Wyoming Genealogy

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Wyoming Genealogy Research Guide

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Wyoming Genealogy Research Guide

Quick Facts

Wyoming sits at the crossroads of the great westward trails, and its record-keeping is shaped by a late start and by remarkable survival. The region was organized as a territory only in 1868 and reached statehood in 1890, and because it was public-domain land opened by the federal government, its earliest land titles run through federal offices rather than colonial grants. Wyoming’s counties have suffered essentially no courthouse record loss, so county-level research is both central and unusually rewarding.

• Capital: Cheyenne — the territorial capital from 1869 and the state capital since 1890.
• Statehood: July 10, 1890, the 44th state, formed from the Territory of Wyoming, which was organized on July 25, 1868 out of parts of the Dakota, Idaho, and Utah territories.
• Counties: 23. Laramie, the first, was created in 1867 while the area was still part of Dakota Territory; the last, Teton and Sublette, were authorized in 1921.
• Land type: Wyoming is a federal (public-domain) state, not a state-land state. The United States held the public domain and transferred it to settlers through the General Land Office, so first titles are federal land-entry records — homesteads, cash sales, and similar entries — and later transfers between individuals are recorded as county deeds.
• Nickname and motto: the Equality State (also the Cowboy State); the state motto is Equal Rights, recalling Wyoming’s 1869 grant of women’s suffrage, the first in the nation.
• Where records live: most genealogical records are kept at the county level — the county clerk holds marriage and land records, and the clerk of the district court holds probate, divorce, and civil case files — while vital records are filed with the registrar of the county where the event occurred and then recorded by the state. Wyoming keeps no city’s vital records separately from the rest of the state.

Libraries and Archives

Wyoming’s principal collections cluster in Cheyenne, which holds the state government’s records, and in Laramie at the University of Wyoming; county courthouses, public libraries, and local societies hold material for their own areas. The leading repositories include:

• Wyoming State Archives (Cheyenne) — the state’s archival repository: death certificates, statewide and county marriage records, territorial and district court records, land and tax records, National Guard and adjutant general files, penitentiary and institutional records, oral histories, and an extensive photograph collection.
• Wyoming State Library (Cheyenne) — local histories, published genealogies, government documents, and the digital collections described below, including historic newspapers and legislative records.
• University of Wyoming American Heritage Center (Laramie) — one of the largest manuscript and archival repositories in the region, holding personal papers, business and ranch records, church records, and photographs documenting Wyoming and the West.
• Wyoming State Historical Society, publisher of the WyoHistory.org online encyclopedia of Wyoming history.
• National Archives at Denver — the NARA branch serving Wyoming, with federal court, land-entry, naturalization, military, and Bureau of Indian Affairs records for the state.
• Bureau of Land Management, Wyoming State Office (Cheyenne) — custodian of the federal land survey plats and field notes for Wyoming’s public-domain lands.
• The FamilySearch Library and its worldwide FamilySearch Centers hold extensive Wyoming microfilm and digital collections, and county courthouses (county clerk and clerk of district court), county libraries, and local genealogical and historical societies hold records for their own areas.

Major Websites

These sites host digitized Wyoming records and indexes. Subscription sites are marked ($).

• FamilySearch — free; the backbone finding aid, with the Wyoming Research Wiki, catalog, and large digitized collections of Wyoming vital, land, probate, court, and church records.
• Ancestry ($) — extensive Wyoming vital, census, naturalization, military, and tax collections.
• MyHeritage ($) — Wyoming vital records, censuses, and immigration collections.
• Findmypast ($) — Wyoming marriage and other record collections.
• BLM General Land Office Records — free; searchable federal land patents and survey plats for Wyoming’s public-domain lands.
• Wyoming Digital Newspaper Collection — free; a partnership of the Wyoming State Library and University of Wyoming Libraries digitizing historic Wyoming newspapers from the mid-1800s onward.
• Chronicling America — free; the Library of Congress newspaper archive, which includes Wyoming titles.
• Wyoming State Archives databases — free; searchable indexes drawn from the State Archives, including a death-certificate index and other record series.
• Find a Grave and BillionGraves — free; cemetery listings, photographs, and transcriptions.
• Internet Archive and HathiTrust — free; digitized Wyoming histories, published record abstracts, and law books.

