ADAMS, a county toward the W. part of Wisconsin, has an area of 1355 square miles. The Wisconsin river flows through it from X. to S.: it is also drained by the Lemonweir river. The surface is mostly covered with forests, from which large quantities of lumber are procured and rafted down the Wisconsin river. The streams above named furnish extensive water-power. Wheat, oats, Indian corn, hay, and butter are the staples. There were raised in 1850, 80,533 bushels of wheat; 46,675 of oats; 23,149 of corn; 8051 tons of hay, and 33,073 pounds of butter. The county seat having not yet been established, this county is attached to Sauk county for judicial purposes. Population, 187. (Baldwin's New and Complete Gazetteer of the United States..., 1854)
ADAMS, County, is bounded on the north by Portage, on the east by Waushara and Marquette, on the south by Columbia and Sauk, and on the west by La Crosse and a portion of Sauk. It was established March 11, 1848, from Portage; at which time it embraced the territory south and west of the Lemonwier and Wisconsin rivers, north of town 13, and east of range 1 E. By an act approved March 6, 1849, the territory was extended north and east, and so changed in the southeast that it embraced only about four townships of its original limits. At the session of the legislature of the winter of 1853, it was restored to its former southern bounds, and the seat of justice located at Kingsbury's Ferry, on the Wisconsin river. The county is attached to Sauk for legislative purposes. It is watered by the Wisconsin, Lemonwier, Yellow, Kecada, and the two Roche a Gris rivers, with several other streams, the banks of some of which are covered by an excellent growth of pine timber. The first surveys of Adams county having been made so recently as 1851, but little is as yet known of its advantages and resources. The population in 1850 was 187, since which time it has been rapidly settling. Upon the Lemonwier are erected and in operation, four saw mills propelled by water, and one by steam, and are supposed to produce from four to six million feet of pine lumber per annum. The valley of the Lemonwier, so called, constitutes that part lying on the west and south of said river, is not easily surpassed in richness and fertility of soil; the timber being principally black and burr oak; numerous small streams and rivulets flow from the high lands across the valley, which already contain a numerous population. There is one steam saw mill, and one mill propelled by water, on the Yellow river, employed in the manufacture of pine lumber, producing from two to three million feet per annum. The country lying between the Yellow river and the Wisconsin, and the Yellow river and the Lemonwier, presents a flat and monotonous appearance; the soil in general being unfit for agricultural purposes, affording, however, many facilities for stock raising and dairy farming unsurpassed in the state. The features of the country are more varied in the east than on the west side of the Wisconsin river, presenting a more broken and undulating surface, and more elevated. This part of the country is fast being settled by a hardy and enterprising class of farmers, and is destined, at no distant day, to be one of the best grain-growing portions of the State. The southeast part of the county is the most densely populated, the country being diversified and much elevated, but not very well watered. At the first election held in the county, in April 1853, the following gentlemen were elected County Officers: County Judge, E.S.Miner; Sheriff, W. J. Sayre; Clerk of Court, S. G. Holbrook; Clerk of Board Supervisors, Wm. H. Spain; Register, Wm. H. Palmer; District Attorney, D. A. Bigelow; Treasurer, S. G. Hulbrook; Surveyor, Caleb McArthur; Coroner, W. I. Webster. (John Warren Hunt, Wisconsin Gazetteer..., Madison, 1853)