 Welcome back to the 2019 Virtual Genealogy Fair. If you are following along from home, this is session number six, our final presentation for this year's fair. The lecture is accessible for all skill levels and entitled, the Homestead Act, the land of your ancestors. In our speaker is James Moon. During this session, he explains the basic provisions of the Homestead Act and demonstrates how to research and interpret Homestead documents found in record group 49, records of the Bureau of Land Management, BLM, and therefore family history research. Mr. Moon is a researcher, writer, and lecturer on federal land policy. I am now turning the broadcast over to James Moon. Well, first, let me thank the National Archives for inviting me to give this presentation. Starting on slide four, for most people, the Homestead Act is the law by which the American frontier was settled. Not enacted until 1862, it was but one of many authorities by which the public lands of the United States were disposed of. It was, however, one of the most important. Under its provisions, it stimulated the settlement and development of the Great Plains, the Far West, and Alaska. Please go to slide five. Homestead entries could only be made on public lands. As a result, no entries could be made in the original 13 states, Maine, Kentucky, Tennessee, Texas, or Hawaii. Exclusive of Alaska, 1.5 billion acres of public lands were acquired. It is on these lands that homesteads could be made. Next slide, number six. As noted, the Homestead Act was but one of a dozen laws providing for the disposal and management of public lands. When passed in 1862, there were already many laws enacted by Congress. Please go to slide number seven. Early land policies sought to generate revenue, reward military service, and promote settlement and development. Lands were sold at auction. Military bounties were given to soldiers who had served in wars like the Revolution, the War of 1812, and the Mexican War. Lands were granted to states. Private land grants were recognized for titles that had been given by previous sovereigns. Road, canal, and railroad grants were issued. Then there were donation and preemption laws that allowed individual settlers to take up land. Please go to slide number eight. After passage of the Homestead Act in 1862, many of the previous land laws continued to operate. Congress also enacted additional disposal laws. The consequence was, as historian Paul Lawless Gates has called it, an incongruous land system with policies often in conflict with each other. For some of the later laws after the Homestead Act, we had laws disposing of gold, silver, coal, as well as oil and gas. There was the Timber Culture Act, which gave 160 acres for people who planted a certain amount of trees. The Desert Land Act gave lands to people who irrigated them. The Timber and Stone Act disposed of those lands that were chiefly valuable for those resources. Then there were conservation policies that later came in like the National Forest, which took lands out of the settlement policies. Please go to slide number nine. Administering the Homestead Act and the other land laws was the responsibility of the land department, as it was referred to as in the late 1800s. The land department consisted of the Department of Interior, created by Congress in 1849, and the General Land Office. The General Land Office handled the day-to-day business in disposing of and otherwise managing the public domain. Under it were district land offices with registers and receivers whose duties included taking applications and reviewing land entries. Surveyors general directed the survey of public lands and special agents investigated suspected fraud cases. Please go to slide number 10. Of the many public lands disposed of laws, the Homestead Act and its amendments are considered by many the most important. Of the more than 1.1 billion acres of public lands disposed of, over 285 million were patented as homesteads, or 25% of the total. More important, about 1.3 million individuals successfully completed homesteads. Please go to slide number 11. The original Homestead law of May 20th, 1862, provided that a settler could enter up to 160 acres. It specified the character of the lands that could be entered, dated who could make entry, and the requirements to be fulfilled to obtain titles. Please go to slide number 12. After passage of the Homestead Act in 1862, Congress did many amendments to the law. Here are a few of them. For example, in 1872, union veterans could apply up to four years of service towards their five years of proving up on their homestead. In 1875 and 84, Native Americans were allowed to make homesteads. In 1898, the Homestead law was extended to Alaska. Please go to slide number 13. In the early 1900s, there were a number of new homestead acts. In 1906, the Forest Homestead Act allowed for entries within national forests. In 1909, the Enlarged Homestead Act gave up to 320 acres to a settler. In 1912, the Three Year Homestead Act reduced the five year period of time to prove up on a homestead to three years. In 1916, the Stock Raising Homestead Act gave 640 acres or a full section of land to a settler. In 1976, the Federal Land Policy and Management Act repealed the homestead laws. Please go to slide number 14. So, what were