Among the other important land grants is that made to the McGregor Western Railroad Company. This company was the successor of the McGregor, St. Peters and Missouri River Railroad Company, which was organized in 1857 for the purpose of constructing a railroad from McGregor to the Missouri River. The construction of the road was commenced in 1857 at McGregor. Large local subscriptions were taken along the proposed line, the writer being one of the subscribers. Work was continued the next year until much of the heavy grading had been done, when the road was allowed to go through the process of foreclosure, like many other roads built in the West at that time. The old stock was completely wiped out, and new owners came into possession of the property, reorganizing under the name of the McGregor Western Railway Company. Nearly all the early investments of Iowa people were thus confiscated by the same class of men who now cry out loudly against confiscatory measures. By an act of Congress approved May 12, 1864, the State of Iowa was granted, for the use and benefit of the McGregor Western Railroad Company, every alternate section of land designated by odd numbers for ten sections in width on each side of the proposed road. The act contained the condition that in the event of the failure of said McGregor Western Railroad Company to build twenty miles of said road during each and every year from the date of its acceptance of the grant the State might resume the grant and so dispose of it as to secure the completion of the road in question. The McGregor Western Railroad Company failing to comply with the conditions of the grant, the General Assembly on the 27th day of February, 1868, resumed the lands and on the 31st day of March of the same year regranted them to the McGregor and Sioux City Railway Company. The act specially provided that the company accepting the grant "shall at all times be subject to such rules, regulations and rates of tariff for the transportation of freight and passengers as may from time to time be enacted and provided for by the General Assembly of the State of Iowa, and further subject to the conditions, limitations, restrictions and provisions contained in this act and in the acts of Congress granting said lands to the State of Iowa." It also contained the condition that at least twenty miles of road should be built by the company every year and that the whole road should be completed to the intersection of the then proposed railway from Sioux City to the Minnesota State line by the first day of December, 1875. The McGregor and Sioux City Railway Company also failing to comply with the terms of the grant, the lands were again resumed by the General Assembly on March 15th, 1876, and regranted to the McGregor and Missouri River Railroad Company upon the condition that it complete the road to the intersection of the Sioux City and St. Paul Railroad on or before the first day of December, 1877.