A canal-boat man visited Wisconsin, purchased 240 acres of land, and moved onto it in spring 1849; another unnamed man went to Illinois, worked on the Illinois Canal, and visited Wisconsin.

The evidence

• “Y., and ran a boat on the Erie Canal. In 1848, went from Buffalo to Chicago on a canal-boat, and ran from there to Peoria and back till navigation closed. In the fall of 1848, visited Wisconsin when it was a Territory; purchased 240 acres of land and moved on to it in the spring of 1849, and built a house that summer ; he has sold 200 acres of the original purchase, but now owns seventy acres, and has deeded sixty acres more to his son Cassius. His residence was built in 1847 by Joseph Prentice.”

  1879-history-of-rock-county/33-bios-magnolia.md, PDF p. 874

  Butterfield, C. W., et al. The History of Rock County, Wisconsin: its early settlement, growth, development, resources, etc. Chicago: Western Historical Company, 1879. Cornell University Library via the Internet Archive, archive.org/details/cu31924028871585.

  Grade A: Found on a page of one of our sources