by the executive committee to recommend to the association that the constitution be amended and the life membership dues be raised to one hundred dollars. Mr. Powers, representing the Torch press, stated that it would be impossible to print the Review and PROCEEDINGS for the coming year at the present cost to the association. The board of editors was instructed to investigate cost of printing in various cities and make the best arrangements possible. Invitations to meet in Iowa City in 1922 were presented by the secretary of the state historical society of Iowa, the University of Iowa, and the department of history of the University of Iowa. Definite action was not taken, but it was agreed that it would be a pleasure to meet in Iowa City in 1922 if circumstances permitted. An invitation was issued by Mr. Fish on behalf of the University of Wisconsin to meet in Madison in 1921. No formal action was taken, but it was the sense of the committee that the invitation be accepted.

The executive committee held a brief session at 8 A. M. on Saturday, May 1. There were present Messrs. Quaife, Buck, Pelzer, Cox, Alvord, Mrs. Paine, and Miss Mitchell. Mr. Quaife was elected chairman of the executive committee for the coming year. It was voted that the nominating committee be required to report to the secretary before the annual meeting each year, said report to be submitted to the executive committee and other publicity given regarding the candidates for office.

The meeting then adjourned.

CLARA S. PAINE, Secretary

REPORT OF THE SECRETARY-TREASURER

(APRIL 30, 1919 TO APRIL 30, 1920)

This association held a session in Cleveland, Ohio, in connection with the annual meeting of the American historical association, December 2930, 1919. Members of the executive and standing committees met at breakfast on Monday morning and discussed business informally. The chairman of the program committee, John W. Oliver, outlined the program for the meeting in Greencastle; and W. W. Sweet, chairman of the local committee on arrangements, told of the plans for entertainment. The date for the meeting was set for April 29, 30, and May 1, the time most convenient for the entertaining city. The convention bureau of St. Louis desired the Mississippi valley historical association to recommend that the American historical association meet in St. Louis in December, 1920 or 1921. No definite action was taken, but the association approved the central location providing it was acceptable to the American historical association.

The following program was given on Monday morning at ten o'clock, Milo M. Quaife presiding: "The foreign policy of Alexander Hamilton," Samuel F. Bemis of Colorado college; "The American position on the revolution of 1848 in Germany," Reginald C. McGrane of the University of Cincinnati; "Southern opinion in regard to the Mexican war and the accession of territory," Chauncey S. Boucher, Ohio state university; "The strategy of concentration in the Mississippi valley in the spring of 1862," Alfred P. James, University of Pittsburgh. The paper by Archibald Henderson of the University of North Carolina, on "The Transylvania project: the last phase," was omitted on account of the absence of Mr. Henderson.

The dinner scheduled for Wednesday evening was changed to Tuesday and was well attended. Informal speeches were made by Mr. Quaife, the president, by Mr. Alvord, and by Mr. Cox, who in closing introduced Albert J. Beveridge, the speaker of the evening. Mr. Beveridge gave a delightfully informal talk upon how he came to write the biography of John Marshall.

The minutes of the business transacted in St. Louis were submitted by mail to the members of the executive committee shortly after the twelfth annual meeting and were returned to the secretary approved.

For the membership committee the secretary reports seventy mem

bers added during the year, including two life members. Thirty-four names have been dropped by cancellation or for nonpayment of dues. The following members have died during the year: John E. Roller, Harrisonburg, Virginia; Laenas G. Weld, Pullman, Illinois; Henry Morse Stephens, Berkeley, California; Heman C. Smith, Lamoni, Iowa; Minnie Elizabeth McKenzie, Cincinnati, Ohio; Darwin S. Hall, Olivia, Minnesota; Frank P. Crandon, Evanston, Illinois; Jan S. Broz, Omaha, Nebraska; Thomas McAdory Owen, Montgomery, Alabama; Charles F. Gunther, Chicago.

The following budget estimating expenditures for the year 1919-1920 was approved by the finance committee, which consists of the president, the chairman of the executive committee, the managing editor, and the secretary-treasurer.

Invitations have been presented to the association to meet in Madison, Wisconsin, and in Little Rock or Hot Springs, Arkansas in 1921. An invitation to meet in Iowa City in 1922 has been received from the state historical society and from the University of Iowa.

The following is the financial report of the secretary-treasurer for the past year.

The balance on hand consists of a checking account in bank, $1,136.20; a savings account in bank, $528.55; and cash in office, $1.15.

This is to certify that we have audited the accounts of Clara Paine, Secretary of the Mississippi valley historical association, for the period from May 1, 1919, to April 24, 1920, and that the foregoing is a correct statement of the receipts and disbursements for the period.

The receipts have been verified by checking, item by item, the stubs of the cash receipts retained by the secretary, and the disbursements have been verified by an approved receipted voucher for each and every disbursement; the balance on hand has been verified by the balanced pass books of the National Bank of Commerce, of Lincoln, Nebraska.

WIGGINS-BABCOCK COMPANY, Public Accountants
BY H. S. WIGGINS, C. P. A.

LINCOLN, NEBRASKA, April 24, 1920

Respectfully submitted,

CLARA S. PAINE, Secretary-Treasurer

THE TIMBER CULTURE ACTS

The timber culture acts were born of a desire "to promote tree culture" upon the "treeless plains of the Great West." They failed in this purpose; and in retrospect they are mainly interesting because on them was based the transfer of nearly eleven million acres of land from the public domain of the United States to the hands of private citizens. The six states in which land in the largest amount was thus transferred lay in the Mississippi valley. Next after them came the three states on the Pacific coast.

On February 20, 1872, Senator Phineas W. Hitchcock, of Nebraska, introduced a bill that on March 3, 1873, became the first timber culture act. Title to a quarter-section of land might be acquired by planting forty acres of trees, set twelve feet apart each way, and cultivating them for ten years. That is, the price of the quarter-section was the planting and care for ten years of about twelve thousand trees. If less than a quarter-section was desired the requirements as to the number of trees were proportionately less. In 1874 the ten years were reduced to eight. The second of the two main acts, also introduced by a senator from Nebraska, was passed, June 14, 1878, and remained the cornerstone of the system until the repeal in 1891.2

were

The three processes-making application for land, complying with the physical requirements, and making final proof all carefully regulated by the statutes, supplemented by regulations from the general land office. By the law of 1873, the en tryman was to appear at the local land office of the district in which lay the land he desired. There were in the United States in the seventies about a hundred land offices. Nebraska, for instance, had seven; Kansas, eight; and Colorado and Dakota

1 Report of the commissioner of the general land office for the year ending June 30, 1872 (Washington, 1872), 69.

2 Congressional Globe, 42 congress, 2 session, p. 1129; Statutes at large of the United States of America, 17:605; 18:21; 20:113; 26:1096; Congressional record, 45 congress, 2 session, p. 57.