Wyoming Territory

“ The population of the township was nearly three thousand. At Sidney, which is a military post, I stopped at the Railroad Hotel. Sheep-farming is a leading industry of Sidney and its vicinity. My last stopping-place in Nebraska was at Evans Ranche, Antelope, a small village on the Elk Horn River.
Crossing the boundary into Wyoming Territory and reaching Cheyenne, I made my entrance into this most interesting region—a great plateau of nearly 100,000 square miles, its lowest level 3,543 feet, its highest altitude more than 13,000 feet above the sea. ”

“ The first governor, John A. Campbell, was appointed in April 1869, and the organization of the Territory was completed in May of the same year. At the first election, on the 2nd of September 1869, 5266 votes were cast. The legislature established the seat of government at Cheyenne, and granted full suffrage and the right of holding office to women. The first great inrush of population, following the discovery of gold and the opening of the railway, brought many desperate characters, who were held in check only by the stern, swift measures of frontier justice. ”

“ Since the creation of Montana territory in 1864, this area had been attached, obviously only temporarily, to Dakota. Now, with the mining and railway influences at work, the population made appeal to the Dakota legislature and to Congress for independence. "Without opposition or prolonged discussion," as Bancroft puts it, the new territory was created by Congress in July, 1868. It was called Wyoming, just escaping the names of Lincoln and Cheyenne, and received as bounds the parallels of 41° and 45°, and the meridians of 27° and 34°, west of Washington. ”

“ After having tried the experiment for nine years, it is safe to say there is not one citizen of the Territory—man or woman—who desires good order, good laws and good government, who would be willing to see it abolished. Woman's influence in the government of our Territory is a terror only to evil-doers, and they, and they only, are the ones who desire its repeal. Such base slanders as the specimen you sent me excite in the minds of Wyoming citizens only feelings of disgust and contempt for the author, and wonder at the ignorance of any one who is gullible enough to believe them. ”

“ The folks are having a good time on t'other side the river, and to-morrer, when Forty Fort surrenders, Wyoming will be wiped out so clean that the only way of telling where it has been will be by the ashes. ”

“ The Constitution, which continued the Territorial provision of full suffrage for women, met the approval of Congress, and on the 10th of July 1890 Wyoming was formally admitted as a state. Since admission the progress of the state has been steady. Extensive irrigation projects have made available many thousand acres of fertile land, and much more will be subjected to cultivation in the future as the large ranges are broken up into smaller tracts. ”

“ An automobile shot out from a gash in the hills and slipped swiftly down to the butte. Here it came to a halt on the white, dusty road, while its occupant gazed with eager, unsated eyes on the great panorama that stretched before her. The earth rolled in waves like a mighty sea to the distant horizon line. From a wonderful blue sky poured down upon the land a bath of sunbeat. The air was like wine, pure and strong, and above the desert swam the rare, untempered light of Wyoming. Surely here was a peace primeval, a silence unbroken since the birth of creation. ”

“ Much as we may admire the various bays and lakes, the inlets, promontories, and straits, the mountains and woodlands of this rarely-visited corner of creation—and, compared with it, we can boast of no coast scenery so beautiful—the valley of Grand-Pré transcends all the rest in the Province. Only our valley of Wyoming, as an inland picture, may match it, both in beauty and tradition. One has had its Gertrude, the other its Evangeline. But Campbell never saw Wyoming, nor has Longfellow yet visited the shores of the Basin of Minas. ”

“ A weary march across the low, bare, sandy plains of the present state of Wyoming, strewn with broken sandstone, brought our heroes to the brink of the precipice dividing these lofty table-lands from the valley of the Arkansas, where they were alike cheered and tantalized by the sight of the river they were seeking, flowing through a rich and fertile country. ”

“ The population having grown, especially in the south the movement originated to form a constitution and apply for statehood. This occurred in 1889, and on July 10, 1890, Wyoming became a state. Wyoming sends a single member to the lower House of Congress. Its chief executive officers besides the governor include a secretary of state, a treasurer and a superintendent of public instruction. Consult Resources of Wyoming; Bancroft's Nevada, Colorado and Wyoming ”

“ The history of Wyoming does not commence, as many suppose, with the war of the American revolution. Long before, the conflict of human passions in the breast of savage and civilized man had discolored its soil with blood. ”

“ Then we would lead such a man out and show him six, eight, ten square miles of green crops; and he, if he was thoroughly nasty, would mention that Wyoming contained ninety-five thousand square miles, all waiting for irrigation and Eden. One of these Eastern supercivilized hostiles from New York was breakfasting with the Governor and me at the Cheyenne Club, and we were explaining to him the glorious future, the coming empire, of the Western country. ”

“ Wyoming's population, smaller than that of any other State with the single exception of Nevada, is less than two-thirds native stock, and this represents a blend from all parts of the United States. Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, have all contributed more inhabitants than either of its neighbors, Colorado and Utah. In these mountain States the general rule that a State is settled by its neighbors, quite breaks down. Its foreign stock is equally mixed; while much is Nordic the State has also attracted its quota of Slavs and Italians, and even of Mexicans. ”

“ For the long summer days of Wyoming were as white as diamonds, and the soft blue mountains stood along the distant west beyond the bright river as if to fend the land from hardships and inclemencies, and nurture in its breast the hopes of men. ”

“ The bitter strife between the New-England settlers and the Pennsylvanians, between the loyalists and the sons of liberty, in our war of revolution, and the fearful massacre, which made the few survivors of the valley fugitives, are too well known, and too painful, to be here recapitulated. Yet, whatever prompted the call to arms, whether the defence of home or country, or the blind ardor of a mistaken cause, the men of Wyoming were always the bravest of the brave. ”

