IMMIGRATION AND AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT. CA3 



of railroads across it; but the main tide of immigration caine after the rail- 

 roads had provided means of sending the staple product of the country, 

 wheat, to the markets of St. Paul, Minneapolis, and Dulutli. The Northern 

 Pacific Raih-oad was built from Duluth to Moorhead and Fargo durino- the 

 years 1870 to 1872, and the next year it was extended to Bismarck. Within 

 the next three years a hue of the Great Northern Railway (then the St. 

 Paul and Pacific) was built to Breckenridge, and another line to Crookston 

 and St. Vincent. From 1875 to 1885 the settlement of the Red River 

 Valley and of a large contiguous area of North and South Dakota went 

 forward very rapidly, nearly all the land in this valley being taken up 

 during these ten years by homestead and preemption claims from the 

 Government and by purchase from the railroad corporations which had 

 received land grants. 



The wise jjolicy of the United States Government was to parcel out its 

 land in small farms to actual settlers, selling none to non-residents, and 

 allowing to no one rights to secure more than three-quarters of a section, 

 or a total of 480 acres. This large amount was possible to be obtained 

 from the Governmeiit only by use of three separate rights, each securino- 

 a quarter section, according to the respective laws for homesteads, preemp- 

 tion, and tree culture. Most of the farms received from the Government 

 comprise only 160 acres; and these were deeded, upon payment of small 

 fees at the land offices, to any citizen, including naturalized foreigners, those 

 affirming their intention to become naturalized legal voters, and widows and 

 unmarried women, all of whom were required to take the land to be their 

 permanent homes. For these free gifts of the fertile prairie of the Red 

 River Valley, sui-passed by no other area of the world in its natural value 

 for agriculture, multitudes came, bringing housekeeping equipments in their 

 emigrant wagons ("praii'ie schooners"), which passed in long processions 

 through St. Cloud and Alexandria, Minn., on their Avay from the older por- 

 tions of that State and from other States farther east and south. Many 

 also came directly from the Old World, especially from Sweden and 

 Norway, being carried from the eastern seaports by railroads to the Red 

 River and James River valleys and other parts of North and South Dakota, 



