Los Angeles herald., 1909-04-20
UNCLE ESAM ENTERS
IMPERIAL VALLEY
LAND OFFICE REPRESENTA-
TIVE TO SETTLE DISPUTES
Prediction Made That Final Titles to
Land Soon Will Be Obtain.
able by Entry
men

Ell CENTRIC, April 19.-After three
years of waiting, the ranchers and land
holders of the Imperial valley have at
last succeeded in getting a representa-
tive of the government land office into
the district with authority to adjust
land disputes and instructions to for
ward complete data on cases that are
adjustable. 1t is hoped that the long
promised patents for which the entry
men have been waiting will be forth
coming within few weeks.
Raymond H. Satterwhite is the repre-
sentative now here. His orders are to
hear both sides wherever there is a dis
pute as to boundaries, claims, priority,
titles, assignments and so on, to decide
such cases as will admit of common
sense disposition and to take in full the
statements of the contesting parties
where the case is complicated. He has
been il the valley one week, and in that
time says that he has talked with more
than 500 men who are seeking adVlce
or the adjudication of their claims. He
probably will be here until November
1, or later, leaving in June for a short
vacation. He is making his headquar-
ters for the present in the various
towns of the valley, but after he has
met the farmers and seen their situa-
tion as a whole he plans to spend most
of his time on the ground wherever
dispute calls for personal investigation.
District Is TroubI.. Maker
'T can say unreservedly that never
in the history of the United States land
office has there been a district opened
for settlement that has caused so much
trouble, confusion and dispute" said
Mr.. Satterwhite this morning. THE
reason for this situation is patent
When the government surveyors first
came to this part of the country, in
1856, there was no thought that this
desert ever would be occupied. The
probabilities are that the surveyors
were fifty miles from water, forced to
live on half rations and losing money
every day they remained in the dis
trict. l suppose that they set corners
wherever they thought them indispen-
sable and made their plats from in
sufficient data.
"Then came the California Develop
ment company. If that corporation had
begun right-had petitioned the govern
ment for a resurvey when they nrst
started operations here and had waited
until they secured such survey all
the trouble would have been obviated.
Instead they went ahead ON their own
responsibility and surveyed the valley
making their own plats and settling
their own corners. When settlers, came
in to file they were told that the So
called &C. D. company stakes and num-
bers were official, and it was with these
numbers that the entrymen filed.
"It was a very short space of time
indeed until the government records
were hopelessly tangled. My business
in the valley is to straighten out this
tangle If it can be done. But there is
much work involved. The entrymen
themselves can greatly facilitate the
work by entering into cooperation with
the land office and wherever 1t is neces~
sary by giving as we'll as taking in their
disputes with neighbors. My work is
more that of an arbitrator of differ
ences than of a judge deciding cases.
Many complicated contests will he
thrashed out by the commissioner