[1] Due to his father's frequent travelling, early childhood for Sibley was spent living with his Puritan grandfather, Samuel Hopkins, in Rhode Island.

Later on, Sibley moved with his mother to Fayetteville, North Carolina, where he received his education and apprenticed as a bookkeeper in the counting house of John Winslow.

Sibley was cleared of wrongdoing because of his good reputation among friends William Clark and Acting Governor Frederick Bates.

At one point Sibley had six slaves; two years before the civil war he freed that last remaining two prior to legal emancipation.

[6] Once the War of 1812 began, Sibley briefly moved back to St. Louis because it was feared that the British would entice the local Native American tribes to attack Fort Osage.

Consequently, Missouri Senator Thomas Hart Benton presented a petition to Congress to fund a survey of the road to Santa Fe.

Until this time, travelers between Missouri and Santa Fe periodically were raided by Indians along the way, so in addition to surveying the road, Sibley was required to negotiate treaties for safe passage along the route.

Sibley, along with commissioners Benjamin Reeves of Missouri and Thomas Mather of Illinois, set off from Fort Osage in April 1825.

The group met with leaders of the Kansa and Osage Nations along a tributary of the Neosho River, where they reached an agreement for safe passage of wagon trains and traders.

Once permission to enter Mexico was granted in September 1825, Sibley continued along the Arkansas River while Reeves and Mather returned to Missouri to report on the expedition's progress.

By December 1829, George had built a log cabin on their property and over the years expanded the structure as enrollment at the boarding school grew to over 20 women being taught by his wife.

On one occasion in 1837, after increasingly irritating area slave owners with his stories in the Alton Observer, an angry mob tried to lynch Lovejoy.