the motivations for homesteading? Well, perhaps most important was for people was getting a farm of their own. They saw this as a better economic opportunity and also saw it a means of economic security. Some took out homesteads to help a family. Children would take out entries so that their father could add it to his original homestead. There were people who speculated, who took out a homestead in the hope that they could sell it for more money after they got patent. There were people who did it for fraudulent reasons. They wanted to help ranchers, coal mining companies or timber companies get lands that otherwise they would not be able to obtain. And then for many, adventure was an important factor. Please go to slide number 15. Interpreting the homestead acts. There were two basic concepts that the land department used when interpreting the homestead act. One was the liberal spirit concept. The homestead act had a generous and benevolent intent in offering 160 acres to settlers. Therefore, the land department took the position that the law was entitled to a liberal construction in aid of the ends to be attained. At the same time, however, the land department had a legal obligation to assure the law's proper construction so as to bestow the public lands for homesteads according to the law and not according to individual or corporate desires. The other concept was good faith. For the land department, good faith on the part of a homesteader was the essential element upon which it determined their compliance with the law. As secretary of the interior, Henry Teller remarked in 1884, the homestead law is a practical law and it is so devised that it may have practical enforcement. The law itself provides its own evidence of good faith in improvement, cultivation, and residence. If these exist as facts, the law is satisfied. Therefore, the land department measured the good faith of settlers by determining if their acts and intentions showed that they intended to make their homestead entries actual homes to the exclusion of others elsewhere. Please go to slide number 16. Like any good bureaucracy, the land department had a flow that people had to follow. Homesteaders first dealt with the register and receiver in the district land offices. Most people only had to deal with these individuals. Here entries were made, final proofs were made and accepted. Once these individuals, or these officials passed on a homestead, it went to the general land office where it was again reviewed and in most cases simply went to patent. If a case was contested for either fraud for one reason or another, it could then be appealed up to the secretary of the interior who would make a decision on whether the homestead should go to patent or not. And in very, very few cases the entry might go to the federal courts. Please go to slide number 17. To make a homestead entry, lands had to be surveyed. This was by done by surveying the land into townships and subdivided into sections so the land could be identified by legal land description. In doing this, the first thing somebody needs to know when looking for a legal land description is the principle meridian. As the color map shows, there are numerous principle meridians. Lands were then surveyed into townships. A township was identified by township, north or south and then range, which was on an east-west axis. Therefore, if somebody says to you, my ancestor was in township one north, one west, well, the big question is, well, which principle meridian are you located? Please go to slide number 18. So as mentioned, the basis of legal land description is the township for the rectangular survey system. A survey township plat shows what the surveyor found when running his lines within a township at the time of survey. Not the date the plat is approved. In this example, the plat shows a lake, streams, roads, houses, fenced lands, and other features. Accompanying a survey plant are field notes giving surveying details, and at the end, a general description that describes the character of the land and oftentimes the settlement activity in the township. If your settlers settled on public lands prior to survey, they should show up on the plat. However, since survey lines are a mile apart from each other, and if somebody is in a ravine, they might be missing. Please go to slide number 19. In addition to township surveys, there were surveys made under the Forest Homestead Act of 1906. That law allowed people to make homestead entries on lands chiefly valuable for agricultural purposes within national forests. The available areas were usually located in unsurveyed mountainous regions, and the agricultural tracks of irregular shape. So the law provided for the survey of entries by meets and bounds description. Known as a homestead entry survey, or HEF, each survey received a specific number for the state or territory located. The HEF plat will show physical features like slope and natural water courses, and will show the location of improvements like houses, barns, and irrigation ditches. The accompanying field nodes provide more information about improvements, the quality of soil, and the agricultural activity on the entry. Please go to slide number 20. Compliant with the Homestead Act and the regulations for it was at times a harder endeavor