Raymond’s Homestead

“My father had always had visions of homesteading on western land, as his father, a Civil War veteran, had homesteaded in south central Nebraska, near Axtell.

Congress had passed an act whereby a person could file on 320 acres instead of 160 acres, as before, so he and a good many others came to eastern Colorado and took up land. He wanted me to take it over, so in November of 1909 he and I came to Sterling, Colorado where we transferred the homestead over to me.

I had until April in 1910 to start my living on the place, so my father and I came to Akron on the train that month and he helped me build a shack on a hill of S½-29-2S-51. We got into Akron on an early morning train on the Burlington and as I looked south from the old depot, I could see nothing but prairie, no buildings in sight, not even freight cars and I thought, ‘what a desolate country.’ ” Excerpt from Raymond Sergeant’s account of homesteading in northeastern Colorado