In his single published work, The Discovery, Settlement, and Present State of Kentucke (1784), John Filson wrote the first history of Kentucky and told the story of its first hero, Daniel Boone. Filson came to the frontier from Chester County, Pennsylvania, where he had been born about 1753, the son of Davison Filson. Little is known of his early life. He probably attended West Nottingham Academy in Maryland, where he learned Latin, Greek, French, and surveying, setting up later as an itinerant schoolmaster himself. Tradition has it that Filson's arm was wounded in the Revolution and that after the war he returned to teaching but soon quit because his injury prevented his properly thrashing recalcitrant scholars. There is also evidence, however, that he spent the war years teaching in Wilmington.

Early in the fall of 1783, aged thirty, Filson made his first journey to Kentucky, where he acquired more than 12,000 acres...