than living on the land and cultivating it. Please go to slide number 21. The Homestead Act, as with all public land policies, is complex. Congress was constantly modifying the provisions of the Homestead Act for a variety of reasons. At times, a new law sought to liberalize a provision. In other instances, Congress sought to close a loophole to prevent frauds from subverting the Homestead Act's intent. Land Department Administration of the law was also constantly evolving. Its efforts to interpret the law in a liberal spirit, but not in a manner that permitted the fraudulent acquisition of land resulted in it having to continually change the rules and regulations used to determine the good faith of settlers in complying with the provisions of the law. What was policy in 1868 might not be policy in 1869. Furthermore, when the land department had a general administrative rule to govern compliance with the Homestead Act, it at times allowed exceptions to such a rule when it was apparent a settler showed good faith in complying with the law. Please go to slide number 22. In making an entry, the first thing an individual had to do was make application. In it, an entryman swore he or she was eligible to make entry and that the lands being entered were of the character contemplated by law. Please go to slide number 23. So, who could make entry? Well, first, he had to be a citizen or have declared your intent to become one. Ex-Confederates were initially denied, but later allowed. Married men of any age could make entry. Single men had to be over 21 years of age. Women in certain cases could make entry. Usually they had to be single and over 21 years of age. African-Americans were allowed, as were Hispanics. Certain Native Americans were permitted to make homesteads. Born-born Asians, however, were excluded because they could never become citizens of the United States. Slide number 24. Making an entry, what lands could be settled? Well, you were allowed up to 160 acres of public land. You didn't have to take 160 acres. You could take as little as 40. Unappropriated, unoccupied, and unreserved lands were open to homesteading. They had to be non-mineral in character. They had to be agricultural or suitable for grazing. Please go to slide number 25. What lands weren't available? Well, those reserved for government purposes, such as military posts. Often Native American lands were not available for homesteading, particularly those within Indian reservations. Those had to be opened by Congress after treaty or agreement with tribes. State and territorial lands granted by the United States were not subject to entry. Valuable mineral lands weren't allowed. Lands chiefly valuable for their timber could not be entered as homesteads. Lands covered by private land grants were excluded. And lands granted to railroads also could not be entered as homesteads. In complying with the homestead law, oh, please, slide number 27, please, complying with the homestead law. Two essential requirements of the law, there were two essential requirements by law required to fulfill the Homestead Act and obtain patents. The first was residents. The homestead law contemplated continuous maintenance by a homesteader and his family of an actual home on the land to the exclusion of a home elsewhere. Except as required by law, the general land office did not stipulate any specific improvements other than the need of a habitable dwelling. But the improvements had to demonstrate a homesteader's good faith to make his or her entry their exclusive home. There was never a regulation specifying the minimum dimensions for dwellings as some sources state. I point this out because many histories will state that a house had to be eight by 10, 10 by 12, 12 by 14, and one documentary says 12 by 40. Please go to slide number 27. The second essential requirement was cultivation. The Homestead Act did not specify how much land needed to be cultivated. Again, good faith was looked for. The general land office usually wanted to see evidence that the land had been broken by plow and a crop raised. In 1880, it was ruled that grazing could be substituted for cultivation in regions where only livestock could be raised. The Three Year Homestead Act of 1912 did require entrymen under the original homestead law to have at least one eighth of their entry under cultivation at the time of final proof. Congress had previously adopted such a policy under the Enlarged Homestead Act of 1909. Please go to slide number 28. If one did not want to live and cultivate their entry for the full five years, they were allowed to commute it. The commutation clause was provided in section eight of the Homestead Act of 1862. It allowed persons to complete their entries to commute them by paying the minimum price per acre, $1.25 or $2.50, to do so, they had to make proof of settlement and cultivation as provided by existing law granting preemption rights. The law as many historians state did not stipulate that the homesteader had to wait six months before commuting. That was an administrative rule made in 1869 to ensure the good faith of commuters. In 1891, Congress increased the time period to 14 months and later made additional changes. Homestead laws like the Forest Homestead Act of 1906, the Enlarged Homestead Act of 1909, and the