"Tracing Our Roots" Newsletter Archive (A monthly genealogy newsletter written by the late Brenda Kellow, dec'd, for the Plano Star Courier newspaper. We've included all the ones we could recover.)
Barbara Coakley, professional genealogist and writer, is my guest writer today while I am recovering from thumb surgery. Barbara is on the board of directors of Genealogy Friends and regularly lectures on genealogy locally and regionally, with expertise in midwest and northeast research.
Thirty of the fifty United States contained land in the public domain. These states are referred to as public land states and include Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Washington, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. The federal government disposed of land to raise money, encourage military service, and encourage settlement in specific areas. Original title passed from the Government to an individual a number of ways including homestead, cash purchase, credit purchase, and military bounty land.
The Continental Congress enacted the Land Ordinance in 1785, which led to a rectangular system of one-mile squares throughout the public land states. Beginning at a principal meridian running north and south and a base line running east and west, six-mile square townships were plotted. Each township was further sub-divided into 640 acre, one-mile squares, called sections. The sections are numbered 1 through 36 beginning in the upper right hand corner and winding back and forth to the lower right hand corner. Each section is divided into 160 acre quarters, which can also be divided into half-quarters of 80 acres or quarter-quarters of 40 acres. Congress realized that there was a need for land for local government use, in each township and range a section was designated to be retained by the local government, normally this was section 16. The land could be used to build a school or sold to pay for education related expenses. The Land Survey Information System website contains a picture of the various divisions at www.geocommunicator.gov/lsi/. A sample description of a quarter-quarter containing 40 acres would be the Northwest quarter of the Southeast quarter of Section 4 in Township 14 South of Range 15 East.
Records of original purchase for public lands are normally located at the National or State Archives. Subsequent purchases are usually recorded in the county where the land is located. Deeds may also be recorded in the county where the buyer or seller resided. In Connecticut, Rhode Island and Vermont deeds are recorded at the town level. Alaska has no counties, so deeds are recorded in four judicial districts. The buyer is also known as the grantee and the seller as the grantor. In most locations, transactions are indexed by the first letter of the last name of the buyer and seller. The index by buyers names is called the grantee or indirect index. The index by the sellers names is called the grantor or direct index.
The United States Geological Survey (USGS) 7.5 Minute maps include the boundaries of sections, townships and ranges. On these maps one inch represents 2,000 feet. They also include details like churches, cemeteries, roads, and waterways. USGS maps can be ordered on their website at http://mapping.usgs.gov/esic/prices/maps.html. There is a growing collection of USGS maps available online at www.lsi.blm.gov/lsis2/map.htm.
Locating the land that belonged to your ancestors can help solve research problems. They place your ancestor in a specific place at a specific time, can contain proof of relationships, and provide clues to places you ancestor lived before the purchased the land or where they moved to when they left that location. By placing your ancestors land on a map, you might be able to determine which churches or schools they attended. Also, plotting land owned by people of the same surname will show you the proximity of the property. Those that are grouped together might be related. Land records may be more difficult to use than some other records genealogists refer to, however, they can also contain important information and be worth the extra effort required to find them.
Brenda Kellow, dec'd, Certified Genealogist and Certified Genealogical Instructor, had a Bachelor s Degree in history and taught genealogy courses at the local Community College and computer genealogy at the University.
