Scope and Contents:
This collection contains transcripts of two diaries kept by Edwin Rice of Lisbon, Kendall County, Ill. The first transcript (10 pages) includes entries early in 1859 and in mid-1862, and refers to sermons by Jonathan Blanchard, William W. Patten, and others.
The second transcript (43 pages) recounts Rice's trip, Feb. 13-Sept. 24, 1865, from Lisbon to New York City, the West Indies, Panama, San Francisco, Nevada, Salt Lake City, and Denver. He discusses people and the landscape in relatively unsettled portions of the American West, and examines the records of the Placerville (Calif.) wagon road, which was built by the firm of Kingsbury and McDonald.
The final pages of the 1865 diary include notes about Rice's travel expenses. The collection also contains a copy of a Kingsbury family genealogy.
The transcripts were made in 1964 from the original diaries in the possession of Helen Moffet Hay of Urbana, Ill.
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