When George Washington (G.W.) Brown and George W. Deitzler set out the morning of Feb. 14, 1857, for the valley of the Upper Neosho River, many of the best townsites in the developing Territory of Kansas had already been selected. However, being a newspaperman, he had heard favorable reports for that portion of Kansas. Brown was editor of the Kansas Herald of Freedom, published in Lawrence.

Mounting their horses, they set out on roads “yet unsettled.” Brown described the journey as “heavy,” owing to a three-hour ride in the mud as they traveled south. They reached the Santa Fe Road that evening and stayed at the home of Mr. Heberling, whose “latch string” was always out “for the weary wayfarer or claim seeker.”

Thousands of teams traveled annually over the Santa Fe Road.

Brown observed, “The trains, for miles in length, remind the observer of Oriental practices, when immense caravans journeyed over the plains of Syria and Arabia, bearing to the cities of the Mediterranean the wealth of the Indies.”

The next day they crossed a bridge at One Hundred Ten Mile Creek. Here, the McGee plantation had several Negro cabins and a horse-powered saw mill. A little after noon they arrived at Council City (today’s Burlingame, Kan.), 16 miles west of Heberling’s place.

Judge Phillip Schuyler and Samuel Caniff of New York established the town of Council City under the auspices of the American Settlement Company.

The town was renamed Burlingame later that year of 1857. Brown noted that with its position on the Santa Fe Trail, the town was “destined to be an important place in the future history of the territory.”

West of Council City, the travelers turned south away from the Santa Fe Road to cross open prairie. After passing Dragoon Creek, no settlements were to be found on an otherwise predominating prairie.

Brown wrote, “We had no other guide than our pocket compass, save a high bluff some 30 miles to the southwest (near Diamond Springs), which towered above the horizon, looking like a peak of a distant mountain.”

Travel continued to be “heavy,” with flooding streams difficult to ford. It was 4 o’clock in the afternoon before they were able to reach the first occupied house after leaving Council City, that of William Grimsley.

By evening, they made the home of Lorenzo Dow. Dow was one of the first pioneers on the Upper Neosho, eight miles above its confluence with the Cottonwood River. G.D. Humphrey operated a saw mill at the confluence.

Several miles below the confluence the abandoned town of Neosho City was visited. Brown didn’t explain at the time, but later commented that John Brown (no relation) had robbed the store of its goods. There were six graves, one of which was a woman killed during the attack.

Returning to Dow’s place for the night, they awoke to a severe snow storm that delayed their departure until near noon. Skirting the Neosho, they found the crossings impassable, forcing them to continue travel to within eight miles of Council Grove. With night coming on, they “tarried with (Elisha) Goddard, an eastern gentleman of capital and energy, who has erected a very lovely home and ... has surrounded himself with many comforts, which we had nowhere seen in so great perfection since leaving Lawrence ... Here was the first place we were able to get our horses into a stable for the night.”

The next day, Feb. 19, they recrossed the river to explore the high rolling prairie between the Neosho and the Cottonwood Rivers. Late in the day, while returning to the confluence, they were met by several “swells” of the prairie, each offering commanding views of the whole region.

“We all stopped and gazed around on the lovely prospects.”

On the last swell, a town had been planned in the early months of 1856. The project was abandoned because of the political disturbances that followed. This was the place Brown was looking for, but as night was falling, they continued toward the Neosho and crossed to return to Dow’s place.

They recrossed the Neosho the next morning of Feb. 20, 1857, “scouring the country in the vicinity of the Cottonwood.” At noon they returned to the same beautiful elevation they had left the evening before. The swell covered nearly two sections of land.

“The sun broke through the clouds and rolled up the curtains ... apparently to give us a view of the lovely country which a wise Providence had created for the abode of a high order of intelligence.”

Several inches of snow turned the “otherwise blackened prairie into snowy whiteness.” To the south, a dark line of timber lined the Cottonwood River, framed by the elevated rolling prairie rising above the tops of the highest trees.

“It required but a little stretch of the imagination to fancy splendid mansions, thrifty orchards, fruitful vineyards and ‘the cattle of a thousand hills’...”

Emporia, Kan., was born that beautiful winter day as G. W. Brown and his companions gazed upon “the loveliest sight in the world,” only to be found on The Way West.

“The Cowboy” Jim Gray can be reached at 220 21st Rd., Geneseo, KS 67444, (785) 531-2058 or kansascowboy@kans.com.