"Donna Hrynkiw" <Donna.Hrynkiw@kwantlen.ca> wrote: > The land description is Secn 1 - Rg 73W - Twp 129N - 5P.M. Since I grew up in Twp 127N, 64W, I had a pretty good idea of where the land you are looking for is located and this helped me find it. I used to know the location of this baseline, but right now I could only guess. Fortunately, you don't need to know the baseline location in order to locate much of land in the U.S. You need to know the state and the legal description. This applies to land surveyed under the Act of May 20, 1785, which generally includes all U.S. lands surveyed after that date and including portions of Ohio and all states west (and in the public domain states to the south). If you have that legal description, you can find out which county in the U.S. the land is located by going to the web site maintained by the Eastern States Land Office, Bureau of Reclamation. Go to: http://www.glorecords.blm.gov/PatentSearch/ Once there, click on "Search Land Patents" at the top of the page and on the ensuing page select "Standard Search." Then select the state and enter the legal description. This will give you a list such as this list of original patentees in Sec. 1, Range 129 Note, Township 73 West: Lutz, Joseph McIntosh ND 6/11/1900 (Homestead) Materi, Wendelin McIntosh ND 12/7/1897 (Timber Culture) Materi, Wendelin McIntosh ND 4/3/1896 (Homestead) Uhrich, Michael McIntosh ND 1/28/1897 (Homestead) Wishek, John H McIntosh ND 6/30/1906 (Cash Purchase) Ziegler, Joseph McIntosh ND 9/11/1905 (Homestead) The authorities for the above patents were: May 20, 1862 - Homestead Act (160 acres free if certain conditions met) March 3, 1873: Timber Culture (160 acres free if certain conditions met) April 24, 1820: Cash Sale (Wishek) (minimum $1.25 an acre, at least 80 acres) Note that the state line between North and South Dakota is on the border between Range 128 North and 129 North, so the southern border of McIntosh County, North Dakota, is on the North Dakota-South Dakota state line. McIntosh County encompasses the area beginning in the southeast with Twp 129, Range 67W and closing on the northeast with Twp 131N and Range 73W. Thus Section 1, Range 73W, Twp 129N is 5-6 miles north of the southern boundary of the county and 5-6 miles east of the western boundary of the county. According to the index of a 1911 Plat Map of the county, found at the McIntosh USGenWeb site, these were the owners of Sec. 1 in that year: Materi, W. 129N 73W 1 Stackert, J. 129N 73W 1 Streifle, John 129N 73W 1 Wolf, J.K. 129N 73W 1 [See: http://pixel.cs.vt.edu/library/land/nodak/link/mcintosh.txt] You will find that most settlers in this area were "Germans from Russia"; that is, they first left Germany to settle in the Ukraine at the invitation of Catherine the Great and lived and farmed there for several generations, maintaining their German culture. When promises such as no military service eventually weren't honored, large numbers of them migrated to the U.S., particularly to the Dakotas and Nebraska, in the latter part of the 19th century and early in the 1900s. In order to obtain Homestead land, one had to be a citizen and therefore for land in this area you will often find a copy of the naturalization papers in the case file for the land transaction, along with other valuable information, such as names and ages of family members, dates settled, improvements made and when, etc. These papers are at the National Archives. Order from: Reference Service NNRS National Archives and Records Administration 8th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W. Washington, DC 20408 Phone: 202-501-5400 You must know the legal land description to obtain copies of these files. There are probably more details at the NARA web site. Regards, Richard A. Pence, Fairfax, VA 22030 Pence Family History <http://www.pipeline.com/~richardpence/> "Richard A. Pence" <richardpence@pipeline.com>