and I had to give it up as a bad job. It was then that I felt that I was undergoing my first experience of being shut out of the State Land Office entirely, so far as any further dealing in State indemnity basis was concerned. The combination of Governor, State Land Agent and "King Pin" Odell was too much for me, and I was obliged to submit to the inevitable.
Odell and the State Land Agent continued to do a flourishing business in the matter of making selections based upon alleged mineral land, and secured the issuance of certificates of purchase to something like 70,000 acres of this character, besides about 20,000 acres that were selected upon other base.
In due course of time, every acre thus selected by them was rejected by the Commissioner of the General Land Office, but in the meantime the firm of Odell & Geer had received pay for the basis, which was the main point with them. In each instance the State was given 90 days in which to file an amended list, and Odell would take advantage of this by rigging up some sort of an appeal that answered the purpose of delaying further proceedings, and preventing the actual cancellation of the selections. The purchaser, or holder of certificate, to the suspended selection was kept in entire ignorance of the situation, and was permitted to know nothing about the sword that was hanging over his title, unless, perchance, he found it out through the local United States Land Office. This condition of things did not deter the pair from keeping right along with their bunco game, however, and as M. L. Chamberlain, Chief Clerk of the Land Office
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