The
Homestead Act, under which so many persons
became land owners in the west, was
enacted in 1862 by Congress and provided
that any person of the United States,
head
of family or 21 years of age, a citizen
of the United States or who had announced
his
intention of becoming a citizen, was
entitled to take a quarter section of
land. Five years
residence, the payment of certain fees,
various improvements, and cultivation
of the
land, were require before final proof
could be made and patent received from
the government.
To encourage, the settlement of
westernlands, in 1873 the Act was enlarged,
and concessions were made to soldiers
and their dependents. Land could
thereafter
be acquired under a Preemption, the
Homestead Act, a Timber claim, or a
Soldier's
Homestead.
The
first claim in the county was that of
Alcia P. Fish, who filed his papers
in 1871, on a homestead in
the southwestern part of the county.
In
that same month and year a party arrived
from Washara county, Wisconsin, to seek
a location for
a colony of Seventh Day Baptists. C.
P. Rood, N. B. Prentice, Amos Travis
and C. H. Wellman
made up the party, and of the group
only Mr. Rood returned a favorable report.
His
reports were sufficiently glowing to
impress his neighbors and friends, and
in November of
that
same year he returned bringing with
him to view the country, his brother,
W. H. Rood, his
son-in-law, Mansell Davis, and John
Sheldon. Mr. Davis and Mr. Sheldon
at this time filed upon
land on the west side of the river,
adjoining the Valley county line, November
6, 1871, being
the first to file on land west of the
river.
John
Kellogg filed on a claim in the fall
of 1871, north of the present town of
Scotia; and in April,
1872, S. C. Scott, his wife and five
daughters, Alonzo Shepard, wife and
daughter, Maud,
A. M. Stewart, together with Mr. Kellogg,
established their homes in the neighborhoodabove
Scotia.
Other
settlers arrived to enlarge the settlement
below the river, and a post office,
known as Lamartine,
was located there April 17, 1873, with
A. P. Fish as postmaster.
In
December of that year, Mr. and Mrs.
James Wallace arrived and soon filed
for land. Mrs. Wallace was
the first white woman in the county.
More
arrivals were the families of:
As
the result of an Act Congress, passed
in 1864, to aid in the construction
of a railroad and telegraph
line from the Missouri River to the
Pacific Coast and to secure to the government
the
use of the same for postal, military
and other purposes. Authority
was given to the "Burlington
and Missouri railroad to extend its
road through the territory of Nebraska.
The grant
included every alternate section of
public land designated by odd numbers
to the amount
of ten alternate sections per mile on
each side of the road of the line thereof,
not sold,
reserved or otherwise disposed of the
United States, and to which preemption
or
homestead claim may not have been made.
One
hundred eighty thousand acres of the
land granted to the Burlington lay within
the borders
of Greeley county. The selection,
operation and the sale was in charge
of William
Stieger, land agent for the railroad
company.
Great
tracts of these western lands were offered
at an extremely low price to prospective
settlers,
from $1.25 to $1.50 per acre until the
country began to settle up, when the
prices advanced.
Source: The Pioneer
History of Greeley County, Nebraska 1939