MS 7617 documents Claasz's schooldays in Ceylon, employment there as a manager of a tea plantation owned by the Scottish Tea and Lands Company of Ceylon Limited, personal and family life, emigration to Australia in 1972, and managerial jobs in ANU Press, the Australian National Gallery, Snowy Mountains Engineering Corporation and Zeilan Ventures. Includes papers on establishment of tea plantations in Queensland, diaries and notebooks relating to tea planting, crop yields, field notebooks relating to tea planting and other notebooks, school notebooks and certificates, Buddhist palm-leaf manuscript written in old Singhalese script on the subject of astrology, press cuttings, printed items, photographs, notes and articles on tea, personal and business diaries, family and personal letters and some papers of the Scottish Tea and Lands Co., Ceylon.