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Show HOMESTEADING, 1862-1882 405 ings in Pierce County were 25,200 acres. One may guess that most of the 148,600 acres entered in Pierce with scrip, warrants, or cash between 1868 and 1873 was acquired by others than small farm makers.36 After examining the soil types of Pierce County and the location of the entries of the estate developers and speculators, and comparing them with the location of the homesteaders and others entering land under the Timber Culture Act and the Preemption Acts, John Caylor, the author of the Pierce County study, found that an overwhelming proportion of the best and most fertile land was acquired by the former group. Fifty-nine percent of the cash and scrip entries were located on soil type 1, whereas only 23 percent of the settlers' claims were located on this soil type; 76 percent of the cash and scrip entries were located on the two best soil types whereas 50 percent of the settlers' claims were on these soil types.37 By getting in early the men of capital were able to select land of better quality on the average. Many of their large estates, Caylor shows, were held for 10 years or more. Pierce County had 27.4 percent of its farms tenant operated in 1890, 40.7 percent in 1900, whereas in the state as a whole percentages were 24.7 and 36.9. The percentage of tenancy in Pierce County was, however, well below that of Nuckolls and Gage Counties where most of the Scully lands were located.38 Michigan, 34,000 acres in that region. Allan Bogue, Money at Interest, pp. 9-75. 36 The statistics in this paragraph are from Caylor, "The Disposition of the Public Domain in Pierce County, Nebraska," passim. 37 Caylor, p. 27. Caylor brings out that one of the fringe benefits officers of the B. & M. Railroad enjoyed was that of purchasing a quantity of land at a low price for individual speculation. 38 Caylor, p. 56. I have compiled the percentages from the agricultural volumes of the U.S. Censuses for 1880, 1890, and 1900. Proportion of Farms Tenant Operated 1880 1890 1900 36.9 49.3 49.8 40.7 Nebraska_____________ 18.1 24.7 Gage County_________ 23.7 38.0 Nuckolls County______ 20.0 39.4 Pierce County________ 7.1 27.4 From U.S. Censuses, 1880, 1890, 1900. Homesteading in Gage County, which is 108 miles farther south and 48 miles farther east than Pierce County has been investigated by Yasuo Okada. His study throws additional light on this area where land had been offered at public sale in 1859 and 1860. In three Gage townships that were intensively studied less than a thousand acres had been entered before the Homestead Act was adopted. Homesteaders early began filtering into Gage County, before speculators had picked over the more likely tracts. The first application was filed on January 1, 1863, by Daniel Freeman; it was one of a dozen or more firsts in as many land districts, but his was named the official first and the Homestead National Monument was later erected on the Freeman Tract. The homesteaders selected the highly productive bottomlands along the streams and never had occasion to regret their choice for in this instance they secured the best land. In five townships of 107,914 acres (excluding state selections) homesteaders entered and ultimately secured title to 17,022 acres between 1863 and 1870. Their percentage of the lands in the five townships was 25. Until 1867 their choice was wide but in that year appeared a group of speculators who quickly grabbed up 53,577 acres with low-priced agricultural college scrip. This virtually halted homesteading except in one township where the land had been withdrawn for railroad selection. When the railroad selections had been made and the reserved lands released from the withdrawal order they were |
