![]() In 1867 the Goodnight –Loving Trail opened markets for Texas cattle in Colorado and New Mexico. Drives were cost –effective too -a drive of two thousand or more cattle usually required only a trail boss and a dozen cowhands. Typically rivers and Indian lands had to be crossed, but good grazing, relatively level terrain, and higher prices waiting at the destination made the hazards worthwhile. More a corridor than a trail, the route was as much as 50 miles wide in some stretches. The trail was established in 1865 by Jesse Chisholm and ran 600 miles from San Antonio, Texas, to Abilene, Kansas. ![]() The famous Chisholm Trail became a major route. Soon others saw the wild Texas herds as a ready means to tap into the lucrative northern market with little start –up capital. McCoy established a cattle market in Abilene, Kansas in 1867, and Responding to the demand for beef, James G. In addition, a ready workforce was already in place: the de-commissioned horsemen of the Confederate cavalry plus freed ex-slaves and Mexican gauchos combined to provide a ready supply of skilled horsemen. Cattle worth four dollars a head in Texas might be sold at 40 dollars a head in Missouri or Kansas. A national preference for pork abruptly gave way to beef. Fortunately for the cattlemen, the close of the Civil War also marked a major transition in U.S. Drives toward the north began again in 1866, but with little financial gain. With the outbreak of the American Civil War (1861 –1865), the focus of Texas cattle drives shifted dramatically to feed Confederate troops in the South.Īfter the Civil War the market for Texas cattle vanished and ranchers were left holding several million head. They even extended to California to feed the gold miners following the Gold Rush of 1849. In the 1840s, most drives continued to originate in Texas, bringing beef northward to various Missouri market points. Further west, some herds were even driven from California to Oregon in the 1830s. Drives took place from Texas to the port at New Orleans. ![]() It was not until the 1830s, however, that cattle driving became a steady occupation. Cattle were driven several hundred miles from Tennessee to Virginia in the 1790s. Having little commercial value, cattle were left to roam freely in the open range, and by the early 1800s hundreds of thousands of wild longhorns populated the region.Ĭattle drives were also known in the newly established United States. By 1690 cattle were brought as far north as Texas. The cattle culture of the early American Southwest borrowed heavily from the South American and Central American cowboys, who were called "gauchos." These gauchos developed the chaps, spurs, saddles, and the techniques of horsemanship and cattle handling associated with the cowboy. As early as 1540, Spaniards established a cattle industry and began driving herds northward from central Mexico, as they looked for good pasturage. The practice was introduced to North America early during European colonization. Cattle drives moved large herds of livestock to market, to shipping points, or to find fresh pasturage.
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