Law and Government

Wyoming’s territorial and state laws explain the jurisdictions and offices that created genealogical records, and many foundational legal texts have been digitized and are free to read.

• The Compiled Laws of Wyoming (1876) — the laws in force at the close of the fourth territorial legislative assembly, together with the applicable federal statutes, the 1868 Sioux and Shoshone treaties, and a synopsis of the pre-emption, homestead, and mining laws; free on HathiTrust.
• The territorial session laws (the General Laws, Resolutions, and Memorials of the Territory of Wyoming, beginning with the first legislative assembly of 1869) and the later compiled and revised statutes are digitized on the Internet Archive and HathiTrust.
• Wyoming Legislation (Wyoming State Library) — free; digitized legislative journals from the first territorial assembly of 1869 onward, together with digitized bills from the 1870s through 2000.
• The Brief History of Wyoming Courts (Wyoming State Library) outlines how the territorial and state courts evolved, useful for learning which court created which records.
• The Wyoming State Archives holds the state’s legislative and executive records.

Vital Records (Birth, Marriage, Death)

Wyoming came to civil registration late, so its vital records begin in the twentieth century and church, census, and county records fill the earlier gap. Statewide registration of births and deaths began in July 1909, with general compliance by the early 1920s; the state did not centralize marriage and divorce records until 1941, although counties recorded marriages from the time each county was organized. Vital events are filed with the registrar of the county where they occurred and then recorded by the state, and Wyoming keeps no city’s records separately.

Records are held by the Wyoming Department of Health Vital Statistics Services and, for older records, by the Wyoming State Archives, while the county clerk holds the county’s own marriage records. Access is time-limited — birth records are restricted for 100 years and death, marriage, and divorce records for 50 years — after which the records open to the public at the State Archives, which searches its indexes and provides copies. Use these indexes to identify a record, then order it from the appropriate office:

• Deaths (statewide, from 1909): Wyoming Death Records, 1909–1969 ($) on Ancestry, and Wyoming Deaths, 1910–1952 ($) on MyHeritage; the State Archives is also building a free death-certificate index for the earliest years.
• Marriages (county, from 1869; statewide from 1941): Wyoming Marriages, 1869–1923 and Wyoming Marriages, 1877–1920 are free on FamilySearch, the latter also on MyHeritage ($); Wyoming State and County Marriage Records, 1869–1973 ($) on Ancestry extends the coverage, and the United States Western States Marriage Index is free on FamilySearch.
• Births (statewide, from 1909): birth records remain restricted the longest and are not indexed online for the general public; obtain them from the Department of Health or, once they open, from the State Archives.
• Reclaim The Records: the Wyoming, Reclaim the Records, State Archives Vital Records, 1908–1966 collection — a marriage and divorce index obtained through public-records requests — is free on FamilySearch.

For events before statewide registration, look to county marriage books, church registers, cemetery and funeral-home records, and the federal and territorial censuses described below; a few counties kept death registers for a short time before 1909, and those early records were later sent to the state.

History and Timeline of Major Events

Key dates that shaped Wyoming’s jurisdictions and records:

• 1803 — The region passes to the United States, most of it in the Louisiana Purchase and the far southwest corner later through the 1848 Mexican Cession.
• 1807–1840 — Fur-trade era: explorers such as John Colter open the country, South Pass is identified in 1812, and annual trappers’ rendezvous are held through 1840.
• 1834 — Fort Laramie is founded as a fur-trading post, later becoming a major military post and emigrant waystation.
• 1840s–1860s — The Oregon, California, Mormon, and Overland trails cross Wyoming by way of South Pass, followed by the Pony Express and the Overland stage.
• 1850–1860 — The area is enumerated in the federal census as part of Utah Territory (1850) and Nebraska Territory (1860); other portions lay in the Dakota and Idaho territories.
• 1867 — The Union Pacific Railroad reaches Cheyenne, and Laramie County is created while the area is still part of Dakota Territory.
• 1868 — Congress organizes the Territory of Wyoming (July 25) from parts of Dakota, Idaho, and Utah; the Second Treaty of Fort Laramie establishes the Wind River (Shoshone) Reservation.
• 1868–1869 — The transcontinental railroad is completed across southern Wyoming, giving rise to Cheyenne, Laramie, Rawlins, Green River, Rock Springs, and Evanston.
• 1869 — The territorial government is organized and grants women the right to vote and hold office, the first in the nation.
• 1872 — Yellowstone is set aside as the first national park.
• 1876 — The Northern Arapaho are settled on the Wind River Reservation alongside the Eastern Shoshone.
• 1885 — The Rock Springs Massacre: a mob of white miners attacks the Chinese community, killing dozens and burning its homes.
• 1890 — Wyoming is admitted as the 44th state (July 10).
• 1892 — The Johnson County War, a violent conflict between large cattle interests and small settlers.
• 1909 — Statewide registration of births and deaths begins.
• 1911 — Goshen and Platte counties are formed from Laramie County.
• 1921–1923 — The last counties, Teton and Sublette, are created, completing the state’s 23 counties.

Census Records and Substitutes

Federal censuses reach Wyoming even before it had its modern name. The area was enumerated as part of Utah Territory in 1850 and Nebraska Territory in 1860, then as the Territory of Wyoming in 1870 and 1880; the 1890 federal population schedules were destroyed nationwide, but 1900 through 1950 survive in full. They are free on FamilySearch and, with images, on Ancestry ($) and MyHeritage ($). The surviving 1890 special schedule of Union veterans and widows is a useful substitute for the lost 1890 population count.

Territorial and local censuses partly fill the gaps between and before the federal years. Wyoming did not take a regular decennial state census, so these enumerations are fewer than in some states, but each adds something:

• 1869 territorial census: the first census of the new territory, taken as it organized; it names residents and can show place of origin and length of residence. It is on microfilm at the State Archives and FamilySearch, and is searchable together with the Cheyenne censuses on Ancestry ($).
• 1875 and 1878 City of Cheyenne censuses: municipal enumerations recording each person’s name, age, sex, birthplace, occupation, and nationality; included in the same Ancestry collection.
• 1885 territorial census: a partial enumeration of which some returns survive, held with the State Archives.

Substitutes. Where censuses are thin, city directories, tax and assessment rolls, voter registrations, and the coal-mine inspector’s annual reports (which record miners and their deaths) are the best tools for placing a family in a given place and year, and the digitized newspapers are invaluable for the same purpose.

Church Records

Because civil registration began only in 1909, church records are the most important substitute for births, marriages, and deaths in the territorial period and before. The largest early denominations were Roman Catholic, Methodist Episcopal, Protestant Episcopal, and Presbyterian, with Congregational, Latter-day Saint, Lutheran, and Baptist congregations also present, and many mining towns had Greek Orthodox and other immigrant churches. Baptismal, marriage, and burial registers from these congregations frequently predate the state’s vital records.

• The FamilySearch Wyoming Church Records guide and the FamilySearch Catalog, searched by county and town, are the best route to digitized congregational registers; early Cheyenne and Laramie Congregational, Presbyterian, Methodist, and Episcopal registers from the 1860s and 1870s are among those filmed.
• Roman Catholic sacramental records are held by the parish or by the Diocese of Cheyenne, which has covered the entire state since 1887, including the Arapaho and Shoshone missions on the Wind River Reservation.
• The Wyoming: Swedish American research guide points to Swedish Lutheran and other Scandinavian church records for the immigrant communities of the railroad and coal towns.

