The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-05-24
INDIANS WILL BE RICH
LAND DIVISION GIVES RED-
 SKINS MILLIONS.
Choctaws and Chickasaws Soon to Have Wealth. Territorial Hold ings will Make Them Pros
 porous.

I
 their property. At present they are the
 wards of the government. The United states are not enamored of the guardian | snip. There Is nothing in 1t for Uncle | Sam except a lot of trouble and expense | therefore the government Is expediting
 the proceedings. especially in those parts
 of the territory owned by the Choctaw | and Chickasaw nations two of the five | civilized tribes.
 In those parts the lands are being par | celed out into three kinds, those which are to be sold for the minerals which un- l derlie them, those that can be utilized for
 town sites and those suited for the In | dfans who desire to become farmers and | stock raisers.
 The Indian office here calls the setting | aside the lands for town sites and mines | segregation. The lands are segregated | from the lands that are to be allotted to | the Indians who desire to farm or raise stock.
 Four hundred and forty-five thousand acres have been set aside for sale to the | public to open the rich coal and asphalt | deposits. The acreage for town sites is | not so large and most of it has already been disposed of. When all the land set aside for town sites has been sold it is believed the Indians of the two tribes | will have $2O,000.0OO to their credit from | that source alone. In this centennial year of the Louisiana purchase it is worth while noting that that sum is greater than the amount paid for the whole territory, of which the Indian Ter
 ritory is only very small part. People of Wealth.
 The assertion that the Indians living in the Territory are the richest people on the earth is based upon the fact that the poorest of them has a citizenship worth at least s10,000. Any Chickasaw or Choc-
 taw who can get the consent of the au-
 thorities there may go into the open mar
 ket and sell for the sum mentioned what
 he is entitled to receive when he comes
 into full possession of all his property 1 The Osages have property which makes
 the poorest among them worth $l5, ,O0O The activity in segregating is due to the | fact that there Is an agreement between
 the United States and the five nations
 whereby the last of tribal governments
 is to be abolished on or before March f.
 l9O6 With the disappearance of tribal | governments goes the community of-land interests. Instead of holding land in com-
 mon the Indians must hold their lands
 in severalty To is to become as near like | his white neighbor as possible. There are land offices in all parts of the l Territory where the Indians are making
 known their selections and doing other | things needful to give themselves a per- | feet title. The sale of the coal and as-
 phalt lands is to be made soon under a | special statute. The sale is to be at auc- | tion in lots of $40 acres each.
 Owing to the fact that the coal lands of
 the eastern part of the United States are
 nearly all under the control of the big l trusts there Is great deal of interest
 in this impending sale. A syndicate of
 Pittsburgers, headed by H. c. Prick and
 in which John w, Gates is said to be a
 prominent factor. is preparing to bid on
 all the land known to have coal veins
 thick enough to warrant mining. One of the reports is that the managers
 believe they will be able to buy the land
 at s25 an acre. If so they are likely to
 suffer keen disappointment. At present | there are several thousand acres leased
 to coal operators. who pay royalty of
 $240 an acre.
 Rather than let the lands go for any
 such figure there are millionaires among
 the Indians who will run the price up At
 the Indian office 1t is the impression that
 there will be price ot about $6O set all
 most at the beginning of the sale. Land Rich in Minerals. | The sale is to be conducted by three commissioners. one to he appointed by l'the Choctaws. one by the Chickasaws and the other by the Federal government The time of tho sale has not been fixed, although 1t is the expectations that it will be held some time this summer The officers of the Indian office regard the Indian Territory as the richest unde- veloped tract of the earth's surface now known to man. It has iron. lead zinc oil, gas and manganese. Some of the coal is Of the coktng variety. It Is therefore not impossible that at some not Tar distant day that section will figure as a rival of Western Pennsylvania in the production of iron and steel The fact that H. C. Prick Is looking at the lands is taken as significant.
 At the sale of the mineral lands a man may purchase as many sections as his purse can pay for. and this fact paves the way for the syndicate that is preparing to bid for the coal lands. It is known at the Indian office that Prick Gates and their associates have also been investi- gating the lands supposed to bear iron ere. At present the steel trust controls more than 0 per cent of the ore lands of the country that 1t Is possible to work Heretofore it has not been possible to take out any of the Indian ores. therefore the steel trust and the syndicate are apt to become rivals for the possession of the ore lands.
 When the appraisement of the ore lands was made tho appraisers did not take in- to consideration anything except the things that will make the land valuable to an Indian for farming and grazing purposes. Therefore the ore-bearing tracts are included in the tracts set aside for allotment,
 The men who want to buy the ore lands have been compelled to go to men in the tribes and enter into contract with them to select, ostensibly for themselves, land which the syndicate shall indicate The Pittsburgers have already picked out the lands they want and undoubtedly many tracts have already been taken up by as the alloting has been going on for sev- eral months.
 Method of Division.
 The lands that are being allotted are divided into classes. The value runs from 25 cents to S65O an acre There are 9 800 Choctaws and $500 Chickasaws, There are 1l,610.6 605 acres Each Indian is to have the value of farm of BIO acres of average land. A man who selects nat urally open bottom land" will receive a farm of 161 acres. The man who selects rough, mountainous land will be given 4,l65 acres. Owing to the fact that the iron ore is to be found in land of that kind which belongs in class No 19, there is likely to be a big rush for allotments of that character.
 The former slaves of these Indians are to be taken care of in the grand distr- button. Each is entitled to select 521 acres of No. 19 land. But if he prefers the rich land of the valleys he must be