Rafinesque claimed the original narrative was recorded in pictographs on birch bark, or cedar wood tablets or sticks (Rafinesque explained that "Olum ... implies a record, a notched stick, an engraved piece of wood or bark.") He said "the late Dr. Ward of Indiana" acquired the materials in 1820 from a Lenape patient in return for a medical cure, and eventually passed them on to Rafinesque. From Rafinesque's personal notes and a family legend, this Dr. Ward was tentatively identified in 1954 as Dr John Russell Ward, a Kentucky physician who died in 1834, but a potential Indiana candidate has been identified: Malthus A. Ward (1794–1863, so not "late" in the sense of "deceased") who spent some of his early career in Indiana, moved to New England in 1823 and from 1831 was professor of natural history at the University of Georgia. He said the explanatory transcription of verses in the Lenape language came from a different source, in 1822. After his translation was published, Rafinesque said he lost the actual plaques.