The Historical Records Survey’s inventories of Wyoming church archives, compiled in the 1930s and 1940s, survive at the Wyoming State Archives and help locate the original registers.

Court Records

Wyoming’s courts reach well beyond lawsuits into estates, guardianships, naturalizations, and divorces, and their records are among the most useful for family history. The system has been comparatively simple:

• District Courts — the trial courts of general jurisdiction since the territorial period, sitting in every county and grouped into judicial districts. They handle felonies and major civil cases and, importantly for genealogists, probate, divorce, and (before 1906) many naturalizations; the clerk of the district court keeps the files.
• Territorial courts (1868–1890): the territorial supreme court, district courts, probate courts, and justices of the peace, established by the 1868 Organic Act; the territorial district courts also served as the federal courts for Wyoming.
• Circuit courts (formerly the justice-of-the-peace and county courts) — the lower courts handling smaller civil claims and misdemeanors.
• Wyoming Supreme Court — the state’s appellate court since 1890.

Older district-court files for each county have largely been transferred to the Wyoming State Archives, which publishes guides to its holdings county by county, while federal court records for the District of Wyoming are held by the National Archives at Denver.

Ethnic/Minority Records

Wyoming’s population was shaped by the trails, the railroad, the mines, and the reservation, and knowing where a group settled points to the records most likely to document a family.

• Native peoples (Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho). The Wind River Reservation, established in 1868 for the Eastern Shoshone and shared with the Northern Arapaho from 1876, is central to Indigenous research. The federal Indian Census Rolls, 1885–1940 ($) on Ancestry — free on FamilySearch and at the National Archives — and the Bureau of Indian Affairs agency records are the core sources; the National Archives at Denver holds the agency records, and tribal enrollment is administered by the tribes themselves. The FamilySearch Indigenous Peoples of Wyoming guide and the National Archives Bureau of Indian Affairs guide for Wyoming gather additional resources.
• Chinese. Chinese laborers came to work on the Union Pacific and in the coal mines, forming a substantial community at Rock Springs (and at Evanston and Almy) until the 1885 Rock Springs Massacre. Their history is documented in the coal-mine inspector’s reports, governors’ papers, and vertical files at the Wyoming State Archives, and in the collections of the American Heritage Center.
• Basque, Hispanic, and European mining communities. Basque sheepherders, Mexican and Hispanic laborers, and Finnish, Slavic, Italian, and Scandinavian miners settled across the state; company records, mine-inspector reports, naturalizations, and American Heritage Center manuscript collections document them.
• African Americans. People of African descent served in the frontier army regiments stationed at Fort D.A. Russell and other posts and settled in the railroad and mining towns, and an African Methodist Episcopal congregation formed in Cheyenne in the 1870s. The FamilySearch African American Resources for Wyoming guide points to the relevant records.

Immigration and Naturalization

Wyoming had no seaport, so immigrants arrived overland, drawn by railroad and mine work and by the Homestead Act, and were naturalized in the local courts. Because any court of record could naturalize before 1906 and the process was federalized afterward, the records are split between the counties and the federal court.

• Before 1906, the territorial and state district courts naturalized immigrants; the resulting declarations, petitions, and certificates are held by the clerk of the district court in each county and, for older records, by the Wyoming State Archives.
• Laramie County Naturalization Records, 1867–1920 ($) on Ancestry index the records of Wyoming’s most populous county, drawn from the territorial, state, and federal courts; county naturalization records for several other counties are on microfilm through the FamilySearch Catalog.
• After 1906, naturalizations were handled through the federal court, and the National Archives at Denver holds the federal naturalization records for the District of Wyoming.

Land Records

As a federal (public-domain) state, Wyoming was surveyed and granted by the United States rather than by a colony or the state, so first titles are federal land-entry records and there is no colonial patent system. Settlers acquired land chiefly through the Homestead Act and by cash purchase, along with timber-culture, desert-land, and other entries; once a patent issued, later transfers between individuals were recorded as county deeds. Because Wyoming’s courthouses have essentially no record loss, both the federal entry files and the county deeds survive well.

