MRS. CHARLES B. LETTON 168 BOULDER AT FORT CALHOUN, COMMEMORATING THE COUNCIL OF LEWIS AND CLARK WITH THE OTOE AND MISSOURI INDIANS 187 MRS. OREAL S. WARD 203 OREGON TRAIL MONUMENT ON KANSAS-NEBRASKA STATE LINE 240 MRS. CHARLES OLIVER NORTON 252 OREGON TRAIL MONUMENT NEAR HEBRON, NEBRASKA 268 MRS. WARREN PERRY 305 MEMORIAL FOUNTAIN, ANTELOPE PARK, LINCOLN 326 MRS. CHARLES H. AULL 333 MONUMENT MARKING THE INITIAL POINT OF THE CALIFORNIA TRAIL, RIVERSIDE PARK, OMAHA 337 CALIFORNIA TRAIL MONUMENT, BEMIS PARK, OMAHA 337 SOME FIRST THINGS IN THE HISTORY OF ADAMS COUNTY BY GEORGE F. WORK Adams county is named for the first time, in an act of the territorial legislature approved February 16, 1867, when the south bank of the Platte river was made its northern boundary. There were no settlers here at that time although several persons who are mentioned later herein had established trapping camps within what are now its boundaries. In 1871 it was declared a county by executive proclamation and its present limits defined as, in short, consisting of government ranges, 9, 10, 11, and 12 west of the sixth principal meridian, and townships 5, 6, 7, and 8, north of the base line, which corresponds with the south line of the state. Mortimer N. Kress, familiarly known to the early settlers as "Wild Bill," Marion Jerome Fouts, also known as "California Joe," and James Bainter had made hunting and trapping camps all the way along the Little Blue river, prior to this time. This stream flows through the south part of the county and has its source just west of its western boundary in Kearney county. James Bainter filed on a tract just across its eastern line in Clay county as his homestead, and so disappears in the history of Adams county. Mortimer N. Kress is still living and now has his home in Hastings, a hale, hearty man of seventy-five years and respected by all. Marion J. Fouts, about seventy years of age, still lives on the homestead he selected in that early day and is a respected, prominent man in that locality.