leader of the early twentieth century.