Editing Daniel Boone National Forest (section)

===European exploration until statehood===
By the early 16th century both the [[French colonial empire|French]] and the [[British Empire|British]] had laid claim to the land that would become the Daniel Boone National Forest. Among the first Europeans to enter the area was the French [[René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle]] in 1669.<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|1}} He was later followed by the party of the English [[Thomas Walker (explorer)|Thomas Walker]] in 1750, who would go on to make the first European discoveries of the [[Cumberland Gap]], Cumberland River, and the pass through [[Pine Mountain (Appalachian Mountains)|Pine Mountain]]{{efn|near modern day [[Pineville, Kentucky]]}}<ref name="usfs">{{cite book|last1=Collins|first1=Robert F.|editor1-last=Ellison|editor1-first=Betty B.|title=A history of the Daniel Boone National Forest, 1770-1970|date=1975|publisher=[[United States Forest Service]]|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nUN8AAAAIAAJ|access-date=1 December 2017|ref=usfs}}</ref>{{rp|1–3}} Several others made expeditions in the area over the following decades with mixed success.{{efn|This included John Findley from 1752 to 1753; James McBride in 1754; a party of 19 unnamed Virginians in 1761, 1763, and 1764; Isaac Lindsey in 1767; and John Swift in 1761, 1762, 1764, 1764-68, and 1768-69.<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|4–7}}}}

Around 1760, Daniel Boone reached an understanding with [[Richard Henderson (jurist)|Richard Henderson]] for the exploration and preparation of the wilderness beyond the [[Appalachian Mountains]], so that it may be more easily settled by those who sought to move westward.<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|15–6}} Boone made an expedition in 1767 into the area of modern-day [[Prestonsburg, Kentucky]],<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|17–8}} and then in 1769, he set out with five others on an extended expedition through the Cumberland Gap and into Kentucky, where he stayed until March 1771.<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|21–2, 30}} Boone set out on a failed attempt at settlement in 1773, and then again in 1774, where he served as an [[Officer (armed forces)|officer]] in [[Lord Dunmore's War]].<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|33–4, 37–8}}

On March 17, 1775, the [[Transylvania Colony]], founded by Henderson, and for which Boone was employed, reached an agreement (over the objections of the governors of [[Colony of Virginia|Virginia]] and [[Province of North Carolina|North Carolina]]) with a grand counsel of the [[Cherokee Nation (1794–1907)|Cherokee Nation]] to purchase all land from the [[Kentucky River]] to the Cumberland River, including large part of modern-day Kentucky and [[Tennessee]], an area known as the Transylvania Purchase.<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|47–50}}{{efn|The land was purchased for 10,000 [[Pound sterling|pounds]] in currency and trade goods.<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|52}}}} In anticipation of this purchase, Boone and a party were dispatched on March 10, marking and clearing trails in the newly acquired lands, and eventually founding Fort Boone, near the confluence of Station Camp Creek and the Kentucky River.<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|57–66}}{{efn|Near modern day [[Irvine, Kentucky]]<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|63–4}}}} This became the fledgling Transylvania Colony,<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|73–85}} until being eliminated in 1778 by the [[Virginia House of Delegates]], becoming [[Kentucky County, Virginia]], and by 1792, the Commonwealth of Kentucky.<ref name="usfs"/>{{rp|93, 126}}