The area around Walker Lake in the Utah Territory was set aside for Indian purposes in 1859, but the Walker River Indian Reservation was not formally established until President Grant signed the executive order on March 19, 1874. On August 31, 1874, Indian Agent Calvin Bateman reported that the reservation was home to at least six hundred Pah-utes who were absent only temporarily if away at all, and he said the government had promised them an abiding place whose permanence justice and honor required to remain inviolate. In 1974, over 500 tribal members lived on the reservation, whose total land area, including the northern end of Walker Lake, exceeded 300,000 acres, as it had in 1874.