An autobiography and files of Judge Anderson regarding a proposed history of Trempealeau County. Correspondence is from Anderson's writing to various old-timers in the county requesting factual information about the people and events in the county during its early years. After Anderson's death, the project seems to have been carried on by Roy H. Masters and Henry A. Kline Jr. This project may have been started in the 1870s by Judge B. F. Heuston. Form 1912 to 1916, Milo M. Quaife, director of the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, seemed very interested in the study Anderson was preparing and corresponded with him frequently.
The folder of David M. Wade Family papers represents a fairly complete set of family correspondence that was given to Judge Anderson for his historical research. Filed separately are recollections by Anderson of Nicolas Bourlier, a somewhat hermit-like settler on a bluff between Osseo and Pigeon Falls about 1865.
The autobiography concerns Anderson's life in Norway as a child of extremely poor farmers, immigration to the U.S. in 1867, other settlers in Trempealeau County, work at various jobs in Wisconsin, teaching school in Trempealeau County, studying law at the University of Wisconsin in 1887-1888, election as prosecuting attorney for Trempealeau County, and practicing in Whitehall.
