Baxter Laundries Corporation was founded in 1876 by Alfred Baxter in the basement of the haberdashery firm of Gardner & Baxter on Monroe Ave. in Grand Rapids, Mich. Baxter Laundries, which by 1928 had become the largest corporation of its type in the world, owned 30 cleaning plants in 17 states. The bulk of the business records in this collection originate from the era in which Howard F. Baxter (1886-1969) and Robert T. Baxter (1913-1975) were in charge of the company's operations. Included in the collection are meeting minutes of stockholders and corporate boards, acquisition agreements, deeds and property abstracts, as well as unused stock certificates and checks. Also included are the corporate records for Careful Dan Linens, Inc. of which Robert T. Baxter was President and the Home Research Bureau, Inc.