Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1890-05-16
The New Land District.

The act creating the new land dis
tricts l. published in this issue OF the
.rANDAKD, to show just what size Of
+. pig in poke" has been secured for
our people.
1t will be seen that the newly created
district embraces portion OF the Sc
attic district and small portion OF
the Vancouver district. The south
boundary is 81 miles south OF Olympia,
and it extends northward - miles to
the Fifth Standard Parallel. The
portion lying west of the Willamette
Meridian, runs north and takes in
about half of the Olympic range OF
mountains. This district embraces
nearly all the old surveys, and large
portion consists OF patented lands.
The claims on which final proof has
not been made are ve:.. few. There
are four or five fractional townships
lying east of Olympia, in the Cascade
mountains, that may be surveyed in
the course OF time, and say ten other
townships lying to the westward that
can be surveyed sometime, making an
aggregate of fifteen townships. The
area of half of them is railroad land
and the two school sections in each
township, makes an aggregate OF twenty
sections already appropriated, and
leaves but sixteen, or total in the
probable II townships of 24O sections,
on which $50 timber, homestead and
pre-emption entries may be made. 1t
may be ten or fifteen years before this
land is surveyed, and its limits may
be still further circumscribed by Sc
lections for the State.
To show still more fully the made
quacy of the new district for the public
wants, we have only to consider that
while it reduces the work of the Sc
attic Office very little, as there are at
present few contests within the dis
trict created by the act, the distance
TO be Travelled by those most generally
affected, is not materially reduced.
The people of Shoalwater Bay were
delighted with the prospect of being
once more tributary to Olympia, and
not compelled to 60 by the round
about way by Astoria or this city to
Vancouver to reach the land Office.
But they are to be disappointed.
They and their neighbors of Willapa
the upper Chehalis, Lincoln and Bum
ker creeks, and the Upper North river
country, will have to come here, or 60
to Centralia or Chehalis, and thence
to Vancouver, by way of Portland, in
volving an expense of from $50 to $40
and nearly a weeks time, while if they
had been included in the new district,
they could have come one day and re-
turned the next, .. one-fourth the
cost. The residents near the head
waters Of the Nisqually and Deschuttes,
which streams and their tributaries
come from the south, where there are
several small valleys in fractional
townships Ii and IA, are still more
entitled to commiseration. These set
tiers will have 10 come down the Mis-
qualify or Deschuttes valleys to spoint
at or near Yelm station, take the train
Tor Portland to reach Vancouver, al
an expense of from $40 to $50 and the
loss OF about two weeks time. The
topography of the country is such
that travel is compelled to go in these
directions from natural causes.
These facts were known to our rep
resentatives in Congress when the Gis-
trict was planned, but to avoid giving
ofYense to existing Offices our district
was made on the bobtail plan.
The nret newspaper published in Warrington
The Ps:es Sosad Heraid, both At sreiIacoom.-
zri6Wae.
There are one or two slight errors
in the above statement Of our esteemed
contemporary. The Pioneer and Dem
ocrat was not the first newspaper pub
lished in Washington, nor indeed the
second. The Columbian was the first
newspaper, published in . small build
ing which formerly stood on the cor
ner opposite to this Office. The Pho
neer succeeded the Columbian, and
later on . prospectus for the Northwest
Democrat was issued by r. L. Doyle,
but before the paper was started it was
merged with the Pioneer, and that
suggested the name Pioneer and Dem
ocrat. That paper was never pub
lished ut Steilacoom. It first saw the
light of day in Olympia, and died in
1861. shortly after the appearance of the
STANDARD. that journal being its chief
mourner. The Puget Sound Herald
was not the second paper in the Ter.
ritory, but the Puget Sound Courie,
was, appearing at Steilacoom in 1854,
and was published by Afilick 4 Gum.
Aside from these corrections, the
1ribune's item is " eminently correct. "
THE Ifibunes' brilliant advocacy oil
the Tacoma Republican city ticket is
not without . parallel in history. The
valiant knight de LaMancha seems
TO have -been impelled by . similar
motive when he took up the cause Of
the oppressed and made his heroic
charge on the wind mills. The re-
suits were Interestingly similar, and
poor Dom Quixote with his broken
lance and shattered armor could not
have felt worse than our esteemed
neighbos doubtless does over his first
tilt with the cold realities of heart
less VERDI
A FIRE destroyed $4,000 worth Of
property at spokane Falls, yesterday
morning. about 8. o'clock. The water
supply, as at the former fire, was made.