Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1883-04-18

throwing Wealth into the Laps of
INSCRIPTIONS Lumbermen.
ST. PAUL. April ga reporter who
has been investigating the timber land
business says: The lumber manufac-
turing industry Is SO gigantic and ex-
tended that the mere mention of it at
tracts attention. Fully so per cent, It
is estimated Of all the remaining vaItl-.
able lands in the government contro! is
timber or mineral land, In the latter.
owing to the great care with which it is
guarded by the mineral land laws and
by the peculiarly effective steps which
miners take to protect themselves and
one another, wrong doing and plumber
ing is reduced to a minimum. But with
the former there is reason to believe that
rigid investigation of the operation of
the land Offices III the districts where
large extents of lumber lands are being
disposed of would disclose sorne of the
most systematic and gigantic plumber
ing yet unearthed-a system which
has been going on from the very
opening of any of the government
timber lands to the so-called mar
ket f" IN the great forests of the
whole lake region. An informant of
large experience, himself lifelong op-
orator, and who has amassed an immense
fortune, estimates that of Michigan pine
lands, less than l per cent. remains still
III the government control, and that the
percentage is but little greater for Wis
consin. The Minnesota lands, although
OF large percentage, are yet, it is be-
heved, so securely in the hands of a gi-
gantic timber ring that the percentage
virtually amounts to avery small part of
what the government ought to have re-
allied. The government plan for dis
posing of timber lands is diAmetricaiiy
the opposite Of the policy relative to the
farming lands. The latter it is insisted
shall go into the hands Of individuals.
who by the operations of the homestead.
presumption or timber culture laws are
bound up by the most exacting regula-
tions to make actual settlements.
If by any Of the many tricks these
lands get into the hands of rich
spectators, though the poor home
steader may have been obliged, to
save himself or family from starvation,
to sell cut his "claim, +" the cry of fraud
goes up, and the land office agents and
detectives are put upon the scent IN
stantly. But the timber lands are sys-
tematically figured into the hands of
the few rich. Every detail in the man
agement Of the interior department.
from its head clear down 10 the inside
operations OF the land Offices, is based
on the principle that the timber is to go
to the wealthiest. The government
plan of marketing the lands Is at So
called public sale. When informed that
a tract is surveyed and ready to be dis
posed Of from the commissioners Office
of the general land Office the presidents
proclamation is issued, which declares
and makes known that on certain day
there will be offered at public sale a
schedule of lands, which is given. The
restrictions imposed by the general
statutes are quoted, and the proper
citation regarding homestead and pre-
emption rights is made IN the body Of the
proclamation. On the day of sale
there is gathering of interested parties,
sometimes more, sometimes less in num-
bers, and likewise variable in interest, as
will lee seen. The sale goes on. Some
times number OF tracts Of land are
knocked off to bidders, sometimes none
at all, but at the close of the sale i'm
mense tracts are secured by ''private
entry" the law, which is quoted in the
proclamation, making a provision that
after public sale land which has not
been bought, but which has been offered
to bidders, may be foreclosed at private
entry, the government price Of which IS
uniformly $1.25 per acre, or So. so for
such as are held at what is called ''dou-
BILE maximum. Thus the problem of
those who want the lands is how to es-
cape the dire necessity of bidding them
off when fair competition and their real
value for the timber only would make
them sell from SO to $50 per acre and
get them at the private entry. At re-
cent sale at ST.. Cloud Is, 258.0 OF acres Of
timber land were entered at $1.25
per acre, according to the maodus
OpeT0ndi Of the sharps, total
of $19,072.56. The lands were prob
ably actually worth, in the auction
total of 1928, 721.05, and perhaps any
one of fifty persons responsible and
with the cash In hand would at the sale
have been willing to take the whole at
that figure if there had been no other
way to possess them for less. Timber
on the stump in that egion-stumpage
lis actually worth In the lumber mar
ket So per thousand feet. The conf
Dental estimates of the surveyors and
explorers on portions of these lands
were 10000 feet to the acre, or a
total, if it would run that high. or
even approximately, of over 100000
feet, worth well above $1,000, 900,
at the lowest figures. This st. Cloud
sale is only used by way OF illustration.
AS matter of fact, more recent one
at the Duluth land Office was Of
much greater dimensions. When it was
over, and the private entry :" method
had been applied with success, and
the lands so obtained duly divided
and shared, it was the private boast OF
one of the largest purchaser" that his
stumpage cost him little under 81
cents per 1000 feet. The same individ
ual turned around and sold out about so
per cent. of his timber by acreage to an
actual manufacturer who had not been
able to get son the inside" for So. rs per
900 feet. He would not sell the other