for a town of that name in Indiana. The ground was purchased by the county, a town platted by Benjamin Barker and J. F. Stratton, the lots appraised and offered for sale. George Garman purchased the first lot for thirty-eight dollars upon which he built a house in which he opened a store. The first sermon was preached by Rev. Morgan Parr, a Christian minister. In the spring of 1852 a term of court was held by Judge McKay in an unfinished log house. The first newspaper in the county was the South Tier Democrat established in 1858 by Cutler and Binkley at Corydon. Lineville, which lies near the State line, in the southwest corner of the county was the first town laid out, in 1848. Allerton is a thriving town four miles southwest of Corydon. The Chicago and Southwestern Railroad was the first built into the county. The Chariton River was named for a French trader who was the first to establish a post near its mouth in Missouri. His name was also given to a county in Missouri where his old trading post stood and later to the county-seat of Lucas County in Iowa.
WEBSTER COUNTY, as first established in January, 1853, is now Hamilton, but by an act of the same General Assembly, which took place six months later, the counties of Yell and Risley were united under the name of Webster and the original county of Webster was named Hamilton. In July, 1855, the south half of Humboldt was added to Webster. The latter county was named for the famous Massachusetts lawyer, Daniel Webster, and these numerous changes in boundaries were made through the influence of the proprietors of the towns of Webster City and Fort Dodge in order to secure to them the county-seat.
Henry Lott and others went into the Des Moines valley near the mouth of the Boone River in 1847 and soon after Isaac Bell, Jacob Mericle, Tolman Woolsey, D. B. Spaulding, Orsborn Brannon, John Tolman, Thomas Holliday, and William Pierce settled in the southern part of Web-
