Commonplace book; there is also a carbon copy of the typed transcription of the book created by Addie S. Vance in 1936 under Works Progress Administration project #65-33-118, which was sponsored by the University of South Carolina and supervised by Dr. Anne K. Gregorie and Flora B. Surles, as well as a January 17, 1968 memo from Mary Stevenson, Clemson University Libraries, concerning the authorship of the book. The transcription is entitled "Common Place Book of John Ewing Colhoun," but Stevenson's memo attribues the book to Rhodes and presents supporting evidence.

The commonplace book is a compilation of accounts, agreements, book summaries, clippings, estimates for a woolen factory near Pendleton, SC, written extracts of magazine articles and speeches (some by John C. Calhoun), formulas, a "health journal" concerning his illness of June 13-18, 1837, lists of orders for goods, a short log of correspondence, receipts and recipes. Many of the items in the book deal with medicine, politics and the textile industry.