After years of raids—led by the leaders of the
Boomers activist movement such as
David L. Payne—into the central area of what would become the U.S. state of
Oklahoma, Congress finally agreed to open what was dubbed the
Unassigned Lands. Seven land runs in all took place in Oklahoma, beginning with the initial and most famous
Land Rush of April 22, 1889, which gave rise to the terms "Eighty-Niner" (a veteran of that run) and "
Sooner." That area led to today's
Canadian,
Cleveland,
Kingfisher,
Logan,
Oklahoma, and
Payne counties of Oklahoma. On the following day, a land run was held to settle
Tecumseh, the pre-designated location of the
county seat of County B, later renamed as
Pottawatomie County. On September 28, 1891, another land run was held to settle
Chandler, the pre-designated location of the county seat of County A, later renamed as
Lincoln County. The
Land Run of April 19, 1892, opened the
Cheyenne and
Arapaho lands. The
Land Run of September 16, 1893, was known as the
Cherokee Strip Land Run. It opened 8,144,682.91 acres (12,726 square miles or about 3.3 million hectares) to settlement. The land was purchased from the
Cherokees. It was the largest land run in U.S. history, four times larger than the
Land Rush of 1889. The
Cherokee Strip Regional Heritage Center museum at the eastern edge of
Enid, Oklahoma commemorates this event. The final land run in Oklahoma was the
Land Run of 1895 to settle the
Kickapoo lands. Each run had exhibited many problems and the Federal Government deemed the run to be an inefficient way to distribute land to would-be settlers. After 1895, the government distributed land by sealed-bid auctions. Major openings by this method included Kiowa-Comanche-Apache Reservation (1901), the Wichita-Caddo Reservation (1901), and the Big Pasture (1906). There was one land run in the 20th century, but on a much smaller scale, held to select lots in the community of
Arcadia, on August 6, 1901. This was similar to the run to settle Chandler in 1891. ==Legacy==