This is a Message Board Post that is gatewayed to this mailing list. Surnames: Blanchard, Platt, Walton, Gaston, Case, Gary, Smith, Waubonsie Classification: Biography Message Board URL: http://boards.ancestry.com/mbexec/msg/rw/ok.2ADE/1479 Message Board Post: During her retirement, Mabel Bridges (4/6/1891 - 4/18/1976), using a card file, gathered notes on the earliest of the pioneers in Fremont county. I'm copying the following from Mabel's notes: 1.--1837: Shawnee Baptist Mission was founded in 1837 by Ira D. Blanchard and his wife Mary (Gaston) Blanchard on the present site of Edwardsville, Wyandotte county, Kansas. The flood of 1844 broke up the school..... Ira D. Blanchard's abrupt dismissal from the church and withdrawal of his ordination = ?.--Kansas Hist. Quarterly, Vol. I No. 2, Febr. 1932, page 83. 2.--1843: J.D. Blanchard was paid $1,377.90 on Dec. 31, 1845, by Herman Lincoln, Treasurer of the Baptist Foreign Mission, Boston, for services in supervising and teaching the Delaware boarding school from the June 30, 1843 term...Paid again on July 30, 1846. 3.--1848: J.D. Blanchard was among the 40 or 50 people who met at the Wahbonsie Indian Agency's cabin northwest of Tabor, in October 1848 to petition the Iowa Legislature to organize a county in southwest Iowa with the belief it could be successfully controlled by the Gentiles.....That petiton was never heard of until years later.--1881 Hist. of Fremont county, pp. 372 4.--J.D. Blanchard came to Civil Bend and community and located 3 miles southwest of Percival. Place was an underground railroad. He was among the first settlers in Benton township in 1848.......The Blanchard family halted at wehat is now known as the Blanchard farm. We found a wild country, the tall prairie gass growing around where the house now stands. There was there a log hut covered with stakes and dirt. Not a rod had been turned and not a house in sight. A bevy of wild turkeys had been scratching around the deserted hut--it was a dreary outlook and the howling of wolves made the night hideous.--1881 Hist. of Fremont county, pp. 540. 5.--1848: J.D. Blanchard was the second physician in the county; he organized the first temperance society in the county, called Washingtonian Society, in 1848; he organized the first Sunday School in the county in Civil Bend in 1848.--Lingenfelter, page 7. 6.--1848: Biographical Hist. of Mills and Fremont: Dr. Blanchard and family located near (Lester) Platt in 1848----had been sent by the Baptist Society as a missionary to the Kaw Indians in Kansas. 7.--1850: Federal Census of Fremont county: J.D. Blanchard....41...physician....b. Ohio Mary..................42.........................Mass. Lydia..................13.........................U.S. Territory Olive...................11.........................U.S. Territory Almira.................10.........................U.S.Territory Abigail..................7.........................U.S.Territory Rebecca...............5.........................U.S.Territory William Smith......24...Shoemaker.....N.Y. Abigail Walton.....30.........................Mass. 8.--1852 Fremont county Census: "Fulton township" J.D. Blanchard....2m....6f 9.--1852: J.D. Blanchard was allowed $1.00 for his service as clerk of election; Nov. 4, 1852.--Judge Greenwood records. 10.--1852: J.D. Blanchard was allowed $6.00 for his services as clerk of elections Dec. 30, 1852.--Judge Greenwood records. 11.--1853: J.D. Blanchard as assessor of Fulton township made a return in July 1853.--Judge Greenwood records. 12.--1854 Fremont county Census: "Fulton township" J.D. Blanchard...2m...6f...1 voter...1 militia...no aliens 13.--1856 Iowa State Census: "Benton township" J.D. Blanchard....47...physician...b. Ohio......8 years in Iowa Mary..................48........................Mass....8 years in Iowa Olive H...............17........................Kans.....8 Elmira................16........................Kans.....8 Abigail................13.......................Kans......8 Rebecca.............11.......................Kans......8 Cephas Case......73...farmer...........Conn......7 years in IOwa Abner Gary...........5.......................Mass.....1 year in Iowa