The John W. Lambert Photograph Collection consists of 9,687 black-and-white and color photographs, 2,048 black-and-white and color negatives and nine photographic slides, as well as a small amount of textual material primarily documenting air operations during World War II.

The strength of the collection is that it includes visual documentation of Army Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, and Allied aircraft in combat around the world. There are photographs of aircraft on operations and photographs of Axis ground targets, aircraft, and ships under attack. Most of the major aircraft used during World War II are represented in the collection. The bulk of the collection illustrates the air war in the Pacific from 1941 to 1945 and is especially strong in material on the Seventh Air Force and its VII Fighter Command that served in the Central Pacific. Many of the photographs appeared in the books that Lambert wrote, although there are many photographs in his books that are not included in this collection of photographs. Likewise there are also many images present in the collection that were not ultimately used in his publications.

Among the unique items are a collection of photographs of the Hawaiian Air Force prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor, including photographs of Amelia Earhart at Hickam Field and early Army Air Corps aircraft that served in Hawaii. Throughout the collection there are also photographs of airplane nose art, often from the veterans who flew or serviced these aircraft. While the majority of the images in the collection are of aircraft, there are some small groups of photographs of aircrews of Army Air Force, Navy, and Marine squadron personnel. A folder of photos on famous Americans in World War II includes images from the book by that name by William R. Van Osdol.

Most of the photographs in the collection were copied from images in the National Archives and from the archives of the U.S. Air Force, U.S. Navy, and the Marine Corps. Some images were obtained from Army Air Force, Navy, and Marine Corps veterans. Lambert also acquired, from a variety of sources, photographs of aircraft in service with the British Royal Air Force and other Commonwealth air forces, the German air force, and the Japanese Army and Navy air forces. Most of the photographs indicate where they are from.

The prints in the collection vary in size from a few inches to 8x10 inches. The vast majority of images are black-and-white with a small minority in color. Some are digital prints. Condition and quality varies greatly. The negatives are all copy negatives in 35mm and 4x5-inch format. Many of the copy negatives in the collection do not have corresponding prints.

The collection also includes numerous maps, line drawings, color drawings, unit insignia color representations, poetry, short narratives, captions, and credit information.