Stock Raising Homestead Act of 1916 did not allow for commutation of entry. Please go to slide number 29. Filing final proof. The Homestead Act required that after complying with the current requirements of residents and cultivation for five years, but no more than seven after entry, claimants could prove up. The General Land Office did this by having homesteaders along with two credible witnesses attest to having fulfilled the law's requirements as to residents and cultivation. Initially, claimants were asked to answer only a few specific questions, but over time, questions became more numerous and detailed so that the final proof forms were at times several pages in length. If the register and receiver at the district land office determined the proof sufficient, homesteaders received a final certificate. That document signified that claimants were entitled to a patent provided the General Land Office found no irregularities upon further adjudication. Please go to slide number 30. Upon final adjudication, homesteaders were issued a patent for the lands they had entered. Patents recite the name of the claimant, the legal land description of the lands to which title are being passed and reservations and most easements that the tract was subject. Since the 1830s, patents were not personally signed by the president, but made by a secretary in the General Land Office appointed for that purpose. In the 1880s, the patents for many homestead act entries were not issued for up to six or seven years because they were awaiting adjudication by the General Land Office. Under the act of March 3rd, 1891, Congress directed patents for entries that were not contested or protested to be issued within two years of the issuance of final certificate. The patent form used for homestead entries proved up under section 20, section two, providing for five years of residence and cultivation, recite the homestead act of May 20th, 1862 as the authority for issuance. The patent shown here as a certificate patent, the kind issued prior to July 1st, 1908. For certificate patents, it is important that you know the state and territory where the homestead was made, the district land office it was issued under, the final certificate number, the law under which it was issued, homestead act, and the certificate number. Please go to slide number 31. The General Land Office continued its certificate patent series on July 1st, 1908 and introduced a new system called the serial patent system. In this example of a serial patent, note that this homesteader took lands subject to any vested and accrued water rights as well as associated ditches. The right for the later construction of ditches and canals by the United States and the reservation to the government of all coal under the Act of June 22nd, 1910. To identify a serial patent, you just need the patent number, which is given on the lower left of this document. Please go to slide number 32. If an individual commuted their homestead act entry under section eight, they received their patent on a cash patent form, which recites the Act of April 24th, 1820, the General Sales Authority for Public Lands. Like certificate homestead patents, you need to know the State, Territory, Land Office, the fact that it is a cash patent and where the entry was located. Slide number 33. In addition to paying for commuted homesteads by cash, one could use military land warrants for various types of what was called script. If that is used for proving up on a commuted homestead, you need to go to those series to find your homestead patent file. Slide number 34. Not everybody was successful under the Homestead Act. There were two ways in which homesteads were canceled. First, relinquishments. That was a voluntary surrender of an entry. Before 1800, lands covered by a relinquished homestead entry could not be re-entered by another person until the land was reopened by the commissioner of the General Land Office. Under the Act of May 14th, 1880, when a relinquishment was filed in the local land office, the lands immediately became subject to entry by others. Under the law, relinquishments could not be sold, but it was a common practice. Slide number 35. Then there were cancellations. There were many reasons the General Land Office could cancel a homestead entry. Abandonment of an entry by a settler was a common reason. And contests filed by third parties alleging failure on the part of a homesteader to fulfill some requirement could also result in cancellation. The General Land Office could cancel an entry if it felt it was fraudulent or the final proof found defective. In all cases, homesteaders had the right to a hearing where all parties could present testimony and evidence. A party could then appeal an adverse ruling. Rulings made by registers and receivers were reviewed by the commissioner of the General Land Office. That official's decisions could be appealed to the secretary of the interior. And in rare instances, the secretary's decision could be taken to the federal court. Please go to slide number 36, record keeping. It was of great importance to the General Land Office. Various types of finding aids were maintained at both the district land offices and the General Land Office's headquarters in Washington, DC. This allowed land officials not only to identify