On this day in 1862, President Abraham Lincoln signed the Homestead Act. The Act offered 160 acres of surveyed Federal Land to any US citizen or intended citizen who paid a small filing fee and lived on and cultivated the land for five years.
In all, more than 160 million acres (650 thousand km2; 250 thousand sq mi) of public land, or nearly 10 percent of the total area of the United States, were given away free to 1.6 million homesteaders; most of the homesteads were west of the Mississippi River.
The Federal Land Policy and Management Act of 1976 ended homesteading; by that time, federal government policy had shifted to retaining control of western public lands. The only exception to this new policy was in Alaska, for which the law allowed homesteading until 1986.
Elizabeth (Betty) Clouse-Smith was the last woman homesteader to successfully prove up land in her own name. She was among a group of people, including her son William J. Smith, who filed for homestead west of Big Delta, Alaska. On October 18, 1984, she received a patent for her 116-acre claim (47 ha).
The last claim under this Act was made by Ken Deardorff for 80 acres (32 ha) of land on the Stony River in southwestern Alaska. He fulfilled all requirements of the homestead act in 1979 but did not receive his deed until May 1988. He is the last person to receive a title to land claimed under the Homestead Acts.
Henry Holm’s sod house in Custer Country, Nebraska. Library of Congress
BADA BING!
The new Pope has a degree in mathematics from Villanova. This guy doesn’t just understand sin. He understands cos and tan.
You can either expect me to work well with other or pass a drug test. But not both.
Trump accuses Librarian of Congress of having pro-book bias.
I’ve decided my body is not a temple; it’s a haunted house! It’s slowly falling apart, makes weird noises, and contains the spirit of an old man who’s always mad at something.
Two Irishmen were in a graveyard. Paddy reads a gravestone and says, “This guy was 95 when he died!” “Who was it?” the Mick asks. “Somebody named O’Toole from Kerry,” Paddy replies. Mick says, “Never mind him. There’s a feller here called Murphy who was 102 when he died! From Castletown. “Well that’s nothing!” says Paddy. “This chaps stone says 147!” “147? That’s amazing!” says Mick. “Who was he?” “According to the stone, its somebody called Miles from Dublin!”
Tablets were replaced by scrolls, and scrolls were replaced by books. Now we scroll through books on tablets. Times change.
I’m officially at the age where everything that feels like only a couple years ago was actually a couple decades ago.
Old age has come at a terrible time, just as I was starting to know it all, I’m now forgetting everything I knew.
Many top scientists are on the autism spectrum. So technically, autism causes vaccines.
I’d picked up lots of skills during all my years at work, but learning when I shouldn’t make sarcastic comments is not one of them.
Be with someone who gives you the same feelings you get when you see your food coming at a restaurant.
I still can’t believe Aldi sells shopping carts for $.25. I’ve got 8 of them now but don’t really have a use for them. But it’s just to good a deal to pass up.
I asked my wife if she loved me for my face or my body. She laughed and said it was for my sense of humor.
There should be a summer camp for adults where you just go and sleep for 2 weeks.
Last week I walked into a revolving door and just kept going. I did four laps before I realized what was going on.
Today is the birthday, in 1944, of Joe Cocker, English singer and musician who had the 1968 UK No.1 single with his cover of The Beatles With a Little Help from My Friends, plus he had 8 other UK Top 40 singles and appeared at the 1969 Woodstock Festival. He scored the 1982 US No.1 single with Jennifer Warnes ‘Up Where We Belong’. In 2007 he was awarded a bronze Sheffield Legends plaque in his hometown and in 2008 he received an OBE at Buckingham Palace for services to music. Cocker died of lung cancer on 22 December 2014 in Crawford, Colorado. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfgwrdYUQ2A
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