After the Revolutionary War, the federal government was faced with a huge financial debt. Congress turned to the sell of the public lands to reduce this debt and to produce an operating income for future years. Before these western lands could be sold, the federal government had to extinguish the Indian Titles, have the land surveyed and determine which lands were legally in private hands. All of this paperwork generated is an important source for tracking frontier families. These books are a necessity for researching these records before 1819, as the Bureau of Land Management does not have these records on their web site.