Personal story and history of Amecican’s woman pioneer, Christiana Holmes Tillson. The book was first published privately under the title: “Reminiscences of early life in Illinois by our mother.” This is a true excellent picture of society and conditions in rural Illinois in 1820, and of the life of the founders of Illinois described by a contemporary observer, Mrs. Christiana Holmes Tillson. On the day when Illinois was both territory and state its population of some 35,000 lay in two columns on opposite sides of the state, resting on the connection with the outside world furnished by the Mississippi, the Ohio, and the Wabash Rivers respectively. The population clustered in the rich river bottom, gift of the Mississippi, where Illinois history began, and in the neighborhood of the United States saline in Gallatin County. It tended always to make settlements on water courses for the sake of securing timber, water, and easy communication.