It was on the 13th day of August in 1885 a tall, wiry looking youth left Vermont with a mind fully made up to see some of the wonders of the western world. I started from Swanton, Vermont. When I reached Chicago, I took an immigrant train to Scotland, Dakota. The train was filled with Europeans, some of whom carried all of their possessions in an old blanket.

In due time I reached Scotland. I went into a store and asked where John Corliss lived. These are the directions I received: The storekeeper said: "Now I have you to the tow mill." This was the place where they prepared flax for weaving into cloth. "You turn the tow mill around and continue on north for a mile or two until you come to a house with a straw shed. That isn't the place, but the people living there will tell you where to go."

They pointed west and I could see the small house where my brother lived. I left the road and continued straight west across road prairie until I reached the residence of my brother whom I had not seen for fifteen years.

This was a newly homesteaded country and the principle crops were wheat and flax. More flax than wheat. I stayed there two weeks and most of the time we threshed flax. This was pitched by two of the husky daughters of Russia and, believe me, they knew how to pitch flax.

Having two brothers and a sister in Nebraska, I now left Dakota and in due time found myself in Hebron, Nebr. This was a good corn, hog and cattle country. There was better water but the land was more broken. After staying in Nebraska for a month I went to Republic county, Kansas, and husked 1600 bushels of corn for two cents a bushel.  I finished this job the night before Thanksgiving, Nov. 26, 1885. That night at 12 o'clock I took the train for Wray, Colo., and at eight o'clock the next morning arrived there.  Wray consisted of a railroad depot, section house and a sod hotel. The land locaters name was Witcliff Newell.  He took me out 4 1/2 miles south of Wray and located me on 160 acres preemption. After six months continuous residence, I proved up on the land.

I filed on a homestead and tree claim nine miles southeast of Wray and went to breaking prairie.

The winter of 1887, I joined up with a surveying outfit and went down into then Elbert county, now Kit Carson County.  This was the first I saw of the country around the south fork of the Republican river. It was about a year before the railroad was built on, which Burlington is situated.

My brother John, whom I visited in Dakota, became dissatisfied with the country and sold out. He covered his wagon and with a wife and five children came overland to Colorado. He located near the McKrellis ranch in Elbert county about 25 miles northwest of Burlington.

He tried dry farming there for a few years and then was elected treasurer of Elbert county. He held the office for two years. He then sold out and went to Missouri. He died about 1913 and is buried in Ash Grove, Mo.

My brother A. N. Corliss settled in Elbert county about 1889. He lived and tried farming for a few years on a dry land claim. He afterwards sold out and settled on a claim on the Republican river near the old Tuttle ranch, where he accumulated about 2000 acres on the Republican and Launchman, which he still holds as the Corliss ranch. He served as county assessor for several years.

This ranch holds the fable of a miner who died in Chicago. This is his story: "Go to the Launchman. Follow up the Launchman until you come to a spring. Southeast from the spring you will find a mound. In that mound you will find a soldier's blouse, a ramrod, and a gun. Southeast from that mound you will find a cave. In that cave you will find --." And he died. I was one of the hundreds who visited that cave expecting to find a fortune. After scraping and digging for some time, I finally found a few Indian beads.

N. L. Corliss, St. Albans, Vt.