This collection contains various histories of the community of Hesper in Douglas County, Kansas. Included are histories of the Hesper Academy and the Hesper Friends Church, as well as biographies of Davis family members who were early Hesper settlers and witnesses to William Quantrill's August 1863 raid on the nearby town of Lawrence.

F.L. Pilla was a minister in Eudora, Kansas at the time of Confederate ally William C. Quantrill's attack on Lawrence, Kansas in mid-August 1863. Pilla writes to his brother recounting this news and indicating that there was some fear that Eudora might have been one of Quantrill's targets.