Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 36, Number 81, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 June 1904 — THE POOR MAN’S CHANCE. [ARTICLE]

THE POOR MAN’S CHANCE.

Uncle Sam to Give Away 9,000.000 Acres of Land in Nebraska. Any head of a family in the United States may have a cattle ranch in Nebraska one mile square by simply asking for it. The offer is made by the government and there are no conditions imposed that the poorest cannot comply with. As there are nearly 9,000,000 of acres from which selections may be made anyone desiring to become possessor of 640 acres of fine grazing lands will have no trouble finding a tract suitable to his taste. The lands in question have just been opened by the Kinkaid bill, which passed Congress and was signed on the last day of the session. The law becomes operative June 20, 1904. On and after that date these 9,000,000- —to be exact, 8,844,757—acres, many millions of which comprise the finest grazing lands in the world, will be open to .the public for entry as homesteads. As an example of the quality of some of this land, there are in Rock County 220,302 acres of public lands, and yet one railroad station in that county ships more hay to market now than any other railroad point in the whole' world. The lands affected by the Kinkaid bill have been open for homestead entry in lots of 160 acres each for many years, but not being suitable for agricultural purposes and 100 acres not being large enough on which to raise cattle, the lands have never been taken up. A square mile of this land, however, will furnish pasturage and feed for 100 head of cattle throughout the entire year. Immense tracts'of this land have been fenced in by 1 the cattle barons of Nebraska and it was to have these illegally constructed fences removed that the government last year sent Col. Mosby, the ex-Confedera(e cavalry leader and raider, intojthe State to enforce the law regarding these fences. It is said that the Richards ranch, with headquarters at Ellsworth, Neb., had under such fencing nearly 2,000,000 acres of government land. There were dozens of other great ranches which also included hundreds of thousands of government land within their sauces. But the Kinkaid bill sounds the death knell of the cattle kings, whose herds of thousands roamed the open range, more effectually than any fence removal notice which the President might promulgate. With settlers from all parts of the United States flocking in and taking up homesteads of 640 acres each, the public domain in this State is a tiling of onlj’ a few months more. Then, without necessary lands upon which to graze their herds, the cattle barons must go out of business. This is the last largo distribution of good land which the government will ever make. And it is only the really poor man who can homestead this land. Any man owning more than 160 acres of any kind of land anywhere is barred from participating in the NeUYaska land distribution.