and locate geographically individual entries and filings on public lands to ensure the protection of the rights and interests of individuals, corporations, and states and territories, but to detect errors in record keeping. Please go to slide number 37. The most important records that the General Land Office kept were the track books. Congress directed that track books be maintained in 1800. And to this day, the Bureau of Land Management uses a variant of this record. Track books were intended to provide users with a way to determine the status of public lands within a township. At a glance, readers could determine that what lands had been entered, the laws under which entries had been filed, the names of associated persons and entities, the dates of final actions, and what those final actions were, such as final certificate, patent, relinquished, or canceled. Each district land office maintained a set of track books as did the General Land Office's headquarters. For researchers, this record used to be the most important way to find all homesteads. As it will be shown later, there is now an easier method for finding patented homesteads. But for relinquished and canceled homesteads, this is still a very important record. Please go to slide number 38. Prior to July 1st, 1908, the General Land Office also kept records called abstract register books. A set of these books was kept by the kind of entry, homestead, desert land, timber culture, and the action, original entry or final certificate at both district land offices and the General Land Office headquarters. Entries and proofs were entered in the order received and numbered consecutively. For original entries, the number assigned became the application number. For proofs, the number assigned was the final certificate number, which would eventually become the patent number. Homesteads commuted to cash entries will be in cash register books, and appropriate military bounty or script register books for those actions. Please go to slide number 39. Serialized record system. This was devised and started on July 1st, 1908. The new record system was intended to provide for better efficiency and accountability. Commonly referred to as the serialized record system, all applications were arranged by district land office as before, but rather than assigning applications according to the type of entry, homestead, desert land, timber culture, et cetera, all were filed together. The applications numbers were then assigned in consecutive numerical order, starting with zero, one by each district land office. Slide number 40, please. Another record devised by the serialized record system were alphabetical index cards. Each district land office maintained a set, as did the general land office's headquarters. Each card has the name of the land office, name of the applicant, the post office of record, the serial number assigned for each entry and for each entry and filing made by that individual or entity. The alphabetical index makes finding person's homesteads after 1908 simple. Please go to slide number 41. In addition, they also created serial register pages. This is essentially an abstract of every entry that is made. So in case you are missing a case file, you can at least get a sense of the process the individual had to go through. Please go to slide number 42. As said before, prior to 1908, files are always filed according to territory, state, land office and type of entry. This is important to keep in mind because if you go to the National Archives and you say you want homestead patent number one, the first question is, which homestead patent number one do you want? Do you want homestead patent number one for Denver, Colorado's land office or do you want one for Lincoln, Nebraska's land office? This slide will describe some ways in which you can identify and order up case files. Please go to slide number 43. It is continued on to this new page and you guys can read it. There's also a link which will send you to the National Archives and they will have more information on how to order files. Please go to slide number 44. Okay, let's research a homestead. I have chosen the entry of a Fritz-Richard to give you an idea of the trials and tribulations you might encounter when researching for a homestead. Please go to slide number 45. It is important to remember when researching for a homestead act entry, keep in mind that the words homestead and homesteading are often generic. As the land department observed in 1887, the expression homestead laws has more than once been interpreted by this department in a generic sense, so as to include other settlement laws besides the homestead law proper. Settlers and others were often more loose in using the words. The railroad company broadside advertisement to the right offered its grant lands for sale as homesteads. Settlers and their descendants often refer to their entries under other public land laws or purchase from third parties like railroad companies as homesteads. So don't be surprised when your homestead research results in learning that someone did not take up land under the homestead act. Please go to slide number 46. Finding a patented homestead. The Bureau of Land Management has made this much easier with its new GLO records website. Here, you can research by the