The Conquest: The Story of a Negro Pioneer

  CHAPTER VI

  "AND WHERE IS ORISTOWN?" THE TOWN ON THE MISSOURI

  It came a few days later in a restaurant in Council Bluffs, Iowa, when Iheard the waiters, one white man and the other colored, saying, "I'mgoing to Oristown." "And where is Oristown?" I inquired, taking a stooland scrutinizing the bill of fare. "Oristown," the white man spoke up,drawing away at a pipe which gave him the appearance of being anythingfrom a rover to a freight brakeman, "is about two hundred and fiftymiles northwest of here in southern South Dakota, on the edge of theLittle Crow Reservation, to be opened this summer." This is not theright name, but the name of an Indian chief living near where this iswritten.

  Oristown is the present terminus of the C. & R.W. Ry. and he went on totell me that the land in part was valuable, while some portions were nobetter than Western Nebraska. A part of the Reservation was to be openedto settlement by lottery that summer and the registration was to takeplace in July. It was now April. "And the registration is to come off atOristown?" I finished for him with a question. "Yes," he assented.

  At Omaha the following day I chanced to meet two surveyors who had beensent out to the reservation from Washington, D.C. and who told me towrite to the Department of the Interior for information regarding theopening, the lay of the land, quality of the soil, rainfall, etc. I didas they suggested and the pamphlets received stated that the land to beopened was a deep black loam, with clay subsoil, and the rainfall inthis section averaged twenty-eight inches the last five years. I knewthat Iowa had about thirty inches and most of the time was too wet, soconcluded here at last was the place to go. This suited me better thanany of the states or projects I had previously looked into, besides, Iknew more about the mode of farming employed in that section of thecountry, it being somewhat similar to that in Southern Illinois.

  On the morning of July fifth, at U.P. Transfer, Iowa, I took a trainover the C.P. & St. L., which carried me to a certain town on theMissouri in South Dakota. I did not go to Oristown to register as I hadintended but went to the town referred to, which had been designated asa registration point also. I was told by people who were "hitting" inthe same direction and for the same purpose, that Oristown was crowdedand lawless, with no place to sleep, and was overrun with tin-horngamblers. It would be much better to go to the larger town on theMissouri, where better hotel accommodation and other conveniences couldbe had. So I bought a ticket to Johnstown, where I arrived late in theafternoon of the same day. There was a large crowd, which soon found itsway to the main street, where numerous booths and offices were set up,with a notary in each to accept applications for the drawing. Thisconsisted of taking oath that one was a citizen of the United States,twenty-one years of age or over. The head of a family, a widow, or anywoman upon whom fell the support of a family, was also accepted. Noperson, however, owning over one hundred and sixty acres of land, or whohad ever had a homestead before, could apply. The application was thenenclosed in an envelope and directed to the Superintendent of theopening.

  After all the applications had been taken, they were thoroughly mixedand shuffled together. Then a blindfolded child was directed to draw onefrom the pile, which became number one in the opening. The lucky personwhose oath was contained in such envelope was given the choice of allthe land thrown open for settlement. Then another envelope was drawn andthat person was given the second choice, and so on until they were alldrawn.

  This system was an out and out lottery, but gave each and everyapplicant an equal chance to draw a claim, but guaranteed none. Yearsbefore, land openings were conducted in a different manner. Theapplicants were held back of a line until a signal was given and then ageneral rush was made for the locations and settlement rights on theland. This worked fairly well at first but there grew to be moreapplicants than land, and two or more persons often located on the samepiece of land and this brought about expensive litigation and annoyingdisputes and sometimes even murder, over the settlement. This wasfinally abolished in favor of the lottery system, which was at leastsafer and more profitable to the railroads that were fortunate enough tohave a line to one or more of the registration points.

  Became number one in the opening. (page 56.)]

