Volume 9 , Issue 37

A Shrewd Old Mam (Man)

Here is another news item that appeared in The AlvA Pioneer, dated Friday, October 20, 1893, Alva, M County, O.T., with a notation that it was pulled from the Wichita Eagle newspaper. The headlines read: A Shrewd Old Mam, but not sure the "Mam" might have been a typo and should have read "Man."

An Incident of the Opening of the Cherokee Strip -- "a peculiar case concerning the settlement of a claim has come to light in the territory, and one that has never yet been published.

On Sept. 16, two citizens of Oklahoma settled on one claim in the cherokee strip. One was an old man who had long since passed the meridian of life, while the other was still entering into the noon-day of manhood. The latter was in the run at the opening of the original Oklahoma, and succeeded in getting one of the best claims in Oklahoma proper.

His brother, in another state, desired to come to the Cherokee Strip and get a claim, but for some reason or other did not arrive in time. Thinking that some accident delayed him and that he would turn up in a day or two, the Oklahoma brother went to the booth at the line, registered and made a run for a choice claim for the purpose of holding it till the brother came.

As stated, he and the old man referred to got onto the claim about the same time, and a controversy immediately arose between them. The young man stated that he was on the claim first; that he was entitled to it, and hinted to the old man that he had better leave it if he knew what was good for him.

He did not know the old man, but the old man knew him. The old man took the hint, picked up his stake, traveled south with a placid countenance and, entering Oklahoma proper, made straight for the young man's farm and, after he had planted his stake in the middle of a promising wheat field, he put up a sign, "This claim is mine," and held it down.

He is still there, and every attorney in the territory who knows of the circumstances says he can hold it for the reason that it was deserted by its owner when he applied for a certificate to take a claim in the strip. The young man's farm is well improved, is all, or nearly all broken and has growing thereon a very fine crop of wheat. In about seven months more he would have proved up on it and it is said that he had a standing offer of $4,000 for it when he could make a deed.
,br> It is also said that the old man has the sympathy of the settlers in both Oklahoma proper and the Cherokee Strip, and that they are willing and prepared to defend him in his rights under the law. -- Wichita Eagle"
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