The collection consists of correspondence, account books, daybooks, travel journals, receipts, land descriptions, business cards, calling cards, manuscripts, newspaper clippings, photographs, and lecture notes. The Autobiography Series consists of volumes I and II of Edmund Flagg’s handwritten autobiography. The manuscript was written around 1879, but was never published. The manuscript contains a genealogy of the Flagg family. The first page of the autobiography is missing. The Bowdoin College Series consists of Flagg’s college lecture notes, commencement announcements, a photograph of Bowdoin classmate Albert G. Tenney, and other college memorabilia. The items are primarily dated from his years at Bowdoin College (Brunswick, Maine), 1831-1835, but also include items that he collected later in life. The series includes two copies of the Brunswick Telegraph, June 25 and July 2, 1886, which contain articles relating to commencement at Bowdoin College. The Literary Series consists of Flagg’s manuscripts, literary critiques, book reviews, dramas, speeches, New Year’s Eve addresses, and newspaper extracts regarding the sales of his novels, The Howard Queen, Far West, and De Molai. The series contains handwritten copies of Flagg’s Mavin, Ex-president of Venice, Carrero, The Prime Minister of Spain, and The Consumptive, A Sexagenarians Tale. Handwritten notes and scripts from a drama “The Secret Marriage” produced in 1846. Also included are critiques of other writer’s works by Flagg and reviews of St. Louis theatrical productions that were printed in the St. Louis Reveille. The Civil Service Series is separated into two subseries. The Office of Statistics Subseries includes notes, a “commercial scrapbook” of newspaper clippings, correspondence, and memos relating to Flagg’s service with the Office of Statistics, U.S. Department of State, 1854-1858, and a handwritten draft of Flagg’s "Report on the Commercial Relations of the United States with All Foreign Nations" (1856). The U.S. Patent Office Subseries consists of correspondence, copyright requests, and memos produced during Flagg’s service as head of the U.S. Patent Office Copyright Library, Department of Interior, 1861-1869. The Correspondence Series consists of Flagg family correspondence, Edmund Flagg’s letters to his family, friends, clients, and newspaper associates. Box 7 contains letters written by notable individuals that were added to the collection in 1970. Among the letters are several to and from Flagg to the renowned Whig orator S.S. Prentiss, journalist and editor Charles Dana, journalist and author George D. Prentice, and publisher Charles Scribner. The Real Estate Series pertains to Flagg’s extensive land holdings in Virginia, Missouri, Kansas, Indiana, Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Iowa. The papers include land descriptions, receipts, tax receipts, checks, and correspondence with land agents. The Account Books/Journals Series consists of personal expense account books, personal property inventories, travel journals detailing his trips through Great Britain and Europe, including an account of his 1849 voyage abroad the ship Princeton, an 1866 diary of Flagg’s illness, and Flagg’s Fairfax County, Virginia, farm daybooks. The Clippings Series consists of newspaper clippings relating to St. Louis events, theater, riverboat accidents, Flagg’s travels in Europe, controversy surrounding the appointment of Edward A. Hannegan as U.S. consul to Berlin, and Whig politics. Also included is a collection of calling cards and wedding and death notices relating to Flagg’s marriage to Kate Gallagher and the death of Flagg’s sister Harriet.