Contemporaneously with the establishment of the Powers ranch (about 1871), Bosler Brothers & Company built their home ranch on the lower Blue, near the present site of Lewellen, and extended their business to include several ranches up and down the North Platte river on the north side, but they always maintained the principal quarters on the Blue. They ran 15,000 to 20,000 cattle and were one of the big firms of the time. B-Bar and others were their brands.

About 1872 E. E. Cunningham, surveyor general with headquarters at Plattsmouth, sent Alex. Schleigel to survey a part of the Platte river country between North Platte and Camp Clarke bridge. I met Mr. Schleigel a few years ago in Washington, D. C. He was then a draughtsman in the Interior Department, but now lives at Lincoln, Nebraska. He is an old soldier (being under Lt. Beecher in the Battle of Beecher Island), and has been in many Indian battles, and he is an intimate friend of Robert Harvey, our state surveyor, and of John E. Evans of North Platte.

This territory he was to invade was generally known as the Bosler range, although it was occupied by Boyd brothers, of which Ex- Governor James E. Boyd was one ; and the other ranches of less importance in relation to size. Schleigel had been at the work two or three weeks, when he took two men and teams and crossed the country to Sidney for supplies. He bought his provisions at the old C. A. Moore supply depot, then a big concern of the frontier town.