This collection includes the personal and professional papers of Judge John W. Meldrum from 1861 to 1944. The papers span a large part of his adulthood, including his time as Surveyor General of Wyoming Territory and United States Commissioner at Yellowstone National Park. The main parts of the collection are political correspondence and financial and administrative records for his office in Yellowstone. These include regulations for visitors to the park, circulars, and personal and professional correspondence, including communications with Wyoming Governor Francis E. Warren, historian Hiram M. Chittenden, and Horace Albright, who later founded the National Park Service. Also in the collection is a letter written from Camp Morgan in 1861 by G. B. Meldrum (John’s brother), a Civil War soldier in the Union Army (box 2, fd 4), and Ed Howell, poacher and Yellowstone informant (box 1, fd 12). This is related to reward money wired by Meldrum to the Philippines, where Howell was staying during the Spanish-American War. News clippings that piqued Meldrum’s interest, as well as photographs of him and his family, are also present.