Where the records are kept.

• Federal land-entry records: the BLM General Land Office Records site provides free searchable patents and images for Wyoming, and the underlying land-entry case files (homestead proofs and the like) are held by the National Archives at Denver. Wyoming’s public land was administered from a succession of district land offices, including Cheyenne, Evanston, Buffalo, Lander, Sundance, and Douglas.
• County level: deeds and mortgages are recorded by the county clerk, and older county land records have largely been transferred to the Wyoming State Archives.
• Survey records: the Bureau of Land Management, Wyoming State Office holds the official survey plats and field notes.

The Union Pacific land grant. The federal grant to the Union Pacific Railroad gave the company the odd-numbered sections in a broad belt along its line across southern Wyoming, producing the distinctive “checkerboard” of alternating federal and railroad ownership. A great deal of settlement land in that belt therefore passed through the railroad rather than by direct homestead, so an ancestor’s land there may be documented in railroad land-sale records as well as in the federal and county series.

Online, the BLM General Land Office Records site is the essential first stop for Wyoming patents, and FamilySearch Full-Text Search makes many unindexed deeds, patents, and related records searchable by every name they contain, including grantors, grantees, and witnesses. The FamilySearch Wyoming Land and Property guide describes the county holdings in detail.

Military Records

Wyoming came late to statehood, so it raised no Civil War units of its own, but its forts and later its National Guard produced substantial records, and the frontier army left a rich documentary trail.

• Frontier and Indian Wars: Wyoming’s many posts — Fort Laramie, Fort Bridger, Fort Fetterman, Fort Phil Kearny, Fort D.A. Russell, and others — are documented in federal army enlistment registers and in published post histories such as Robert A. Murray’s Military Posts of Wyoming, and pension records for Indian Wars service are at the National Archives.
• Spanish-American War (1898): Wyoming volunteers were mustered into federal service; the governors’ Spanish-American War records and muster rolls are at the Wyoming State Archives.
• World War I and later: Wyoming Military Service and Veterans Records, 1914–1946 ($) on Ancestry gathers World War I and World War II service and related records; World War I draft-registration cards and World War II draft cards are free on FamilySearch, and the State Archives holds service-record abstracts and files for Wyoming men who died in the wars.
• National Guard and veterans: the Wyoming State Archives holds the Wyoming National Guard and adjutant general records, and veterans’ discharge records have been filed with county clerks since 1909. The FamilySearch Wyoming Military Records guide lists the draft-registration and service collections.

Probate Records

Probate — wills, administrations of intestate estates, and guardianships of minors — is among the richest sources for family relationships, and in Wyoming it has long been a function of the district court rather than a separate probate court.

• Territorial period (1868–1890): probate courts and county-level probate handled estates under the territorial system.
• Since statehood: the district court in each county has jurisdiction over probate; the estate file — petition, will or administration, bond, inventory, and distribution — usually names the heirs. Files are kept by the clerk of the district court, with older records at the Wyoming State Archives.

Online, Wyoming Wills and Probate Records, 1875–1908 ($) on Ancestry is name-searchable, and the FamilySearch Wyoming Probate Records guide describes the county holdings; FamilySearch Full-Text Search also makes many unindexed wills and estate files searchable by every name they contain.

Tax Records

Tax lists place a family in a specific county and year and are valuable substitutes where other records are thin; several consecutive years can show when a young man came of age, acquired property, or died and left heirs.

• Federal assessment lists: the U.S. IRS Tax Assessment Lists, 1862–1918 ($) on Ancestry include the Wyoming (and Colorado) district; the Civil War–era Internal Revenue assessment lists are also free on FamilySearch.
• Territorial and county assessment rolls: personal-property and land assessment rolls kept by the county assessors, together with the earliest territorial assessments, are held by the Wyoming State Archives and appear in the FamilySearch Catalog under each county; county treasurers and clerks hold later rolls.