The Washington times., 1901-07-21
ON THE OKLAHOMA BORDER
A COngested Gro vd Awaiting the
Great Land Drawings.
Picturesque Features of the Scenes
in the Camps-Expert Clerks From
Washington Kept Busy - Home
Seekers FIocking to Ell Reno.

| WICHITA, Kan. July 20.-Shifting
| scenes. touching the dramatic as well as
the comic, are being enacted every day
! along the Oklahoma border, where a con-
| gested crowd of $1,000 persons is in camp.
! The crowd includes men and women from
every part of the United States seeking
| free homes in the Kiowa, Cemaache and
| Wichita Indian reservations. to be opened
| to white settlement on August g. Much of
| the wildness of the opening of other lands
| is lacking, because of the fact that there
is no rush. the Government having de-
| cided to abolish the racing-for-land plan,
wherein many accidents. often fatal, oc-
Cured The plan of drawings was a tell
ing coup to do away with .-soonering,"
and among the vast multitude there was
but little grumbling against the scheme.
On July % the great free-land drawing
will begin and for eight or ten days the
0,O00 persons who have registered will
stand around the drawing booths at Ell
Reno and watch the bulletins they
flash forth the names of the lucky per-
sons. For the past ten days these 100000
persons have been fiocking into the regis
tration places, at LawtOn and Ell Reno.
They came in every manner of convey
ance-trains, prairie-schooners, and on
foot. Thousands of men poured in on top
OF cars, anu TOut DeIedlu,
taking on the grimy dirt of the black
plains. In the crowds were hundreds of
women some as old as ninety. but young
in their ambition to become landowner.
Every day the crowds at FL Reno, which
place came to be the Mecca of the home
seekers, grew larger.
A seething mass of humanity filed the
dusty streets, sleeping in alleyways, on
housetops, and steps-in fact, any place
they could lay their heads. The dust in
the roadbed was three inches thick, and
hundreds of men sprawled in the velvet
dirt, seemingly enjoying their bed. Wo-
men with young babes trod the streets
at night cooling their infants to sleep. As
daylight came over the plains from the
east they took on new life. and rushed
into line to register. For days many have
stood thus waiting. waiting 1t is but one
chance in ten they could win a farm but
it We're worth while to the tired and
weary
Expert Land Office clerks from Wash.
ington have found their nerves almost
overtaxed in registering ten to fifteen
thousand persons per day. The home
steaders, to relieve them of the crush
ard jam of every man for himself. with
the accompanying rush and jam of the
line, formed in companies, each under a
captain, and the lines were therefore kept
orderly. The crowds at all times showed
great concern for the women. and when
a woman and child could be pushed to
the front, such a plan was carried out
But the line of women
finally got to be so long that everyone
could not be treated so courteously. for
the men would be blocked out entirely.
When the registration first opened up
~
of the Land Office Department. stated
that certain rules of behavior must fol-
low in the long lines which had formed
the day before, and therefore the order
Of the homeseekers was fairly good. No
drunken men were allowed to register.
and the old, lame, and blind were given
preference over young fellows whose
muscles were strong. Commissioner Rich
ards. once Governor of Wyoming. is not
Z tenderfOot by any means and he knows
the wild life of the border. He knew
when he issued the quiet order it would
have effect upon certain class. but the
real WeSterner cannot be controlled. He
was there with his pistol longer than
ever, and the cool, devilish look in his
eye.
1t was great fun for the cowboy to shoot
passed along the line Offering his drinks
1t a fabulous price. but IL was rather
20 the tenderfoot. II was still
more typical of the real frontier 10 pass
through the dusty streets of FL Reno at
hight and listen to the humping of the
iiscordant piano and guitar as they made
ime for a crowd of dancers on a wooden
platform in the open. Men without Goats
IT collars, women of buXom form and
.areless manner, swing right and left in
he dance. 1t is kept up until daybreak
or the benefit of the younger class OF
lomeseekers. The old men go to some
luiet corner in the alleyway and sleep
peacefully after a hard day of trudging
through the crowds. Sleeping rooms are
Ilmost an impessibility to secure and
here are few who care to be crowded
nto their stuffy interior anyway during
he hot nights of the border.