The Claim Association – Johnson County’s Welcome Wagon.

**Welcome to Iowa!** For many days, the ox-drawn prairie schooner moved slowly westward toward Iowa. Rivers were forded, or if too deep to ford, were crossed in ferry boats. At last the weary oxen ceased to strain at the yoke, and the great canvas-covered wagons came to a halt. The pioneer had reached the site of his new home. Hard work, though, lay ahead of him. Staking out a claim, building a cabin, and breaking the prairie sod for a crop, all had to be done. When the earliest settlers came to Iowa, no surveys had been made. Each newcomer picked out an attractive spot for his home, usually near a spring or a stream so as to be sure of a supply of water. The early pioneers also picked a location where there was plenty of timber to furnish wood for fuel, rails for fences, and logs for a cabin. **Mahan & Gallagher**

On December 21, 1837, in Burlington (Iowa) – which, at the time, was the temporary capital of Wisconsin Territory – the Territorial Legislature approved the formation of fifteen new counties in, what was then, the District of Iowa. One of those counties was named Johnson County, and as you can see from the maps below – the county (614 square miles – 399,000 acres), while located near the center of Iowa District, was largely undeveloped except for the small town of Napoleon. You can read more here.

The following month (January 1838), John Gilbert – the fur-trader who had first made his home here around 1835 – gathered a handful of the pioneers who had also settled on this beautiful land adjacent to the Iowa River. In what would become known as Johnson County’s first business meeting, Gilbert and his fellow pioneer, Pleasant Harris, were appointed to trek over to Burlington to request that the Wisconsin Territorial Legislature 1) approve funding for roads & bridges into Johnson County, and 2) send a report back to Washington D.C. that Johnson County was large enough to deserve its own post office. You can read more about all this here.

Well, suffice to say, that Gilbert and Harris did one bang-up job promoting Johnson County to the legislators down in Burlington, because in July 1838, when Iowa became its own U.S. Territory, the new Governor – Robert Lucas – was convinced that the centrally-located Johnson County was, by far, the best choice for hosting Iowa Territory’s new capital city – Iowa City.

Now, back in Johnson County, when the news arrived that Governor Lucas was, indeed, going to promote the county as the host of the Territory’s new capital, the few pioneers who had settled here prior to 1838 (less than 50) began preparing for the influx of “squatters” who would soon be flooding in as the word spread across the Territory. One month earlier, on June 22, 1838, the U.S. Congress, in preparation for this coming land rush, approved a bill allowing those who had already “claimed” a piece of property in Iowa prior to February 22, 1838, would have up to two years to purchase that property without any outside competition. And, were they right in doing just that, because…

In 1838, Johnson County grew from a population of less than 50 pioneers in January to over 200 by mid-year – on its way to a population of over 1,500 by 1840! Read more here. And while that type of explosive growth sounds exciting, keep in mind that in 1838, very little of Johnson County’s 399,000 acres had been surveyed, and with only two U.S. land offices in the Territory (Burlington & Dubuque), the acquisition of land was chaotic, at best. Read more about the surveying process here. Which brings us, now, to…

Iowa City historian – Benjamin F. Shambaugh – tells us (below) about the March 9th, 1839 formation of The Claim Association of Johnson County – eventually, a group of 285 members who appointed themselves as “policemen” overseeing the 614 square acres of the county. You see, in the absence of an established local government, the Claim Association became “the law”, protecting the land rights of those early settlers who joined the organization.

You’ll notice that Shambaugh rightly calls the 285 members of the Claim Association “squatters” who were protecting the land from new “squatters”. You see, until Johnson County was plotted and surveyed, no one could “officially” purchase land from the government. That meant from 1837 until late in1839, the only “proof of ownership” a Johnson County settler had was his “claim cabin” and the good word of his neighbor. Thus, until such time that the land was plotted and surveyed by the Territory, the Claim Association became the “final word” of authority which compelled “new-comers” to join the organization or be seen as “claim-jumpers”. Shambaugh tells us more…

Once the pioneer arrived, he marked out his claim. He stepped off certain distances in each direction and marked the boundaries by driving stakes in the prairie or by blazing trees. Sometimes a large rock or boulder was used to mark the corner of a claim. Of course, many of the boundary lines were crooked, and often they overlapped. But the settlers understood that these matters would be fixed as soon as the surveys had been made. Government surveys in Iowa began in 1836, and two years later, in June, 1838, two land offices were opened, one at Dubuque and one at Burlington. Settlers flocked to these offices to buy their homes at the government price of $1.25 an acre.

The first homes in a new settlement were very simple. Until a claim cabin was put up, the newcomers used the wagon for shelter. Women and children and the old people slept in the wagon box, while the strong built a bed under the trees. Sometimes a three-faced camp was thrown up for shelter until a more permanent cabin (see below) could be finished. This consisted of three walls of logs about seven feet high, with poles across the top as a framework for the roof. Clapboards, that is, boards about four feet long split from a log with a frow (a blade at right angle to its handle that was driven by a mallet lengthwise of the grain), were used for a roof. These were held in place by poles laid on top. There was no floor, no door, no window, nor chimney. One side of this shelter was open, and in front of it a roaring log fire was built, both to heat the inside of the shelter and to be used for cooking. **Mahan & Gallagher**

Cyrus Sanders (above), who was a trained surveyor, came to Johnson County in 1839. In his journal, he writes about his own land claim that he surveyed and recorded with the Claim Association of Johnson County on April 23rd. You can read more from Cyrus Sanders’ journal here. Benjamin Shambaugh wrote about this transaction (below) in one his many books…

Great question! Again, according to our historian, Benjamin Shambaugh…

Another Iowa City historian, Irving B. Weber, has the details of these two cases of “claim jumping”…

Known as Mr. Iowa City, **Irving Weber** wrote over 800 articles for the Iowa City Press-Citizen between 1973-1997. In his April 15, 1989 article “Settlers stake their claims”, we find these interesting facts…

So, there you have it. Apparently, until around 1840, when government surveys were finally completed throughout the county and a U.S. Land Office was opened in Iowa City, the Claim Association of Johnson County played a vital role in keeping the wild west from becoming too wild. And yes, while a bit of strong-arming occurred on a couple of occasions, for the most part, this community-empowered association did its job in becoming Johnson County’s “welcome wagon” to new settlers moving west into Iowa.