PIPE SPRING Cultures at a Crossroads: An Administrative History

Utah and the Arizona Strip: Ethnographic and Historical Background

Heaton Family Claims to Lands Within the Reservation

President Wilson's Executive Order of June 11, 1913, withdrawing public lands from settlement prompted a flurry of activity by white settlers to legally prove their claims on lands that lay within the reservation. The Heaton family in particular fought a lengthy battle to gain title to lands it claimed. [297] They wrote letters, engaged lawyers in Phoenix and Washington, D.C., made personal appeals to Senator Reed Smoot in Utah and Senator Carl Hayden in Arizona, and submitted numerous petitions to state and Washington officials from about 1915 into the early 1920s, with only limited success. Two actions taken by the Heatons with regard to land claims are worthy of mention here. The first action consisted of separate filings by Jonathan Heaton's plural wife and two sons (Lucy, Fred, and Charles) on three 160-acre homestead entries. Final proof was made on these entries on December 13, 1920. The General Land Office accepted these three homestead applications and the local land office in Phoenix issued certificates. (The application of Charles C. Heaton did not include the Pipe Spring tract, only Moccasin property.)

At the urging of Dr. Farrow, however, the Office of Indian Affairs challenged Charles C. Heaton's homestead application. Farrow feared the Heaton family would at some time in the future cut off the Indians' access to Moccasin Spring. On March 7, 1921, Farrow filed a protest to the filing of a homestead claim by Charles C. Heaton. Upon hearing of the protest to his application, Heaton wrote his lawyers the following letter:

I have just learned from some of the Indians that the object of Supt. E. A. [sic] Farrow's going over our three homesteads. He has entered a protest and he and some of the Indians have signed it. Now these Indians are very friendly with us. They came and told us that they did not know what they were going to sign until the Supt. had them in the courthouse in Kane County, Utah. They came to us and told what the Supt. was doing.

I think it would be well to have this matter brought before Congressman Carl Hayden, as this Supt. [sic] actions on other matters have been put to him.

I also call your attention to the 7 or 8 acres of land that the Indians have used for some time that is in the 40 that my house and most of my improvements are in. Now, I am willing to put up something for the Indians that use this land, so as to be on good terms with them.

Hoping that with this information you will be able to get these homesteads through. [298]

His request for intervention by Senator Carl Hayden was not unusual. Mohave County Sheriff W. P. Mahoney had kept Hayden apprised of the land controversy and the conflict between Farrow and the Heatons for some time. The Heatons and their lawyers also kept Hayden informed. While the details of further negotiations are unknown, an agreement was reached in June 1923 whereby Heaton's homestead entry was approved, with several stipulations. An area not exceeding 200 feet on either side of the spring was to be segregated (about four acres), and it was stipulated that when the patent was issued to Heaton, it would contain a clause allowing him an unobstructed use of two-thirds of the flow of Moccasin Spring. [299]

18. Edgar and Anna Farrow and children, September 1923 (Photograph by Francis P. Farquhar, Courtesy National Archives, Record Group 79).

In addition to protesting Charles C. Heaton's Moccasin claim, Farrow served Heaton with a peremptory notice on August 7, 1922, directing him and other parties using certain lands within the reservation to vacate the lands within 60 days, and to promptly remove all enclosures and fences on those lands. The only exception made to the order was the Pipe Spring tract. Heaton's legal firm conferred with Senator Hayden regarding the matter in September 1922. On advice from his attorney, Heaton took no action to comply with Farrow's demands. [300] The fencing remained in place for another three years.

The second action of note by the Heatons involved the attempt by Jonathan Heaton's immediate family (by his plural wife Lucy) to claim thousands of acres of fenced reservation land under homestead laws. [301] This effort was unsuccessful because most of the 11 children listed as co-applicants with Jonathan and Lucy were minors on October 17, 1917, and thus did not meet the requirements of bona fide settlers as required under the Homestead Act. The family then petitioned in March 1921 to have these lands withdrawn from the reservation. That petition was denied by the Indian Office on April 6, 1921, and upheld by the Department of the Interior on July 5, 1921. [302]

Even after private claims to lands had been settled, relations between the residents of Moccasin and those charged with protecting the interests of the Kaibab Paiute would be strained for decades to come. Land and water were only two of the issues over which conflict arose. Trespassing and unauthorized use of reservation timber and grass by non-Indians created additional problems. [303] Dr. Farrow continued to be extremely diligent in his efforts to protect the interests of the Kaibab Paiute and to oppose the Heaton family's land claims. He was also vociferous about the removal of their fencing from reservation lands. At the request of Commissioner Charles H. Burke, the Secretary of the Interior asked the Attorney General to take legal action against the unlawful fencing in late November 1922; the Heatons and others finally removed the fences in 1925. Farrow's antagonism toward and intense distrust of the Heaton family would considerably color later interactions with Pipe Spring National Monument's first custodian, C. Leonard Heaton. Farrow's actions as an advocate, as well as his kindly doctoring, would endear him to the local Kaibab Paiute. [304]