Amount of scrip and orders issued on general fund to December 15, 1858 $ 6,317.17 Amount of scrip and orders issued on general fund to September 5, 1859 3,140.53 Scrip issued toward building jail 1,675.00 Scrip issued for grading streets, curbing, etc. 10,105.39 ————————— Total $21,238.09 ————————— General deficit $ 9,229.79 The fact that Mayor Pomeroy had strongly urged in his inaugural address the importance of grading and improving the streets of the city “especially Atchison, Second and Fourth streets, and the levee,” possibly accounts for the indebtedness of the city at so early a date. There was a general inclination among the citizens of Atchison to build a modern city in accordance with the standards of the times, and therefore they were anxious to follow the mayor’s advice to put their streets and alleys in order. One of the most interesting and at the same time one of the most difficult tasks in tracing the settlement of a community, is to correctly catalogue the establishment of the first settler, the first house, the first business institution, and the first of everything, and it could with safety be said that this is not only an interesting and difficult task but it is well nigh an impossible one. This is not to be wondered at when we take into account the rush and confusion which always attend the settlement of a new community. However, it has now become an established fact that George M. Million was the first white settler in the Territory, with Samuel Dickson a close second. There was some dispute about who built the first house in the town of Atchison, but we have resolved all doubt in favor of Dickson, just as we have decided that George T. Challiss established the first business house. The Challiss brothers, George, Luther and William all played an important part in the very early history of the county. They were in business and in the professions, and they were all land owners, selecting the choicest tracts “close in” and holding onto them, none too wisely or too well, for their tenacity in this respect later resulted in their undoing. The leading lawyers in the county during those days were M. J. Ireland, A. G. Otis, Isaac Hascall, James A. Headley, A. E. Mayhew, J. T. Hereford, P. H. Larey, Joseph P. Carr and B. F. Stringfellow. Horton, Foster, Ingalls, and General Bela M. Hughes came later. Hascall carried a card in the _Squatter Sovereign_, advertising his legal headquarters as the Border Ruffian Law Office.