Life on the Homestead... By Suzann Gilliland Peterson High Desert Grange, Nevada
I’m a city girl. I’m a city girl who, as a child, dreamed day and night about becoming a farmer’s wife. No doubt, my dreams were inspired by visits to my great aunt and uncle’s farm in Lancaster, CA. I love the earth, the sky, the rain, streams and rivers, and all the animals on God’s green earth. My young life, however, was spent the urban way living in Los Angeles. My father was an outdoorsman fishing streams, lakes and the sea and hunting locally and afar, all to provide for his family of four. Hunting with his camera for the perfect shot was, by far, his happiest pursuit as he sought to showcase environmental issues through his lens and his written words. Long before environmental issues took to the public eye, he was sounding the alarm about over-fishing our oceans and widespread poaching on public lands. I had the great fortune to accompany him on some of his excursions, which deepened my love of nature. I now live in the Great Basin Desert, sixty miles east of Reno, Nevada. My husband, Dan, and I have a house on five acres of pure sand. Dan had homesteaded his first house which now belongs to his eldest son. Over coffee one morning, Dan approached me about homesteading our property as a precaution of what the future may bring. Both of us had lost our former spouses, so security was an important consideration for us. But I knew nothing about homesteading. Perfect timing! I’ve been asked to do a quarterly article on homesteading for Good Day! magazine. The saying “when the student is ready, the teacher appears” is probably appropriate in this instance. I like reference points, history, and the opportunity to share what I’ve learned. My stories will explore the history of homesteading, how it applies to today’s
58
world, and what it entails. Many of you are living the homestead experience; some of you are new to the Grange; and a few of you, like me, may come from an urban environment. My goal is to introduce/ reintroduce you to a facet of Grange that touches many of us… homesteading. What is Homesteading? For those of you unfamiliar with the term, “homesteading” means a selfsufficient lifestyle, one of subsistence agriculture on land owned or rented to support a household. It includes the preservation of home-grown food and livestock. Items made at home such as textiles, garments, and craft work for household use or sale on a small scale may also be part of homesteading. The term has been around for at least thirty-seven decades. What conditions created the need for such a concept?
plots of unappropriated public land. To qualify, an individual must be the head of a household or 21 years of age, have five years of continuous residence on the land, build a home on it, farm it, make improvements, and certify that they have never borne arms against the United States. Two neighbors or friends were required to attest that the individual had fulfilled the requirements. This individual was known as a “homesteader.” If a homesteader was a Union soldier, time served in the Civil War was taken into consideration as a way to decrease the five-year residency requirement. Following six months of proven residency and a fee of $1.25 per acre, the government allowed the purchase of land titles. This meant that United States citizens or new immigrants seeking naturalization were eligible to homestead, as could single women and people of all races. Freed slaves would be
American Life in the Mid-1800s The socio-economic environment of America in the early 1840s catered to men with capital. Big farms were swallowing up smaller ones. A country of land monopoly was on the rise. The issue of slavery was front and center in American politics. Abraham Lincoln was elected in 1860 and the South seceded soon after. The Civil War ravaged the country. Precious metals and minerals were discovered in the west. Amid the backdrop of such polarizing realities, Lincoln and a few Congressional leaders sought to provide an opportunity for every American to own land and provide for his family. At the same time, they sought to create an incentive for people to move to and settle the west. The Homestead Act of 1862 On May 20, 1862, in the aftermath of the Civil War, President Lincoln signed into law the Homestead Act. For the price of an $18.00 filing fee with the local land office, individuals were granted 160-acre
H & L
GOOD DAY!™ MAGAZINE www.nationalgrange.org
An 1869 broadside pamphlet encourages Homesteading in Nevada. Photo courtesy of the Duke University Library