“ Hugh raised his hand for silence and went on, “It doesn’t matter what I am. What does matter is what I can see and get you to see. All that I want to do is to make you view Wyoming as my Uncle Bookie did, here from this door-step. He saw Wyoming men and women as a breed different from other states because our plains and mountains make them so. He knew that folks born of such country as this had a chance to be bigger in mind and body than folks of lesser states. He knew that they had not only the chance but the obligation to be bigger. And he saw them failing to be so. It hurt the old man.” ”

“ St. Rep. 914; Farm Investment Co. v. Carpenter, 9 Wyo. 110, 61 Pac. 258, 50 L. R. A. 747, 87 Am. St. Rep. 918; Willey v. Decker, 11 Wyo. 496, 73 Pac. 210, 100 Am. St. Rep. 939; Johnston v. Little Horse Creek Irrigating Co., 13 Wyo. 208, 79 Pac. 22, 70 L. R. A. 341, 110 Am. St. Rep. 986.
As the United States possessed plenary authority over Colorado and Wyoming while they were territories and has at all times owned the public lands therein, we turn next to its action. ”

“ A young woman in Wyoming writes: "This country is so different, so big, that the horizon alone seems to set the limit. I visited on one ranch that is fourteen miles from one end to the other. There are no green wooded hills here, but great rocky slopes and rushing water and great sandy flats with wonderful changing colors.... I do not think we miss the outside world as there is something about this country that, after a time, fills one's whole thoughts and it is hard to remember that there is any other world than this." ”

“ Wyoming, to be appreciated, should be explored on horseback and not viewed from the observation platform of a limited train. Barren stretches of sagebrush and cactus, and grim, ugly buttes guard too well the secret that golden wheat-fields lie beyond them; the rugged, far-away mountains never tell that their canyon-cut sides are clothed with timber and carpeted with a thousand flowers; and tired, dusty travelers, quite unaware of these things, find themselves actually longing for Nebraska to break the monotony! ”

“ When the British formed an unholy alliance with the Indians during the Revolutionary War and turned the tomahawk and scalping knife against their kinsmen, the beautiful valley of Wyoming became a dark and bloody battle-ground. The organization and disciplined valor of the white man, leagued with the cunning and ferocity of the red man, was a combination which met the patriots at every step in those then remote settlements, and spread rapine, fire, and murder over that lovely region. ”

“ By the levels of Bear Creek that reach like inlets among the promontories of the lonely hills, they came upon the schoolhouse, roofed and ready for the first native Wyoming crop. It symbolized the dawn of a neighborhood, and it brought a change into the wilderness air. The feel of it struck cold upon the free spirits of the cow-punchers, and they told each other that, what with women and children and wire fences, this country would not long be a country for men. ”

“ In defense, Colorado contends that the meadowland diversions in excess of 4250 acre feet were in accordance with Colorado law and were not inconsistent with the decree of this Court until a diversion by Colorado from the Laramie river for all purposes reached the allocated total of 39,750; that the diversion of an amount greater than that total during the period above specified was with the acquiescence of Wyoming; and that Wyoming has not been injured. ”

“ The State of Wyoming, or anyone recognized by her as duly entitled thereto, shall have the right to divert and use all water flowing and remaining in the Laramie river and its tributaries after such diversion and use in Colorado. ”

“ In some places the plains are level, and in others, rolling. The soil is very fertile.
Two mountain ranges hem in the valley. The one on the east has an average height of a thousand feet, and the other two hundred feet less. The eastern range is steep, mostly barren, and abounds with caverns, clefts, ravines, and forests. The western is not nearly so wild, and is mostly cultivated.
The meaning of the Indian word for Wyoming is "Large Plains," which, like most of the Indian names, fits very well indeed. ”

“ The resentful Indians resorted to war. After a long and arduous contest in Wyoming, Montana and Dakota, which lasted from 1874 to 1879, and during which General George A. Custer (q.v.) and his command were killed in 1876 on the Little Bighorn in Montana, the Indians were thoroughly subdued and confined to reservations. The settlers in Wyoming shared the general antipathy to the Chinese, common to the western country. ”

“ In these slowly rotting shells people rioted, believing the golden age was here, the age when everybody should have money and nobody should be arrested. For Drybone soil, you see, was still government soil, not yet handed over to Wyoming; and only government could arrest there, and only for government crimes. But government had gone, and seldom worried Drybone! The spot was a postage-stamp of sanctuary pasted in the middle of Wyoming's big map, a paradise for the Four-ace Johnstons. Only, you must not steal a horse. ”

“ The next stop is at Rock Springs, the greatest coal mining town in the West. The town itself has the typical appearance of an active country town, and there is little on the surface to indicate the labyrinthine workings of the great underground measures, part of the vast mineral 19 treasure house of the state. Wyoming is a state of both underground and over-ground industries, with its coal mines, gold mines, copper mines, its great flocks of sheep and herds of cattle, and lastly a newly developed agricultural field of great possibilities. ”

“ When the treaty of 1868 was made, the tribe consisted of full-blood blanket Indians, unable to read, write, or speak English. Upon consummation of the treaty, the tribe went, and has since remained, upon the reservation. It was known to contain valuable mineral deposits-gold, oil, coal, and gypsum. It included more than 400,000 acres of timber, extensive well-grassed bench lands and fertile river valleys conveniently irrigable. It was well protected by mountain ranges and a divide, and was the choicest and best-watered portion of Wyoming. ”

“ Among the parties dashing hither and thither, in the blind effort to escape the Tories and Indians, who seemed to be everywhere, Fred recognized several friends and neighbors. Indeed, since Wyoming was his native place, it may be said that nearly all the fugitives were known to him.
"Why ain't you with your folks?" suddenly asked a middle-aged farmer, who stopped for a moment in his panting flight to exchange a few words and to gain breath. ”