name and location to get a person's land patent. When researching for names, be aware that the last name spelling can vary. Richard's name is spelled three different ways in the various records we will look at. Richard, Richard, and Richard. In one record, his first name is given as Frederick. Many reasons can explain such occurrences. In this case, part of the explanation is careless record keeping, but also the use of the name Richard in his citizenship certificate. You cannot find unpatented homestead entries using GLO records website. Slide number 47. Can we go back to slide number 46? So we pulled up the GLO records site trying to find Fritz Richard. I do find him here listed twice. He got a patent in 1901, he got a patent in 1915. I look up those patents, they're not homesteads. The family tells me that he certainly homesteaded in the late 1800s, so what's going on? I looked on this page and I see that there's an entry for a man named Fritz Richard. Could that be him? Could the BLM have accidentally put his name incorrectly? Please go to slide number 47. I look at the patent. The patent says it's Fritz Richard. Well, okay, it's not the guy I'm trying to find. It's not Mr. Richard. As we will find out later, this is his patent. He could have asked for a curative patent to correct the error, but he did not. As we look at this patent, there are several things of importance to look at. One, look at the homestead certificate patent number in the upper left corner. It's number 398 under the Central City Land Office. Also note that his entry or application is number 640. Please go to slide number 48. Okay, we haven't found Mr. Richard for certain at this point, so we need to go to some other records. Let's go to the track book. We know from the 1901 and 1915 patents that he had land in Township 3 North Range 81 West. We go to that track book, we start going through it, and we find all of a sudden, hey, there's an entry for Fritz Richard, which I've underlined in red. And look, it says it's application 640, and it also notes that it's patent number 398. Those are the numbers we saw on the patent to Fritz Richard. What the heck is going on? If we hadn't have found him in the track book, we could have gone to the next record. Please go to slide number 49. This is the abstract register book. If we had gone through that, we would have run across Mr. Richard again. And again, we see it's application number 640, and in red, it's written that he got a final certificate of 398. Hmm, looks like we maybe found him. Let's go to slide number 50. Let's pull up his case file from the National Archives in Washington, DC. Here we find, even though the patent says it's Fritz Richard, on the front of his case file, it says Fritz Richard. I think we found our person. Let's go to slide 51. Here in his case file, we find his application for entry. Here you will see he'll say that he's, this form tells us that he made entry in 1887. However, he states he made settlement in October, 1884. The township plat was approved in September, 1883, and filed at the district land office in after. Why did Mr. Richard wait three years after making settlement before making entry? Notations in the track book and other records reveal that Mr. Richard made a preemption act of 1841 filing in October, 1884 for this land, but did not prove up under the law. Why is not known? To keep track of this, to keep the track he had settled, he then was forced to make an entry under the Homestead Act of 1862. Slide number 52. Among the papers in his file is his citizenship paper. And in this, we will note that while his name is spelled correctly throughout most of the document, at one point, his name has changed to Richard. Now why this happened is not known, but it is clear that he did not intend to change his name, because remember in 1901 and 1915, he received patents under the name Richard. Please go to slide number 53. Perhaps the most important document in the case file for Mr. Richard is his final proof, which was made in 1892. In it, he claims to have made substantial improvements. When compared to his application after David, it is, you can see that he constructed a number of new buildings in the five years since he had made entry in 1887. To verify the statements made and to attest to his good faith, the law required Richard to have two witnesses of his choosing answer questions about his residence and improvements. Now, in the end, there is no question that Mr. Richard made his Homestead Act entry in good faith for the purposes of establishing an actual home to the exclusion of a home elsewhere. Perhaps the most telling proof is a 2015 Atlas for Colorado that shows that his lineage still owns the Richard ranch. So, as this example shows, finding a Homestead entry can prove to be a difficult task, but it can be done. However, for finding most homesteads, especially those that went to patent, the research will be straightforward. Please go to slide number 54. So here I've provided you with a few public land terms, which goes on to slide 55. Please turn to slide 55. And then please go to slide number 56. This is a listing of the public land state. So this gives you an idea of where Homesteads could be entered. Please go to slide number 57. And I have provided you with some suggested reading. Most