Robert G. Elliot was born in Union County, Indiana, July 23, 1828 of South Carolina parentage. He was educated in the common schools of Indiana and graduated in 1850 from Miami University, Indiana. It was while attending the University that he met Josiah Miller, a native of South Carolina.

These two young men formed a partnership to publish a paper in Kansas in the interest of freedom. They settled in Lawrence and established the Kansas Free State which was one of the first papers, if not the very first, established by the anti-slavery people in Kansas. It was destroyed on May 21, 1856, when Sheriff Jones and his posse sacked Lawrence and it was never restored. The Free State edited with great ability and it is said to have had a broader influence than any other of the early publications.

Mr. Elliot was in the Territorial Legislature of 1857-58 and from 1868-1874 he was a Regent of the University of Kansas. This picture was given to the library by his son, Sam S. Elliot, on April 21, 1932. It is a photographic copy.