Wyzanski attended the Edward Devotion Grammar School in Brookline, Mass., from which he graduated in June 1918. He graduated from Brookline High School in 1922 and attended Phillips Exeter Academy for one year, graduating in 1923. He completed his undergraduate degree at Harvard College in 1927 and his law degree at Harvard Law School in 1930. He maintained relationships with these institutions as an alumnus, a trustee for Phillips Exeter, an overseer of Harvard University, and a member of the Harvard Society of Fellows. Before high school, Wyzanski attended summer camp at Camp Wigwam in Harrison, Maine, and he maintained some contact with the camp into adulthood. This series contains later correspondence relating to the camp, the schools, various alumni groups, gifts, the Harvard Society of Fellows, and other related topics. Actual school papers (essays, tests) are filed at the end of the series.

Wyzanski was proposed by Felix Frankfurter to Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt as solicitor of labor under Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins, a position he held from 1931 to August 1935, when he joined the staff of the solicitor general, Stanley Reed, as special assistant to the attorney general. This series contains papers and correspondence having to do with his work for the Labor Department, principally the National Labor Relations Act (which he called the "Labor Disputes Act") and refugees and immigration policy, as well as later materials concerning Frances Perkins. These include correspondence with and about Perkins, writings about her, and correspondence with her biographer George Martin. The series also contains a bound volume entitled "Disputes Act, National Labor Board," including drafts and revisions, both typescripts and printed proofs, with many annotations, memoranda, etc., dating from 1934. In August of 1935, Wyzanski joined the staff of the solicitor general (Stanley Reed) as special assistant to the attorney general.

Wyzanski was an associate and later partner of Ropes, Gray, Best, Coolidge, and Rugg, 1937-1941. After serving as a public member of the National Defense Mediation Board in 1941, he was appointed as United States district judge for the District of Massachusetts, serving from 1942 to his death in 1986. He was chief judge, 1965-1971, and senior judge, 1971-1986. After the early 1970s, he often sat in courts of appeal around the country and less regularly in the district court.

This series, the largest in the collection, has six subseries. General files (A) consist of material that was scattered through many boxes but labeled "judicial." These files (arranged alphabetically by titles Wyzanski gave them) pertain to his actual office work, administration, and the mechanics of being a judge, mostly record keeping. Staff files (B) have to do with the many people who worked in his office over the years, mostly secretaries and law clerks. The District Court files (C) consist of case files from his local district court cases and for the Northern District of California and the Southern District of Florida. The Circuit Court of Appeals (CCA) files (D) include his cases in the CCA 1, 2, 4, 5, and 9. Charges to the jury (E) were files created by Wyzanski, as were Opinions (F), which he filed separately.

This series consists of papers related to Wyzanski's activities outside of normal judicial work and some of his club memberships, although not all of his memberships are represented here.

This series is divided into three subseries. Subseries A (Cartons 16-18) consists of alphabetical files of general correspondence, organized by Wyzanski. This subseries contains significant amounts of correspondence with some individuals, named below, but also includes correspondence with many others. Correspondence with Henry Bragdon, Felix Frankfurter, Augustus Hand, and Learned Hand is arranged separately in Subseries B (Cartons 19-20). Subseries C (Carton 21) consists of family correspondence, primarily letters from Wyzanski to family members.

This series consists of chronological files of Wyzanski's writings, both published and unpublished. Subseries A contains more formal writing pieces, and Subseries B contains notes and memoranda.

This series is divided into three subseries. Subseries A includes typescript commonplace-books, mainly containing notes and reflections on his reading; "pieces," or notes and memoranda, extracts, copies of letters and other items that Wyzanski used to record his thoughts, beliefs, opinions, and actions; and an "autobiography" that he wrote at different times, but reflecting his life up to 1977. Subseries B contains biographical writings about him by others, oral history interviews, and genealogical notes and writings about the Wyzanski family. Subseries C consists of correspondence with television personality Bill Moyers and a volume of "exhibits" and "annexes" that Wyzanski sent to Moyers to support his philosophy and view of life.

Some of these files were created by Wyzanski or his assistants, and some were created for items that did not seem to fit in other series.

Included is oversize material pulled from the rest of the collection.