Section, Range and Township – Research in Public Land Records – Kimberly Powell

Land Resources

This section provides information for researching properties owned by your ancestors.

Resource	Description
Section, Range and Township – Research in Public Land Records – Kimberly Powell	Public land in the United States is land that was originally transferred directly from the federal government to individuals, to be distinguished from land that was originally granted or sold to individuals by the British Crown.
Bureau of Land Management – General Land Office Records (GLO)	Bureau of Land Management General Land Office Records provides live access to Federal land conveyance records for the Public Land States, including image access to more than five million Federal land title records issued between 1788 and the present. It has images of survey plats and field notes, land status records, and control document index records. Due to organization of documents in the GLO collection, this site does not currently contain every Federal title record issued for the Public Land States.
Bureau of Land Management – General Land Office Records (GLO) Glossary of land-related terms	Glossary of land-related terms at the GLO
Land and Probate: Terms & Definition	Land and Probate: Terms & Definitions is a downloadable PDF guide that defines many of the archaic terms used in land and probate research.
The Animated Map of the Growth of a Nation	The Animated Map of the Growth of a Nation shows how the original thirteen colonies grew into the 50 United States we know today.
Understanding Location Data	Claims handled by the Bureau of Land Management are not mapped by latitude and longitude, as many maps now use. Instead, many of these claims harken back to an older form of surveying called the Public Land Survey System (PLSS).
Discover Land Patents with The Land Patents	The Land Patents provides data on the locations and status of land patents on public land. The Bureau of Land Management (BLM), along with a wide range patent types, grants individuals and companies homesteading, mining, ranching, logging, and more rights on public land. The Land Patents is a source to see where these land patents are and have been.