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Lyon was originally named Fort Wise. However, during <br />the Civil War it was considered unpatriotic for the United <br />States to have a fort named after a southern governor <br />(Henry Wise of Virginia). Nathaniel Lyon was the first <br />Union general to lose his life in the Civil War (at Wilson's <br />Creek -near current day Springfield, Missouri, in 1861). <br />Thus, in the renaming of this fort on the Arkansas River, <br />he was honored by having the edifice in southeastern <br />Colorado that still stands, and a canal vital to the local <br />economy named after him. <br />The Arkansas River originates near Leadville, Colo- <br />rado. As it meanders in a southeasterly direction, its <br />waters are eventually joined with those of the mighty <br />Mississippi River. The adjoining lands are fertile due to <br />the passage of time and the depositing of top soil which <br />was later spread over the adjacent land by floods and <br />other high water activity. In many of the years when the <br />state had territorial status, that part of southeastern <br />Colorado encompassing the Arkansas Valley was basi- <br />cally Bent County, with the county seat at Las Animas. <br />Originally Bent County reached from west of Fowler to <br />the Kansas line until 1889 when Otero and Prowers <br />Counties were carved out of Bent County. Much of this <br />land was part of the early land grants made by the Span- <br />iards and early Mexicans (especially the Vigil and St. <br />Vrain Grants) to early settlers in what is now Colorado <br />in order to accelerate colonization. Land given away <br />under these land grants even exceeded the amount later <br />given away by the United States under the Homestead <br />Act. <br />Cattle, including longhorns brought in from Texas, <br />were an integral part of the economy. Still, the merits of <br />2 <br />