State
control. The road was completed to Sheldon without delay, and on the
30th of November, 1878, the Governor of the State certified to the
Secretary of the Interior that the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul
Railway Company had completed its road from Algona to Sheldon in
compliance with the conditions of the original grant and the laws of the
State.

It thus took over twenty years to complete this road. Ten years after
its construction had commenced it had only reached Calmar in Winneshiek
County. In 1869 the road was completed to Clear Lake and in 1870 to
Algona. This point remained its terminus until it passed into the hands
of the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway Company.

The State of Iowa has not derived that benefit from the large land
grants made to its railroads which her people had a right to expect. In
spite of these grants roads were built only when there was reason to
believe that they would be immediately profitable to their owners. The
land grants enriched the promoters of these enterprises much more than
they did the State in whose interest the grants were presumed to be
made. As a rule they enabled scheming men to hold the selected territory
until a railroad through it promised to be a safe and profitable
investment, and to avoid the payment of taxes on their millions of acres
of land, which in the meantime became very valuable. Other roads were
built at an early day without Government aid. They were pushed forward
by the current of immigration until the threatened competition of roads
favored by these grants checked their progress. The Chicago, Iowa and
Nebraska road may be cited as a fair illustration. It was projected on
the 26th of January, 1856, in the town of Clinton, to be built from
Clinton to the Missouri River via Cedar Rapids. It was opened to De Witt
in 1858 and completed to Cedar Rapids the following year. The road was
82-1/2 miles long and was built entirely with private means, receiving
neither legislative aid nor local subsidy. It is more than probable
that this road would at an early day have been completed to the Missouri
River, had it not feared the rivalry of the subsidized Cedar Rapids and
Missouri road.

The total number of acres of land granted by Congress to aid the
construction of Iowa roads is 4,069,942. A fair idea of the value of
these lands may be obtained from the fact that the Chicago, Rock Island
and Pacific Railroad Company sold over half a million acres of it