  At Johnstown, people from every part of the United States, of all agesand descriptions, gathered in crowded masses, the greater part of thembeing from Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, Minnesota, North Dakota, Kansas andNebraska. When I started for the registration I was under the impressionthat only a few people would register, probably four or five thousand,and as there were twenty-four hundred homesteads I had no other thoughtthan I would draw and later file on a quarter section. Imagine myconsternation when at the end of the first day the registration numberedten thousand. A colored farmer in Kansas had asked me to keep him postedin regard to the opening. He also thought of coming up and registeringwhen he had completed his harvest. When the throngs of people beganpouring in from the three railroads into Johnstown (and there were twoother points of registration besides) I saw my chances of drawing aclaim dwindling, from one to two, to one to ten, fifteen and twenty andmaybe more. After three days in Johnstown I wrote my friend and told himI believed there would be fully thirty thousand people apply for thetwenty-four hundred claims. The fifth day I wrote there would be fiftythousand. After a week I wrote there would be seventy-five thousandregister, that it was useless to expect to draw and I was leaving forKansas to visit my parents. When the registration was over I read in aKansas City paper that one hundred and seven thousand persons hadregistered, making the chance of drawing one to forty-four.

  Received a card soon after from the Superintendent of the opening,which read that my number was 6504, and as the number of claims wasapproximately twenty-four hundred, my number was too high to be reachedbefore the land should all be taken. I think it was the same day I lostfifty-five dollars out of my pocket. This, combined with mydisappointment in not drawing a piece of land, gave me a grouch and Ilit out for the Louisiana Purchase Exposition at St. Louis with theintention of again getting into the P----n service for a time.

  Ofttimes porters who had been discharged went to another city, changedtheir names, furnished a different set of references and got back towork for the same company. Now if they happened to be on a car that tookthem into the district from which they were discharged, and before thesame officials, who of course recognized them, they were promptlyreported and again discharged. I pondered over the situation and came tothe conclusion that I would not attempt such deception, but avoid beingsent back to the Chicago Western District. I was at a greaterdisadvantage than Johnson, Smith, Jackson, or a number of other commonnames, by having the odd French name that had always to be spelledslowly to a conductor, or any one else who had occasion to know me. Outof curiosity I had once looked in a Chicago Directory. Of some twomillion names there were just two others with the same name. But on theother hand it was much easier to avoid the Chicago Western District, orat least Mr. Miltzow's office and by keeping my own name, assume that Ihad never been discharged, than it was to go into a half a dozen otherdistricts with a new name and avoid being recognized. Arriving at thisdecision, I approached the St. Louis office, presented my referenceswhich had been furnished by other M--pls business men, and was accepted.After I had been sent out with a porter, who had been running threemonths, to show me how to run a car, I was immediately put to work. Ilearned in two trips, according to the report my tutor handed to thechief clerk, and by chance fell into one of the best runs to New York onone of the limited trains during the fair. There was not much knockingdown on this run, but the tips, including the salary were good for threehundred dollars per month. I ran on this from September first to Octoberfourth and saved three hundred dollars. I had not given up getting aDakota Homestead, for while I was there during the summer I learned if Idid not draw a number I could buy a relinquishment.

  This relates to the purchasing of a relinquishment:

  An entryman has the right at any time to relinquish back to the UnitedStates all his right, titl
e, and interest to and in the land covered byhis filing. The land is then open to entry.

  A claimholder who has filed on a quarter of land will have plenty ofopportunity to relinquish his claim, for a cash consideration, so thatanother party may get a filing on it. This is called buying or selling arelinquishment. The amount of the consideration varies with quality ofthe land, and the eagerness of the buyer or seller, as the case may be.

  Relinquishments are the largest stock in trade of all the real estatedealers, in a new country. Besides, everybody from the bank presidentdown to the humble dish washer in the hotel, or the chore boy in thelivery, the ministers not omitted, would, with guarded secrecy, confidein you of some choice relinquishment that could be had at a very lowfigure compared with what it was really worth.