The Telegraph-courier. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1888-1946, 1895-12-26
TITLES NOT PERFECT
IAN OPEN OPPORTUNITY FOR
LAND SHARKS.
xENoSHA FARMS INVOLVED
IN About 1000 Instances the Patents OF
Farms and City Property Have Not
Been Issued, Leaving Titles
Imperfect.

A Washington attorney has been
making stir in real estate circles in
Kenosha, and it is such a stir as will
be likely to make some disturbance
among the Kenosha county farmers.
He brought abstracts with him when
he came here from the records of the
land office at Washington, showing
that nearly 1000 Of the titles to land in
this county are not perfect.
While this thing may not be, strictly
speaking, a new discovery, the discov
cry is rather a recent one that there is
an opportunity for land sharks to make
trouble for many of our most prosper
Gus farmers by securing from the gov
eminent land office title to some of
the best property in the county. These
1000 instances mentioned are those in
which the original occupants of the
property failed to secure a patent of
the land from the land Office. 1t has
been known for a long time that the
abstracts in this county were incom-
ple.e in that one particular Of not being
able to show the transfer of the prop
erty from the government. Of course,
just that tar there is a cloud on the
title, and one which may or may not at
of trouble for the present acknowledged
owners of the property.
1t came about in this way. When
the property in this county was origin
ally pre-empted the government land
office at Milwaukee issued to each Of
the settlers or pre-emptOrs duplicate
certificate of the amount of money paid
for the land. This certificate WAS in
no way a conveyance, but merely
showed that the payOr had paid the
amount Of money specified on the face
of it and named the piece of land it
affected. The only thing necessary to
perfect the title was to forward this
duplicate certificate to Washington
and secure the patent, which was the
conveyancing paper. This was done
in few instances, but in a majority
OF instances it was not done, but the
parties were left IN undisturhed pos
session. Of course, the way is clear
still for those who can find these du-
plcate certificates to get the patent at
any time. But there were many in
stances where, for one reason and an
other, these duplicate certificates were
returned to the land Office. In
these cases an immense amount
of trouble is in store if land sharks
should decide on securing the original
entries, duplicate certificates and the
patent. In order to defeat such a thing
it would be necessary for the affected
property occupant to bring up host of
witnesses, make out long list of aft
daVits and dispositions and perpetuate
testimony with reference to proving til
tie by possession, which would be de-
cidedly expensive process.
The abstract books in possession of
Benedict & Tarbell make very bad
showing with reference to the failure to
secure these patents. There is one
whole quarter section in one portion of
the county where an enormous amount
of trouble might result from land
sharks tricks, and t1ere are several
other equally large pieces where the
trouble in perfecting titles might not
be SO bad, but they would stir up plen-
ty of difficulty.
The attorney came here to secure, if
possible, the names of all the property
owners affected. He gave it out as his
purpose to secure the patents where OBJ
tainable easily for the farmers at a
modicum of expense.
When seen about the matter this
morning D. B. Benedict, of Benedict &
Tarbell, was unable to say exactly
whether any titles in this county could
be disturbed. He was inclined some
what toward the opinion that the du-
plicate certificates were a sort Of 0rjnaG
facie evidence of title, such us would
preclude the real possibility of any
ones getting any title as against pres
ent occupants, and he did not think
anybody would be disturbed.