First Homesteader Can Prove His Title Clear

Daniel Freeman of Beatrice Has the Honor, According to the Land Office Record.

(Written for the Sunday World-Herald)

Beatrice, Neb., Aug 25 - A few days ago the World-Herald contained an article setting forth that Marion Gore took the first homestead under the act of May 1902.

Were there any room for dispute about this matter it might remain a theme for discussion. But the controversy is believed to be settled by the records of the land office beyond dispute and Daniel Freeman of Beatrice is the first homesteader under that act, and resides upon his homestead at this hour, four miles west of Beatrice.

February 19, 1897, Hon Galusha A. Grow, who was the father of the homestead law, delivered a speech in the house- of representatives at Washington from which the following is an extract.

"There are two interesting incidents connected with the final passage of the original free homestead bill. First, it took effect on the day of Lincoln's emancipation proclamation.

Second, the first settler under the homestead bill, which provided free homes for free men, was named, Freeman. Daniel Freeman of Beatrice, Gage County, Nebraska, was a Union Soldier, home on furlough, which would expire on the 2nd or 3rd day of January, 1863. It was a little past midnight on the 1st day of January 1863, when he made his entry in the land office of his district, and left his home the same day to take his place again in the ranks on the tented fields.

His entry was No. 1; his proof of residence was No. 1. his patent was No. 1, recorded on page 1 of book 1of the land office of the United States. The first settler under this law was a Freeman, and I trust the last of his beneficiaries in the long coming years of future will be a freeman.

Daniel Freeman has now in his possession, the patent form the government for that homestead. It is "Homestead Certificate No. 1. Application No. 1, Recorded on Page 1 of Book 1", and he made his entry at Brownville, Neb., at a few minutes past midnight of the morning of January 1, 1863, and the honor of having taken the first homestead in the United States cannot be taken from him by any one upon mere statements, especially where, as in this case, that person is so poorly informed.

The article in the World-Herald makes Mr. Gore say that it was long supposed that J. Sterling Morton's home was the first homestead; Hon J. Sterling Morton's home was a pre-emption and not a homestead at all.

Mr. Freeman is justly proud of the fact that he took the first homestead, and of the further fact that it is still his homestead and does not propose that some one not entitled to the honor shall usurp it, unless he can show the record.

Hon Galusha A. Grow took the trouble to look the matter up and the extract from his speech shows that he had no doubts as to whom the honor belongs.

The homestead, thus distinguished above all others, lies in section 26, township 4, north of range 5, east of the sixth principal meridian and is about four miles west of the city of Beatrice in the midst of as fine an agricultural region as can be found in the world. It lies in the valley of Cub Creek, which rises in the prairie in the southern part of Jefferson County and runs almost a straight course east to empty into the Big Blue River.

Here Mr. Freeman has always resided and reared a large family. Here he has watched his trees and his orchards grow up around him, and here he has hospitably entertained his friends in his comfortable home.

He is a remarkable man in many ways. At the breaking out of the Civil War he enlisted as a private in the Seventeenth Illinois Infantry. He was soon detached and entered the secret service of the Army, where he continued to the end of the war. He went in search of information into nearly every state in the Confederacy and carefully examined and reported upon the defenses of the city of Richmond in Missouri he led an expedition that defeated a guerrilla force in which Colonel Dick Chiles was wounded and taken prisoner, and in which he captured the horses of Senator Stephen B. Fihins Company, and came near capturing the senator himself when he was a simple Missouri bushwhacker.

He was on the frontier furring the troubles with the Sioux Indians and was a member of the expedition which went to meet that knight of the plains, Spotted Tails, on the Little Blue River.

His life has been full of strange vicissitudes, and he is in many respects a remarkable character.

In person he is a good six feet in height and finely proportioned and although now in his 76th year, with a beard like snow, he is erect, and in his modes of thought and in his step and movement he is yet a young man.

He is a man of strong will and which a loyal and steadfast friend he is also a steadfast enemy and right good hater. He was an abolitionist and a great friend of Abraham Lincoln.

His opinions never stagnated and his convictions never go to bed.

He is on the front line of reformers today; he takes a deep and intelligent interest in all public affairs and is an outspoken radical on all questions.

He is bitterly hostile to sectarian teachings in the public schools and has a suit now pending in the Supreme Court, to present religious services and bible reading in the public school district.

It is characteristic of him to never cease trying to accomplish whatever he once undertakes to do. It was this feature of persistence that caused him to prevail upon the register and receiver of the land office at Brownville to remain awake with

him until the clock struck 12 and January 1, 1863 had come, so that he might secure the first homestead. His application was filed within few minutes after the New Year's arrival.

He lives in comfort here, content with his lot, and doing as he sees it, his duty, as a valiant man, respected by the people among whom he has lived so long.

W. H. Ashby

Sunday World-Herald - September 8, 1901

ICKES DESIGNATES FIRST HOMESTEAD AS U.S. MONUMENT

WASHINGTON — Secretary of the Interior Harold L. Ickes has designated the first homestead farm in the United States as a national monument.

Ickes announced that the National Park Service had purchased a quarter section of land on Cub creek, Gage County, Nebraska, originally claimed by Daniel Freeman, a physician and farmer from Ohio.

Freeman filed the first claim under the homestead law signed by President Lincoln in 1862. Five minutes; after midnight Jan 1, 1863, the day the law became effective.

Ickes said that the entire 160-acre farm, situated five miles northwest of Beatrice, Neb., had been purchased from five children and heirs of Freeman.

Freeman obtained a furlough from the Union army to file his claim. Fearing that his furlough would expire before he could register it, he persuaded the land agent at Brownville, Neb., to open his office five minutes after the law became effective.

The Coshocton Tribune - Wednesday, January 18, 1939, Coshocton, Ohio