Richmond daily palladium. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1876-1904, 1901-05-11
OUR INDIANS.
How they Are Getting Along In Their
Tcrritory-Mixing With White
Trash.

ARnM0RE. T.. Nav y. 1901

ARrMORE, | T., May D, l9ol-
On the 9Th of March 10 company
wit Inspector Beede of Iowa | was as
signed to the duty of assessing the
value of the right of tie Oklahoma x
Western railway which is being CON
structed through the lands of the
Choctaw and Chickasaw nations. and
also the damages done to the adjacent
lands by the building of said road,
and for the first month have been en-
gagged in the work assigned and ex-
pect to bring it to close next week.
The road begins at Hartstone, a
town on the Choctaw & Gulf railroad
and r. MS southwest to Ardmore. |.
T.. a distance of III miles. and this
distance has been made twice In
private conveyance and nearly every
legal sub division has been
inspected and the charac
ter of the soil ascertained
this being essential to a correct
Judgment as to the value of right oil
way and also as to damage done te
the land. This valuation and dam
ages by the law creating the right
of way and treaty with these two ma
blOuS RON-S W ndtiObo ~ 10 WIZ
pro-rated among the individual mem
bers thereof, men women and chill
dren.
The valuation and damages as
sessed by the present undertaking i
almost conclusive and this carries
with it a good measure of response
bility, and | am very glad to shar.
this responsibility with the gentle
man with whom / am associated in
the work.
While the road passes over very
uninvitirg stretch Of country, as
rule, yet there are some as lovely
little prairies along the way as | have
ever seen. They are surrounded
with fringe of timber with little
groves in the bosom of same, max
ing a most charming and inviting
landscape. While this country be
longs to the Indian it is,
however, practically in the possession
of the white men who have come here
in great numbers from Texas. Arkan-
sas, Mississippi and some from the
northern states and have become
tenants of the Indians; that is, they
have entered into some sort of an
agreement with them by which they
rent the land for period of years,
to put a house, stable
and fence the ground, and give the
landlord either grain or money rent.
The house and barns are on the old
style and full of bed bugs, and all one
has to do to prove this is to camp in
one over night. The people who live
in this territory are most certainly
people without a country, and as
result they are as q rule a shiftless,
azy class without energy or ambi-
lion, being content to make a bare
living; the men chaw tobacer and
dip snuff. / think | have
seen as much apparent squalid
among this class of people as
anywhere in all my experience.
The Indian, however, is but little
n evidence along the line of the pro
,osed road. It's white men who have
Y ana Women s hho bv sh lsasa
have been by the courts
declared citizens of the Nations and
half breeds, have taken up these
ands and rented them as outlined
.bOve, while the real Indian, in or
Ter to keep away from the presence |
# the hated white man, the one
VhO he feels, without right, with
ut justice, often by fraud, and his
uperiOr prOwess, has despoiled him
( his once magnificent domain, has
AIKEN up his abode in the hills and at
he foot of the mountains, which,
Thile it furnishes him last retreat.
nd bee use from there the game was
ne last to disappear, is much of il
ractically worthless, and here
e will take his alIot-
tent, exc out a miserable existence,
ait patiently for the summons to
ne happy hunting ground of his
Ithers where amid its ever green
elds, its swift cumming brooks, its
lightly mountains and plains COW
ed with countless herds of wild
anne, with his bow and arrow, free
ON the presence of the pale ace, he
,pects to be happy forever. HeI
'nnot be happy here. He cannot or
ill not adult himself to the changed
'nditiOns about him, so he must
ISIS on to the great hereafter sad in
art, disappointed in life and in
any instances glad to be away. This
'plies more especially to the middle
'ed and the old men and women.
neither the children who are face
face with the new life who will
me up under different influences
d to degree through the schools
II face away from the past and be
lch different from their fathers re
inns to be seen.
Ii was some time about 1885 that
ese Indians extinguished by treaty
their rights to lend east of the
ssissippi.
+. b. REYNOLDS.