What is Quarter Section?

A Typical Quarter Section Homestead Farm was 145 Football Fields and a Typical Township had approximately 100 Farms

A township, at least in most of the "flat" plains states, was surveyed out to be a square six miles on either side. This township was then broken into 36 squares, like on a checkerboard, each a mile square. This is what is called a section. A section has 640 acres. In the Kansas area, and may have been somewhat different for other areas and times of settlement, an immigrant applied to homestead a quarter section, or piece of ground 1/2 mile by 1/2 mile square (160 acres). Homesteaders in Kansas also got another 80 acres (an eighth of a section), if they promised to plant 80 acres of the total 240 in trees.

So, in a township, there would "ideally" be from 144 farmers at 160 acres to a farm, or 96 farmers at 240 acres per farm, to each farm to start out with. The township was the political and social unit around which life revolved in those days. These 100 or so farmers would elect their township boards to determine policies on the school for the township, roads, bridges and these kinds of things. Townships were of more consequence in the early days than they are now, where most decisions of this kind are made at the county level today.

A football field is 1.1 acres. So, a 160 acre quarter section was roughly 145 football fields. Now, just imagine you and your two fine work horses are going to plow that tomorrow morning! (And what do you do when one is sick?)

Numbering System - Sections are numbered from 1 to 36, starting in the NorthEast corner and snaking down. So, you go from 1 to 6 on the first row, from East to West, then 7 to 12 on the second row from West to East, and so on. All other gradations after that are labeled by the corner of a unit. So, a 20 acre piece could be labeled the northern 20 acres of a 40 acre parcel, which is the NorthEast 40 acres of the SouthEast Quarter section of Section 12 in the Glover Township in Geary County. Now, you know where it is and you can go right to it, on a map or on the ground!

The Parallel - In Kansas, being flat, most roads developed along section lines, or one every mile. So, a typical township would have 72 miles of roads criss-crossing through it, plus boundary roads of 24 miles (4 sides x 6 miles) all around the township shared by the neighboring townships. Every once in awhile, the surveyors needed a "hiccup" to account for the situation that not all degrees of latitude maintain the same distance as the surveyor moves north. This hiccup was established by laying out a line, which typically was a road and dividing line, called the Parallel, to get the surveyors back on target. The Taylor's, Millirons, and Johnston's, at one time or another, lived near, or on "the Parallel"in Cloud Co, Kansas, as it was known in the area. (i.e. this special road had a name all of its own). The farmer's who owned land that came up against this parallel might be short or over their normal "quarter section "size.

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Related Links

For a graphical display of this, see Graphical Display of the Federal Township and Range System

For a good web page that will help to explain about the use of land records in genealogy, visit the Land Notes. The author's primary focus is Wisconsin, but has good general knowledge here. Also, see this webmaster's links to world wide web sites about land. Don't be misled by the title about Wisconsin, many of the links mentioned are significant to all parts of the country.

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