INDIAN TERRITORY

an area of about 30,000 sq. miles, which had been set apart as an Indian reservation, in 1834, with Kansas on the N., Mi ouri and Arkansas on the E., and Texas on the 8. and W.4 After the Civil War, when the West was being settled, strong pre ure was brought to bear on the Government to open this section up to settlement, and finally, in 1889, it was decided to purchase that part known as Oklahoma from the indians and declare it open for settlement. The rest of the territory remained closed, but in 1894, Congre authorized a survey, the country being until then almost unknown. It was inhabited by what were known as ‘the five civilized tribes,’ the Creeks, and Semi noles, numbering 101,506, in 1922. Unlike the surrounding prairie states, this country was found to be largely mountainous, and two-thirds covered by heavy forest. In 1907, this territory and Oklahoma were joined together, and as a whole admitted into the Union as the forty-sixth state. The discovery of oil has done much to develop the state since then, the output of this commodity in 1920 being valued | at over $401,000,000, many of the enriched land owners being Indians.