COLORADO. 



169 



and the reservation was thrown open at noon, 

 May 4. Excepted were lands reserved or allotted 

 to the Indians and the lands reserved for other 

 purposes in pursuance of the provisions of the 

 act of Congress as lands that have become a 

 part of the public domain or become subject to 

 entry under the desert homestead and town-site 

 laws and the laws governing the disposal of coal, 

 mineral, stone, and timber lands, providing that 

 no homestead settlers should receive title to any 

 portion of such lands at less than $1.25 an acre, 

 etc. A provision was also inserted in the proc- 

 lamation recognizing the claims of settlers who 

 now have undisputed rights to any of the in- 

 cluded lands, but this covers only a small tract. 



Land Surveys. The report of the Commis- 

 sioner of the General- Land Office gives the fol- 

 lowing details of work of the bureau in Colorado: 

 According to the latest surveys, Colorado covers 

 103,969 square miles, 300 miles of which is water 

 surface. During the past year 892 mineral and 

 mill-site patents were issued in the State and 10 

 coal-land patents, embracing 548 acres. But two 

 grants of public lands were made to the State, 

 and they were for school-land indemnity, em- 

 bracing a total area of 7,486 acres in the Pueblo 

 land district. The report shows 40,185,991 acres 

 of vacant public lands in Colorado, of which but 

 5,469,853 acres are reserved. The greater portion 

 of the unreserved lands are now surveyed. Four- 

 teen hundred acres in Colorado were placed under 

 military land warrants last year. The areas of 

 the reservations are as follow: White river 

 plateau timber-land reserve, 1,198,080 acres; 

 Pike's Peak timber-land reserve, 184,320 acres; 

 Plum creek timber-land reserve, 179,200 acres; 

 the South Platte forest reserve, 683,520 acres; 

 and the Battlement mesa forest reserve, 858,240 

 acres. 



Boulder. A bill passed Congress this year 

 granting to the city of Boulder about 1,800 acres 

 of public land to be used as a park and for pre- 

 serving the native trees. The report of the Com- 

 mittee on Public Lands says : " The land consists 

 of precipitous mountains, mostly all rock, and 

 is totally unfit for agricultural purposes. The 

 fact that this land is close to the city of Boulder, 

 and has never been located upon for homestead, 

 pre-emption, or mineral purposes, shows that it 

 is of no commercial value whatever. Boulder 

 has about 7,000 population. The State Univer- 

 sity of Colorado is there, and the Chautauqua 

 brings from 1,000 to 1,500 persons from other 

 States, who reside in the vicinity of that city 

 from June until September each year. This land 

 is of no value whatever to the United States, and 

 can be made a great attraction to the city of 

 Boulder. At the same time it will prevent, to a 

 large extent, the contamination of the water sup- 

 ply of Boulder." 



The land will revert to the Government unless 

 the city puts it to the use designed within three 

 years. 



Victor. In August the city of Victor lost its 

 business portion by fire, the value being esti- 

 mated at $2,000,000. Help was summoned from 

 Cripple Creek, but the town had been built in 

 the early days of the camp, and was of pine tim- 

 ber for the most part, and burned like paper. 

 The first house was built in Victor in October, 

 1893. In July of the following year the city was 

 incorporated, and six years later it contained 

 10,000 persons. 



Silver Plume. A great snow avalanche oc- 

 curred near this place Feb. 12, carrying with it 

 trees and mining timbers, burying Italian miners 

 and their families, and sweeping away buildings 



connected with the mines. The town was not 

 in the track of the slide. 



Legislative Session. The twelfth General 

 Assembly, after a session extended to the limit 

 set by law, adjourned the second week in April 

 William Smith was Speaker of the House, and 

 D. H. Dickason chief clerk. The Governor, in 

 his inaugural address, recommended " an inherit- 

 ance tax, the abolition of four district courts 

 and the Court of Appeals, increased appropria- 

 tions for the State L T niversity and School, and 

 radical changes in insurance and election laws 

 including the abolition of emblems on tickets; 

 the appointment of a State bank examiner, the 

 abolition of the truck system in mining districts, 

 the suppression of trusts ' peaceably if possible,' 

 civil-service rules for minor State offices, employ- 

 ment of convict labor, and admission of ex-Con- 

 federate soldiers to the State Soldiers' Home." 



The Cripple Creek mining district was sepa- 

 rated from Colorado Springs and erected into a 

 new county, named Teller, after strong opposi- 

 tion. The new county is about 6 miles square, 

 and produces half the entire gold product of the 

 State. 



A bill abolishing party emblems on election 

 tickets was passed; also one providing that "the 

 period of employment of workingmen in smelters 

 and in all other institutions for the reduction or 

 refining of ores or metals shall be eight hours 

 per day, except in cases of emergency where life 

 or property is in imminent danger." This law 

 went into effect in June, and a corresponding 

 reduction in wages led to a strike among em- 

 ployees. The Supreme Court had decided in 1895 

 that the Legislature could not single out the 

 mining, manufacturing, and smelting industries 

 of the State and impose upon them restrictions 

 with reference to the hours of their employees 

 from which other employers of labor are exempt. 



The question of issuing bonds for an auditori- 

 um in Denver will be submitted to a vote of the 

 people. 



Several bills affecting irrigation were passed, 

 the most important of which, in the opinion of 

 the State Engineer, was one "in relation to the 

 exchange and transfer of water from one ditch 

 to another; hereafter, when the change of the 

 point of diversion is sought, it will be necessary 

 for the owners to petition the district court from 

 which the original decree was issued, praying for 

 such exchange, and the practice and procedure 

 will be the same as for the original decree ; should 

 the court determine that such change does not 

 injuriously affect other appropriators, he will 

 issue a new decree allowing the change and with- 

 out forfeiture of his original priority." It is 

 believed that this "will tend to stop the indis- 

 criminate transfer of water, and will prevent the 

 using of the excessive decrees which were re- 

 cently granted and never used except in part. 

 A great deal of the trouble of recent years," he 

 says, " has arisen from the fact that the amount 

 of the older decrees were largely in excess of what 

 they needed or that the ditch could carry." 



The principal items of a bill in relation to reser- 

 voirs provide " that all reservoirs of a capacity 

 of more than 75,000,000 cubic feet shall be con- 

 structed under the supervision of the State En- 

 gineer, and that he shall determine annually the 

 amount of water which it is safe to impound in 

 all reservoirs within the State; he may also cause 

 to be withdrawn water from any reservoir which 

 he deems unsafe. The examination and accept- 

 ance of a reservoir, however, does not relieve the 

 owners from the payment of damages caused by 

 the washing away of the dam." 



