to the Virginia state assembly, this time from Bourbon County. He began to have financial troubles after engaging in land speculation, buying and selling claims to tens of thousands of acres. These ventures ultimately failed because of the chaotic nature of land speculation in frontier Kentucky and Boone’s poor business instincts. Frustrated with the legal hassles that went with land speculation, in 1789 Boone moved upriver to Point Pleasant, Virginia (now West Virginia). There he operated a trading post and occasionally worked as a surveyor's assistant. That same year, when Virginia created Kanawha County, Boone became the lieutenant colonel of the county militia. In 1791, he was elected to the Virginia legislature for the third time. He contracted to provide supplies for the Kanawha militia, but his debts prevented him from buying goods on credit, so he closed his store and returned to hunting and trapping, though he was often hampered by rheumatism. In 1795, Boone and his wife moved back to Kentucky, on land owned by their son Daniel Morgan Boone in what became Nicholas County. The next year, Boone applied to Isaac Shelby, the first governor of the new state of Kentucky, for a contract to widen the Wilderness Road into a wagon route, but the contract was awarded to someone else. Meanwhile, lawsuits over conflicting land claims continued to make their way through the Kentucky courts. Boone's remaining land claims were sold off to pay legal fees and taxes, but he no longer paid attention to the process. In 1798, a warrant was issued for Boone's arrest after he ignored a summons to testify in a court case, although the sheriff never found him. That same year, the Kentucky assembly named Boone County in his honor. Into Missouri Having endured legal and financial setbacks, Boone sought to make a fresh start by leaving the United States. In 1799, he moved his extended family to what is now St. Charles County, Missouri, but was then part of Spanish Louisiana. The Spanish, eager to promote settlement in the sparsely populated region, did not enforce the official requirement that all immigrants be Catholic. The Spanish governor appointed Boone "syndic" (judge and jury) and commandant (military leader) of the Femme Osage district. Anecdotes of Boone's tenure as syndic suggest he sought to render fair judgments rather than strictly observe the letter of the law. Boone served as syndic and commandant until