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Archiver > MSSMITH > 2006-08 > 1155420358


From: Harold Hopkins <>
Subject: Re: USEFUL WEB SITE FOR LAND RECORDS
Date: Sat, 12 Aug 2006 15:05:58 -0700
References: <20060810222954.43113.qmail@web36207.mail.mud.yahoo.com>
In-Reply-To: <20060810222954.43113.qmail@web36207.mail.mud.yahoo.com>


I've been using it for years. Now and then the Bureau of Land
Management (BLM) closes down for maintenance (improvement of
information systems). The states specifically omitted from the BLM
grants/sales are the original 13 colonies, where land had already
been distributed by the states themselves after being ceded by Indian
tribes. There may be others. Some states -- or areas that would
later become states after the Revolutionary War -- had various land
sale and distribution systems. In North Carolina representatives of
the Earl of Granville -- to whom a large area of North Carolina was
chartered -- sold the land at low prices to incoming settlers or
migrants. Other areas in NC were ceded by "Crown Grants."

In Georgia, an original colony, the distribution from Indian
sessions was by land lottery (about five in all between about 1805
and 1835), with eligibility for drawing based on a year's residence
in the state, age, military service, marital status, and included
widows and orphans hood of men who would have otherwise have
qualified to draw in the lottery. In Georgia, too, if you were a
lucky winner and did not pay the small fee and move onto the land and
start improving it, the land would revert to the state which would
then resell it to the highest bidder. There are probably other
states than the 13 original colonies that were excluded, from the BLM
homestead exemption grants and low-price land sales. Some
grantees in original states such as NC and GA sold their rights to
land speculators.

These notes do not purport to be complete. The availability of free
or cheap land was responsible for the migrations throughout much of
the late 18th and the 19th centuries that
resulted in populations moving and settling practicallly every part
of the country.

Harold Hopkins



ug 10, 2006, at 3:29 PM, M Inman wrote:

> I found a very usefull web site to research land records but not
> every state is accessable. The site is www.glorecords.blm.gov.
>
> Very easy to use too! Good luck hunting. Mickey
>
>
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