homestead

A small unit of public land in the USA that was freed for dwelling and cultivation by the 1862 Homestead Act and subsequent legislation. This act stipulated that, as long as the land was cultivated for five years and a home built on it, it would then belong to the homesteader. The homestead system attracted some 1 million claimants, mostly after 1900, and was responsible for opening up large areas of the Midwest to settlement.

The Homestead Act enabled a homesteader – the adult head of family – to occupy 65 hectares/160 acres (a ‘quarter section’) of land and farm it, in return for a nominal fee. The act had originally been thought likely to draw pioneers from overcrowded cities on the eastern seaboard; it appeared to realize Thomas Jefferson's Utopian vision of an ‘agrarian democracy’ of generations of free Americans tilling the land. In the event, most homesteaders were newly emigrated Europeans attracted by publicity. For many it was a genuine opportunity to work on the land and own their own plot. However, others abused the provision that the homestead could be bought outright after six months – for $3.09 per hectare, or $1.25 per acre – and passed their property on to speculators for quick profit. In 1909 the Enlarged Homestead Act opened 130-hectare/320-acre tracts in semi-arid areas to homesteading, and under the 1916 Stock Raising Homestead Act, a full 260 hectares/640 acres could be claimed in marginal areas for ranching. In Canada the Dominion Lands Act of 1872 was modelled on the US legislation. Both governments, responding to economic change and to perceived abuses of the system, began by World War I to restrict homestead access, turning instead to forms of leasing and (in Canada) to provincial, rather than federal, control of lands. Since the 1970s, US laws have encouraged ‘urban homesteading’ by making older existing city housing stock available, at nominal prices, to those who agree to occupy and repair it.

Homestead

City in Dade County, southeastern Florida, 45 km/28 mi southwest of Miami; population (2000) 31,900. It lies in Florida's fertile Redlands district, well-known for its many fruits and vegetables (notably citrus and avocados), and is a shipping centre for these products. It also manufactures rocket fuel and pharmaceuticals.

Homestead is the site of several tropical gardens, and is a gateway to Everglades National Park and the Florida Keys. The city is a service centre for Homestead Air Force Base, which was established in 1942, 6 km/4 mi east of the city. Both the city and the military base, which was due for closure in the late 1990s, suffered catastrophic damage from Hurricane Andrew in August 1992.

Homestead

Borough in Allegheny County, southwestern Pennsylvania; population (1990) 4,200. Homestead is an industrial suburb on the Monongahela River 10 km/6 mi southeast of Pittsburgh. Bessemer Steel built blast furnaces and a mill here in 1881, creating a company town at the heart of a regional steelmaking complex.

The columns and beams used for the construction of the Empire State Building in New York in 1930–31 were made at the Homestead steel plant. The site occupied by the steelworks is now part of neighbouring Munhall.