Philip Hull, according to Robert Ellis, had arrived in what became Cedar Rapids just a very few weeks before he came. He says: "Hull was of my age and I took a liking to him. He weighed about 170 pounds, was about five feet eight inches tall, had dark hair and was stoop shouldered. He was a native of Ohio, and returned to Illinois or Ohio in 1840 to get married, as he was very lonesome out here on the prairies of Iowa. Hull never returned to Cedar Rapids. Mr. Hull and I walked to William Abbe's and bought four yoke of oxen, a wagon, and a breaking plow. We had but little money so we agreed that in payment for this property we should break 75 acres of land and cut and split 10,000 rails, which we did. It took two men to break, one to handle the cattle and one to hold the plow. It was no easy job on a hot day when the oxen would pull for a pond with all their might if not closely watched, and many were the times they would give us the slip and would lie down in the pond and we could do nothing but wait till the air cooled and night came on. Neither one of us made anything, and I saw nothing of Mr. Hull till I met him at Sacramento, California, where he had preceded me by several months. We often talked over our lives in Linn county, neither one at the time even believing that Cedar Rapids had any future. Hull was an agreeable companion, a splendid fellow and square in all his dealings. He preferred frontier life and would be content in no other locality except on the frontier." Ellis says further of Wm. Abbe: