By an act of the Massachusetts Legislature approved April 1, 1788, it was provided that "this Commonwealth doth hereby agree, to grant, sell & convey to Oliver Phelps and Nathaniel Gorham, for a purchase price of $1,000,000, payable in three equal annual installments all the Right, Title & Demand, which the said Commonwealth has in & to the said 'Western Territory' ceded to it by the Treaty of Hartford." But first Phelps and Gorham had to go up against competing companies and persuade the Iroquois to give up their title to the land.