Letter sent from David Olmsted to Antoine Grignon requesting tea and sugar, June 21, 1851. Olmsted was living at and managing a trading post at Long Prairie at the time. From the Eben Douglas Pierce papers (Manuscripts Collection, Wisconsin Historical Society, Madison). Used with the permission of the Wisconsin Historical Society.

Letter from Lawrence Taliaferro to William Clark dated August 12, 1834. In it, Taliaferro informs Clark (Superintendent of Indian Affairs) that he (Taliaferro) confiscated six barrels of whiskey from fur trader Alexis Bailly on July 22, 1834 and is holding them at Fort Snelling. Taliaferro and Bailly clashed numerous times over trading practices and Bailly's illegal distribution of alcohol to nearby Dakota and Ojibwe communities. This seizure of alcohol eventually led to a lawsuit brought by Bailly against Taliaferro. A judge ruled in Bailly's favor in 1841.

In this letter, a doctor describes the transportation of Italian immigrant D.P. to the Diamond Point Quarantine Station in Washington state, chosen for its isolation and temperate mountain climate. Leprosy was still incurable, and although leprosy is virtually impossible to transmit without sustained contact, great care was taken to ensure the patient left no disease-causing bacteria behind. On the journey, Mr. D.P. separated his bedsheets from the mattress with a thick towel to ensure no skin flakes or body fluids were left behind, regularly cleaned his sink with a 60% alcohol solution, gargled and flushed his nose with a antibacterial wash multiple times daily, and kept his used linens separate for later disposal.

Lewis H. and Hephzibah J. Merritt, c.1880.