ner!" Governor Curtin was profuse in his apologies. Sherman then said, "Take your seats, but you will not be served with oysters or soup, but start on the next course with others at the table!" And so they did.

XIII

OKLAHOMA, 1901

Drawing of Lands in Kiowa and Wichita Reservations - Fifty-thousand People and no Accommodations-Report of the Committee - Twenty Years Later-Trip to The Yellowstone, 1902.

In June, 1901, I took my family to Grand Haven, Michigan, for the summer. The first visit I made to that place was in the summer of 1875, and this I have repeated (with the exception of two or three summers) every year since. The climate is cool and pleasant, and I have never found any locality more desirable for comfort and rest in the months of June, July, August and September. While practicing law, it frequently became my duty in summer to go back and forth at intervals. In July, 1901, I went on one of these visits to St. Louis intending to remain but one or two days and then to return to my family. However, the morning I arrived, July 17th, I found under the storm door of my house, which was closed for the summer, notice of a telegram. At the telegraph office I found the following:

Washington, D. C.
July 15, 1901.

Colonel D. P. Dyer, St. Louis, Missouri.

Will you act as one of the Committee of three referred to in the President's proclamation, to

supervise the drawing on the 29th instant for lands in the Kiowa and Wichita reservations? Compensation twenty dollars a day and expenses. Committee to meet at El Reno on the 26th instant to arrange details. Keep this confidential and answer quick. E. A. Hitchcock,

Secretary.

Being absent from the city on the 15th, I did not receive the message. On the 17th, I received the following:

The weather at the time was exceedingly hot, and I hesitated to accept the tendered appointment. However, I sent the following to the Secretary:

Sorry my absence caused you inconvenience. If you think I can be of service to the Government, I will accept.

On the 20th, I received this further message from the Secretary:

Your appointment will be mailed you today. Your Associates will be Asst. Com. Richards and Honorable Frank Dale of Guthrie, Oklahoma.

Then came the following:

I have the honor to inform you that you have been selected by me as one of the committee of three persons to have the supervision and immediate observance of the drawing to determine the order in which registered applicants will be permitted to make homestead entry of the public lands in the El Reno and Lawton land districts in Oklahoma, and you are hereby appointed a member of said committee. You will be allowed a compensation of twenty-five dollars a day while employed in this service, with actual expenses of travel, and three dollars a day in lieu of subsistence.

This action is taken in conformity with the President's proclamation of July 4, 1901, and the provisions of the law for protecting public lands from illegal and fraudulent entry and appropriation.

(Stat. 56th Cong., 2d Sess., p. 1158.)

You are requested to take and subscribe an oath of office, and to report at El Reno not later than the 26th instant. A copy of the President's proclamation is inclosed.

Very respectfully,
(Signed) E. A. Hitchcock,
Secretary.

On the twenty-second day of July I left St. Louis for El Reno and arrived there on the afternoon of the 23rd, where I found and became acquainted with my associates, Commissioner Richards and Judge Dale.

Richards had been at one time Governor of

Wyoming and Dale a Judge of the Territorial Court of Oklahoma, appointed thereto by President Cleveland. They were both excellent men, one a Republican and the other a Democrat. There were also present a large force of clerks from the Land Office at Washington to assist in the drawing. This proved to be the most interesting public service that I had ever undertaken or been concerned in.

The number of people attending that drawing who were actually present at the time exceeded more than fifty thousand. They came from every part of the country, nearly everyone of whom was an applicant for land. Photographs were taken at the time of the members of the committee, of the platform and the boxes used and the vast crowd of people present. These photographs are in the Land Office at Washington, but I was fortunate in getting copies for my own use. Those who care to may follow up this episode for themselves.

The first gives a fair likeness of the three committeemen, Richards in the center, Dale on his left, and myself on his right. The second gives a view of the platform and the boxes, and the third a partial view of the vast crowd in attendance.

The vast territory comprising that great number of acres of land was at the time unimproved, and had been the home of roving bands of Indians and great herds of buffalo. The town of El Reno where the drawing was held, was a small place with only a few hundred inhabitants. More than fifty thousand persons gathered in and about this little town during the drawing. Many had arrived in every sort of con