The Leavenworth echo. [volume] (Leavenworth, Wash.) 1904-current, 1913-08-22
GREAT LAND DRAWING
IN MONT. NEXT MONTH
Government Expects That There Win be
$4,000 People File for Lands
Worth SIS an Acre

Nearly 5000 160-acre farm homes
will be drawn by the lucky ones" as
the result of the throwing open of l.
345,000 acres of land upon the Fl.
Peck Indian reservation in northeastern
Montana next month. This is the
last great land drawing Uncle Sam has
to offer his people and one Of the
greatest in the history Of government
land openings in point Of fertility.
Government agricultural experts esti-
mate that when this vast stretch of
virgin soil is titled it will add about
25,000,000 bushels Of grain annually
to the production of the United
States-enough to feed an entire ma
ton.
The Interior Department is making
extensive preparations to rush a big
corps Of clerks to Glasgow, Havre and
Great Falls, Mont, which are to be
the registration points. These land
Offices will be open September l next
and the work of filing for this land will
then begin. The people will have a
chance to continue filing until Septem-
Der 20.
The vastness of the area opened to
white settlement is expected to make
this one of the most alluring land
openings ever presented to the people
inasmuch as their opportunity of get
ting something in the drawing will be
much better than in any previous land
opening. For instance when the
Couer d'Alene, Flathead, and Spokane
land drawings were held last year to-
tai of 100000 people filed and drew for
the lands in those three Indian reser-
vations, the total area Of which was
about one-fourth OF the area to be
opened upon the Fl. Peck reserva-
ton. Government officials do not
think that more than $4,000 people
will file for the Fl. Peck land. Hence
the chances OF drawing quarter sec
ton in the Fl. Peck reservation lot
terry are about four times as good as
they have been in previous govern
ment land drawings. The actual value
of this land is said by government ag-
ricultural experts to average about $25
an acre. However, the governments
appraisal for its opening to white set
Element is only from $3.50 to 81 per
acre, thus making real prizes for those
who draw this land.
The drawing will take place in this
way: The names of all who file for
land will be placed in big box and
the envelopes drawn out one by one
and numbered, until enough envelopes
are taken from the box to correspond
with the number OF quarter sections
available-8, 400. Those getting the
early numbers will of course get first
pick OF the land, in rotation, according
to the numbers drawn. Then actual
settlement of the land will begin May
l, 1914. Settlement is the same as
under the homestead law, except that
the appraised valuation must be paid
from $3.50 to 81 per acre, at these
terms: One-ffth Of the total down at
time Of entry and the rest in five an
nual payments. The settler, however,
has the option Of taking advantage of
the new three-year homestead law by
paying for his land at the end Of three
years and thus proving up on it. This
gives the man Of small means chance
for his white alley"
Half dozen modern town-sites al
ready have been located by the gov
eminent at points along the main
transcontinental line Of the Great
Northern railway which runs through
the Fl. Peck reservation for 100 miles.