of them, admittedly, are somewhat on the academic side, but most of them are pretty good. With that, I think I'm going to go to, let's go to slide number 58. This is where I've got my illustrations. Slide number 59, please. And I guess now it's time to be grilled. Thank you so much for your presentation. That was very informative. We do have several questions that have come from our online audience. So if you're ready, we'll start right in. Let's do it. Let's do it. So our first question is, are all of the documents associated with Homesteads available online, for example, an application, the patents, and the proofs, are those available online? And if yes, is there a webpage that you could refer us to? You can find only a few documents online, going to that BLM's GLO records website. There you can find the patents that somebody was issued. They're in the process of trying to put up track books, but if you want to look at a case file, you need to go to the National Archives, Archives One in Washington, D.C., and order it. They have an order form that's listed in one of my pages on where you need to go, and they will then provide the document. But for the most part, no, you're not gonna find most of the public land documents. You can find surveys on that GLO records site, but those are incomplete, so sometimes you have to go to the Bureau of Land Management to get copies of the survey. Okay, thank you for that answer. And then specifically, where can we locate the track books for research? Well, track books are located in, well, a variety of locations. First, there is a master's set, the GLO headquarters set, is that Archives One in Washington, D.C. The regional archives have many of the track books, but they won't always. For example, before the National Archives was created and the land office was closed, either the district land office track books and other records were sometimes destroyed or they've ended up at a state historical society. So if you're, let's say, well, let's take Minnesota and North Dakota. They both have GLO land district office records in their historical society. So you may have to search around a bit to find where a track book is. The GLO website is trying to get, the BLM's GLO website is trying to get track books up on their site. Right now, I think they only have three states. Okay, thank you for that informative answer. At this time, I would like to also introduce Marine Baker to help answer our questions. Ms. Baker is an archivist with the National Archives at Denver and subject matter expert for land records. So she is in the same room with Mr. Moon. So thank you for joining us, Marine. If we have any questions for you, feel free to jump right in. So going on to our next question. Several years ago, the National Archives Homestead National Monument, University of Nebraska and others started an effort to digitize homestead files. What is the saddest of this effort? So my understanding, and Jim, you might know more since you worked with Homestead a little bit, but my understanding is that we got Nebraska taken care of, but other than that, I think it's still a work in process. I think that's part of the issue is funding for the project, but I'm not 100% certain on that, and I can certainly look that up and put a more thorough answer up on our History Hub site under the land's records, and I could even do a blog about it. Well, thank you very much, Marine. I appreciate your jumping in. We have at least three more questions, so the next one is you mentioned the amount of acreage a person could homestead increased. Could you please tell us what that amount is and explain why the government allowed for larger homesteads? Whoa, fairly complicated answer, but let's make it big. Mostly 160, in 19, well, first in Kansas with the Kincaid Act of 1904, Congress began to increase acreage, but the most important ones were the Enlarged Homestead Act of 1909. It increased it to 320 acres. They were going on the assumption at that time that the Great Plains was a hard place to farm, and that a person needed more acreage to be successful. They'd come out with this new agricultural practice called dry land farming, and the idea was that you would cultivate half your land one year, and that you would leave it follow the next, or half your land follow, and you could switch it around in that way, keep regenerating the land. So they went ahead and increased it to 320 acres. Let me note too that if you'd already taken out a homestead of 160 acres, you could take out another 160 under the Enlarged Homestead Act to fulfill the 320 acre under that law. For stock raising, it was, because it was mainly for grazing, and cattle needed a lot of land, particularly in the semi-arid west, they would go to 640 acres. Of course, 640 acres was not enough land. This law, in many respects, was a failure. A lot of agricultural experts at the time thought that you needed 100 head of cattle to support a family, and at 640 acres, a lot of people said couldn't support more than 10 to 25 head. And I guess that's my, trying to make my answer short. Thank you, it sounds like there's much more. Next question, is there an easy way to tell the date of your family's patent? Well, you look at the patent, it will be dated on there. It gives you the date that the patent was