 Madison was only wooded hills and swamps between the four lakes, which had just been bought by James Doty and some other real estate speculators with an eye toward founding a city there.Early leaders in the territory needed a place to meet and establish the territorial government.Several land speculators saw this need even before the territory was official, and tried to prepare sites which could be chosen as the territorial capital, hoping to become wealthy if the capitol was built in their city.