Thanks, Mary Lee. I have seen the book, and I have a lousy (fourth-generation) photocopy of it. It has a few errors, but it is indeed loaded with good leads. Since it is at best second-hand reporting, I use it as a basis for searching out primary sources. A similar book is "They Also Came" for secondary-source information about Osborne county. I have only seen a few pages from it so far, and it offers a few plat maps as well as stories of pioneer inhabitants of the area. I just recently found a very interesting primary-source document from one of the early Osborne county pioneers : _Sod-House_Days_ by Howard Ruede (1855-1924) (ed. John Ise, publ University Press of Kansas, 1983; ISBN 0-7006-0234-8. 248 pp.) This is 1 1/2 years of journal entries and revised newspaper columns written in the period 1877 to 1878. Ruede lived about 15 miles from Osborne, in a series of sod houses in the Kill Creek township. He wrote for the "Osborne County Farmer" at times, and this account benefits from his mix of the journalist's background and the farmer's homey language. Another contemporary account is _Went_to_Kansas_ by Miriam Davis Colt (1817-?) (Ann Arbor [Mich.] University Microfilms [c1966] ), also a journal of a woman's travel in 1862 with her husband to settle in the Kansas Territory, only to see her husband slowly grow more and more ill on the way. She buries him in Kansas and returns to her original home in New York. The book is also available online at http://www.ukans.edu/carrie/kancoll/books/colt/. The Kansas Collection of the University of Kansas is home to more than 50 similar books online at http://www.ukans.edu/carrie/kancoll/books/. Tom Kohn >>> <MDewald62@aol.com> 9 May 2002 10:08 PM >>> Have you seen the small paperback book entitled "Early Day Couples of Tipton, Kansas" put together in 1975 for the town's centennial by Warren J Lingg, Box 72, Cawker City, KS 67430.? It mentions your great grandfather moving to LaCrosse in 1880 in a covered wagon when Mike Kohn was one yr old and his brother, Pete. When he was eight, his father moved back to Tipton when his wife died (1887) with the four children where they were cared for by Aunt Mary Reinert Gillon and the Grandmother Reinert. It also describes the weddings (photo of each couple) of each of these children and tells of their children as well. You may already know all of these bits of info but if you are interested in knowing more, let me know. It is a fascinating little book. Sincerely, Mary Lee DeWald