issued. Okay. But the thing to remember is, and like I pointed out, sometimes patents lag final proof by six to seven years. So don't look at a patent. If somebody says, well, I patented in 1892, and therefore, grandpa probably must have settled in 1887. That may not be the case. You mean, you know, if that patent lagged for that six years or something, he could have made his homestead, you know, 10 or more years previously. And so, but the patent itself will have the date that the patent was issued. It said a researcher, Jim, had just the number. So let's say it's like Mr. Richard, where it's 398. We know that that's gonna be pre-1908 because it doesn't start with a zero. No, that applications only start with a zero. Okay. The serial patents are numbered or whatever. So we have to look at when the patent was issued to know what he got it. Well, again, it gets kind of complicated. There are ways to tell whether you got a certificate patent or a serial patent. Mostly serial patents are tied for the most part. But anyway, I don't know. Hopefully that answers the question. Okay, hopefully it does. I'm sure it did. I have three more questions. How would you start your research for family's homestead if they did not patent the land and it was not listed on the GLO website? Well, I mean, that's a difficult one. I mean, the first thing is you have to have a big idea of where they would have settled. If you don't, the only thing I could suggest is for example, if it's after July 1st, 1908, go to that alphabetical index card. Like I said, archives one in Washington, DC has the master set given the name of the person and see if it shows up. Provided the last name is spelled correctly. That's probably the fastest way after July 1st, 1908. Before that, you really have to have a sense of where they might have settled. And then you can either go to the track book if you kind of have a township and range that you think they might have been in. Go through that page by page, hoping to find them, looking at all the townships around and slowly going out or go to the register book for homestead for a particular land office and just go page by page looking for your name. It will not be an easy process. And also the question comes down to like I said before, just because somebody says Grandpa Joe made a homestead act entry, it might not be a homestead act entry. It might have been a preemption. It might have been a desert land. Who knows? So it's not going to be easy. I guess that's the end of that answer. Okay, hopefully this next one is an easy one. It's about military. Did military rank impact the amount of acreage that a veteran got from military service? Well, now we're going into military land bounties and those were only given like I said before the homestead act of 1862. And yes, rank did account for that. But under the homestead act, soldiers were given certain privileges, certain concessions by Congress. And one of them, like I said, they could apply up to four years of their service time in the civil war towards their five years. So they could prove up in one year. In other cases, there were some situations where a homesteader could only enter 80 acres. But later Congress said, well, if you're a veteran of the Union Army, then you can make it 160 and they would then allow even for additional entries elsewhere to make up that 160 acres. Hopefully that answered that question. Oh, that's interesting. Thank you. Our next question is about the Glow Web page. On the Glow Records site, some of the entries are in red ink. Do you know what that red ink means? Sometimes they double, if you look, usually if you look up above, you'll see the same entry before. I don't know. You'll have to talk to the Bureau of Land Management. I did work for them, I left in 2000. I actually worked for a company that started to help them put together that GLO records website. But you really will need to deal with the Bureau of Land Management to find out what that's all about. Okay, fair enough. Last question for the day. My ancestor patented land in Texas late 1850s, early 1860s. If this was not a homestead, what kind of patent was it and can this be researched through the GLO as well? No, you cannot research it through the GLO website. Texas is not a public land state. Texas came into the union after being an independent republic and Congress provided that they would retain title to the lands within what is now Texas. So all of that would have been under Texas state law. So you will have to call the Texas Historical Society and ask for the Texas State Land Department website to see how you can find a homestead in Texas. Thank you very much. You've had lots of compliments on here for your answers and your great presentation. So thank you, Jim and Maureen. If our presenter did not get to your question, please send an email to inquireatnara.gov and please reference this particular session. And with that, I am turning the microphone over to Vernon Smith. This concludes our sessions for the 2019 Virtual Genealogy Fair. Thank you for joining us. If you missed a lecture, the videos and handouts will remain available on the fair website and from this YouTube page. Thank you for participating. If you have lingering questions, check our website. Visit us in person or send an email to inquireatnara.gov.