Jefferson County Online A part of the IAGenWeb and USGenWeb Projects Financial Condition of the County January 3, 1842, and Last Meeting Under Territorial Jurisdiction

"James L. Scott reported to the Commissioners that he had collected taxes for the year 1841 to the amount of $1,083.33." Receipts for licenses during the year, $202.50; fines, $15. Total receipts, $1,300,83. The total amount of expenditures for the same period was $1,573,76, leaving a balance against the county of $262.93. In those days, it appears that the closest economy was practiced by the county authorities. There was no source of revenue except from the tax assessed against personal property, licenses collected from merchants, grocers, etc., and fines for misdeeds. The latter were small, amounting to only $15 for the year ending on the 31st day of December, 1841.

The last meeting of the Commissioners under Territorial jurisdiction was held on the 3d day of November, 1846. The following were their last official orders previous to the admission of Iowa Territory into the Union as a sovereign and independent State:

Ordered, That the Treasurer pay William Brown $10 for four days' services as County Commissioner.
Ordered, That the Treasurer pay Albert L. Connable $10 for four days' services as County Commissioner.
Ordered, That the Treasurer pay Smith Ball $10 for four days' services as County Commissioner.
Ordered, That the Treasurer pay John Shields, Commissioners' Clerk, $22, as per bill on file.
Ordered, That Court adjourn until the first Monday in January, 1847.
(Signed)
William Brown.
Albert L. Connable.
Smith Ball.

The transition from Territorial dependency to State independency was easy, and involved no change in the management of county affairs. The January session was governed by the same rules, and everything went along as smoothly as if "nothing had happened." Wolf-hunters were present in force, and the most of the first day was devoted to the examination of prairie-wolf scalps and the allowance of premiums for the taking thereof. Two full pages of the old journal are taken up with orders, of which the following two are verbatim copies:

Ordered, That the Treasurer pay H. C. Ross $1 for one prairie-wolf sculp, as per certificate on file.
Ordered, That the Treasurer pay W. L. Hamilton, assinee of Joseph Scott, $3 for three prairie-wolf sculps, as per certificate on file.

Forty-five dollars were "ordered" paid for this branch of hunters' industry, and it hadn't been a very good season for wolf-sculping, either.

From the date of the first meeting of the County Commissioners at the town of Lockridge, on the 8th day of April, A. D. 1839, to the present -- a period of thirty-nine years -- the business of the county has gone smoothly along. The county increased in population and wealth from year to year, until now it is among the foremost counties in the State in all that goes to make a people proud, prosperous and happy. The economy commenced by the early Commissioners has been rigidly enforced, and, as a result, the credit of the county is "good as gold."

Commencing with the first presence of white men in the territory now included in Jefferson County in August, 1835, the history of its settlement and development down to the organization of the county, in 1839, was as carefully and accurately traced as possible. The incidents occurring previous to that date, and which are made to form a part of these pages, were gathered from such of the old settlers as have been spared to the present. That some errors will be detected by critical readers, the writer has no doubt. But the cause of the errors, if errors there be, does not rest with either the writer or his authority. The incidents are all quoted from the memory of such of the surviving settlers as could be seen. Not one of them had ever been committed to paper, and to treasure and preserve such a multiplicity of events, dates, names, etc., intact and unbroken, and recall them in regular order after the lapse of nearly half a century, without written data, is beyond the power of man.

The history of the organization of the county, and the modus operandi of starting the county machinery and of its political economy, is gathered from such of the county records as have been preserved. It was not the purpose to follow in detail and transfer to these pages the entire proceedings of the Board of County Commissioners, County Judge and Board of County Supervisors, but only to quote sufficiently therefrom to preserve the history of the first public acts and establish the economy of the early county authorities. Having accomplished this purpose, we leave the general details of county management and will only note a few of the more important events, such as the building of the present Jail, the Court House, the railroad enterprises, Poor-Farm, war record, Agricultural Society, etc.