In 1838, two years after his arrival, Lapham began the collection of material for a gazeteer of Wisconsin. Published at Milwaukee in 1844, it constitutes both Wisconsin’s first book of history and the state’s first home-made book of any character to be published in more durable binding than paper. So attractive were its merits that an unscrupulous rival author, Donald McLeod, more adept at wielding the scissors than the pen, promptly and brazenly plagiarized a large portion of its contents for his _History of Wiskonsan_, published, appropriately enough, by “Steele’s Press” at Buffalo, in 1846: and a copy of this fraudulent publication was recently offered for sale by a dealer, with due encomiums upon its rarity and worth, for the modest sum of thirty dollars. Thus far we have followed Lapham’s career in due chronological order. Some thirty years were yet to elapse before his death in 1875, years crowded with earnest, self-effacing labors in the cause of scholarship. In what follows I shall treat of his various scholarly interests and achievements in topical order, without regard to chronology. Although himself self-taught Lapham’s active interest in educational institutions persisted throughout his life. In 1843 he secured the adoption by the territorial legislature of a resolution to Congress petitioning a grant of land for the purpose of establishing in Wisconsin an institution for the instruction of the deaf and dumb, and blind, and an asylum for the insane. He is the real father of the Milwaukee public high school system. In 1846 he donated thirteen acres of land lying within the city limits for the purpose of establishing the first high school. In the spring of 1848 he was commissioned by the city as its agent to secure a loan of $16,000 in the East for the building of schoolhouses, and he made the long trip to New York and Boston on this public mission. In the same year he proffered the newly authorized University of Wisconsin the gift of “a pretty extensive herbarium” of 1,000 or 1,500 species of plants. In March, 1848, by a meeting of citizens held at the council house “it was deemed expedient to establish a college in this city” and an executive committee of five townsmen was appointed with full power to consummate the desired object. Lapham was one of the five men charged with this weighty responsibility, and out of this movement proceeded the “Milwaukee Female Seminary,” which today is represented by the Milwaukee-Downer College, one of the state’s noble institutions of higher learning. In August, 1850, as president of the executive board of the college, Lapham had the satisfaction of delivering to its first two graduates their diplomas. When, in later years, he was offered a professorship in the school he declined the position, modestly explaining that his lack of education and of teaching experience rendered him unfit to discharge the trust.