John Grant

     
“Interesting Reminiscences. John Grant was the 1st white man who settled in the territory now known as Kenton County. The settlement was made on Licking river some 13 miles from its mouth. The place was afterwards dignified with the name of Wilmington, and there the 1st court for Campbell County, then including all this region was held (of country)
About 3 miles from this city and not far from the Lex. Pike, is a house that was built 60 years ago. It is an old fashioned cabin, built of blue ash logs, & is yet in a good state of preservation. The cabin was built with port holes & c. as at the time of its erection “Indians were about.”

from the Paris Western Citizen, March 21, 1851, as found in the Draper Papers, 11CC72

Lyman C. Draper (1815-1891) collected information on America’s first frontier and its notable figures and events, such as Daniel Boone, George Rogers Clarke, and The Battle of King’s Mountain. Draper’s papers include a treasure trove of information on the frontier settlers of the Carolinas, Virginia, Kentucky, Georgia, Alabama, Tennessee, and Pennsylvania.

The original papers are held at the Wisconsin Historical Society. They include thousands of handwritten letters of correspondence comprising nearly 500 volumes of information not available anywhere else about the pioneer settlers of the trans-Allegheny West.