Wyoming in 1882 - Cheyenne, Yellowstone National Park, Sweetwater River

This map of Wyoming was published in 1882 by George F. Cram of Chicago for his Unrivaled Family Atlas of the World, one of the earliest editions of that atlas and, according to Rumsey's own research, previously unrecorded in the standard bibliographies. Cram's state maps in this particular printing are distinctive: the title is set inside a rounded oval, and the map is hand-colored rather than the machine-printed color Cram switched to the following year once the expense of hand coloring an entire atlas run proved unsustainable. This sheet covers Wyoming Territory in its rail-and-county format, relief shown by hachures, at a time when the territory remained eight years from statehood, its economy and settlement patterns still built almost entirely around the Union Pacific Railroad's transcontinental line.

The Union Pacific Railroad is traced across the southern part of the territory, the single line responsible for most of Wyoming's early towns and the connective thread linking it to the rest of the transcontinental network. In the northwest corner, Yellowstone National Park is marked, just a decade after its 1872 founding as the world's first national park, an early instance of federal land conservation appearing on a commercial atlas map. The Gros Ventre and Wind River Mountains rise across the west-central territory, rugged country that limited settlement even as the railroad pushed through the plains to the south. The Sweetwater River and the arid Red Desert are also named, marking the difficult, sparsely populated country north of the rail corridor, with scattered forts across the sheet pointing to the ongoing military presence of the period.

This map makes a striking gift for anyone drawn to Yellowstone country, the old Union Pacific rail corridor, or the wider history of Wyoming Territory before statehood. It pairs naturally with a Rand McNally edition of the same territory published just three years earlier, in 1879: this 1882 Cram sheet is distinguished by its hand-applied color and distinctive oval title, features unique to this early, rarely seen printing of the atlas. It is available unframed in a full range of sizes, from a compact study print to a larger statement piece.