History of the Homestead Act

By Emily Brannan (Kansas Historian)

In 1862 congress approved an act that would drastically shape the United States into the country we know today. This was the Homestead Act which, on May 20, marks its 160-year signing by Abraham Lincoln. This act ushered in a wave of westward expansion not seen since the late eighteenth to early nineteenth century. The Homestead Act stated that any American citizen or intended citizen who had not taken up arms against the United States Government during the Civil War was intitled to 160 acres of government land on which they were to live and improve upon for five years at which time the land was theirs free and clear. The claimants only had to pay a fee of $18 broken down as followed: $10 to make a claim, a $2 commission to the land agent, and a final payment of $6 to receive an official patent. The title could also be acquired after only six months and with trivial improvements provide that the claimant paid $1.25 an acre to the Government. Union Soldiers could deduct their service time from the required residency meaning that if they served for three years then they only had to reside on the land for two years in order to receive it free and clear. Although this act was meant to help curb poverty it was not the solution that Congress hoped it would be as many farmers and laborers could not afford to build a farm or acquire the necessary tools and supplies to do so. The Act was also so ambiguously framed that it practically invited fraud. Though Congress tried to make changes early on this seemed to only compound the problem. This resulted in much of the land being given to speculators, cattle owners, miners, loggers, and railroads. Of the almost 500 million acres given out between the years of 1862 and 1904 only 80 million went to actual homesteaders. In the end small farmers would acquire more land in the twentieth century than the nineteenth due to mining booms and the Great Depression pushing hundreds further west in search of opportunities.

In regard to Kansas, the Homestead Act helped to settle much of the state with most towns that we know today being settled under the act. Many of the homesteaders who came to Kansas were known as “sodbusters” because they would build their homes out of sod brick cut from the earth. The Homestead Act opened a door for newly freed slaves who were fleeing the south during and after the Civil War and many fled west to start anew. Most of the African Americans who fled to Kansas came from Lexington, Kentucky and they hoped for a bright and prosperous future on the plains. Unfortunately, when they arrived and realized how harsh and barren Kansas was, many returned to the east. However, not all returned and those that stayed formed predominantly Black communities with one of the most well-known being Nicodemus, KS. Nicodemus was founded in 1877 and became a refuge from Reconstruction Era South. It was the first predominantly Black town west of the Mississippi. Today Nicodemus remains the only predominantly Black living community west of the Mississippi but more importantly it stands as a reminder and lasting monument to the African American migration west. The town is a historical site that draws hundreds of visitors each year to see the original buildings. However, only the Town Hall is open to the public. Though few people live there today, some are the descendants of the original settlers, and it is they who deserve the credit for keeping Nicodemus alive.

Many other towns in Kansas can credit homesteaders who came west in the search for free land for their existence today. Goddard and most, if not all, of Sedgwick County was settled by homesteaders under the act. The county we know today was first organized in 1867 and its modern boundaries were established in 1870. Wichita became the county seat two years later after the first railroad arrived in the town. Dodge City was founded west of what we know as Fort Dodge by a homesteader named Henry J. Sitler who built a sod house on a claim to oversee his cattle. From this, Dodge City developed naturally over time as it was in a convenient location to the Arkansas River and Santa Fe Trail. These are just a few of many towns in the state that can trace their origins or, at the very least, their present-day boundaries to the “sodbusters” and homesteaders who came here in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries with the promise of free government land under the Homestead Act.

The Homestead Act was officially repealed in 1976 with the institution of the Federal Land Policy and Management Act which was meant to retain Federal ownership of public lands. By the time it was repealed it had dramatically altered the landscape of the Western United States and changed the course of history forever.