Cattle drives were a major economic activity in the 19th and early 20th century American West, particularly between 1850s and 1910s. In this period, 27 million cattle were driven from Texas to railheads in Kansas, for shipment to stockyards in St. Louis and points east, and direct to Chicago. The long distances covered, the need for periodic rests by riders and animals, and the establishment of railheads led to the development of "cow towns" across the frontier.
Due to the extensive treatment of cattle drives in fiction and film, the horse has become the worldwide iconic image of the American West, where cattle drives still occur.[1]
Movement of cattle
Cattle drives represented a compromise between the desire to get cattle to market as quickly as possible and the need to maintain the animals at a marketable weight. While cattle could be driven as far as 25 miles (40km) in a single day, they would lose so much weight that they would be hard to sell when they reached the end of the trail. Usually they were taken shorter distances each day, allowed periods to rest and graze both at midday and at night.[2] On average, a herd could maintain a healthy weight moving about 15 miles (24km) per day. Such a pace meant that it would take as long as two months to travel from a home ranch to a railhead. The Chisholm Trail, for example, was 1,000 miles (1,600km) long.[3]
On average, a single herd of cattle on a long drive (for example, Texas to Kansas railheads) numbered about 3,000 head. To herd the cattle, a crew of at least 10 cowboys was needed, with three horses per cowboy. Cowboys worked in shifts to watch the cattle 24 hours a day, herding them in the proper direction in the daytime and watching them at night to prevent stampedes and deter theft. The crew also included a cook, who drove a chuck wagon, usually pulled by oxen, and a horse wrangler to take charge of the remuda (spare horses). The wrangler on a cattle drive was often a very young cowboy or one of lower social status, but the cook was a particularly well-respected member of the crew, as not only was he in charge of the food, he also was in charge of medical supplies and had a working knowledge of practical medicine.[4]
Origins
Cattle herd and cowboy, circa 1902
Long-distance cattle driving was traditional in Mexico, California, and Texas, and horse herds were sometimes similarly driven. The Spaniards had established the ranching industry in the New World and had begun driving herds northward from Mexico beginning in the 1540s. Small Spanish settlements in Texas derived much of their revenue from horses and cattle driven into Louisiana, though such trade was usually illegal. Most cattle driving routes in the United States were shorter. For example, early 19th-century Pennsylvania cattle drovers travelled to Philadelphia on the Conestoga Road and Lancaster Pike, which ended near the present site of 30th Street Station.[5] Relatively long-distance herding of hogs was also common. In 1815 Timothy Flint "encountered a drove of more than 1,000 cattle and swine" being driven from the interior of Ohio to Philadelphia.
The Texas longhorn was originally driven overland to the railheads in Kansas; they were replaced with shorter-horned breeds after 1900.
As early as 1836,[6] ranchers in Texas began to drive cattle along a "Beef Trail" to New Orleans. In the 1840s, cattle drives expanded northward into Missouri. The towns of Sedalia, Baxter Springs, Springfield, and St. Louis became principal markets.[7] The Shawnee Trail, also known as the Texas Road or Texas trail, played a significant role in Texas as early as the 1840s. But by 1853, as 3,000 cattle were trailed through western Missouri, local farmers blocked their passage and forced herds to turn back because the Longhorns carried ticks that carried Texas fever. Texas cattle were immune to this disease; but the ticks that they left behind infected the local cattle. By 1855 farmers in western and central Missouri formed vigilance committees, stopped some of the herds, killed any Texas cattle that entered their counties, and a law, effective in December of that year, was passed, banning diseased cattle from being brought into or through the state. Therefore, drovers took their herds up through the eastern edge of Kansas; but there, too, they met opposition from farmers, who induced their territorial legislature to pass a protective law in 1859.[1]
During the 1850s, emigration and freighting from the Missouri River westward also caused a rise in demand for oxen. In 1858, the firm of Russell, Majors and Waddell utilized about 40,000 oxen. Longhorns were trained by the thousands for work oxen. Herds of longhorns also were driven to Chicago, and at least one herd was driven all the way to New York.[7] The gold boom in California in the 1850s also created a demand for beef and provided people with the cash to pay for it. Thus, though most cattle were obtained from Mexico, very long drives were attempted. Even the Australians began cattle drives to ports for shipment of beef to San Francisco and, after freezing methods were developed, all the way to Britain. In 1853 the Italian aristocrat Leonetto Cipriani[fr] undertook a drive from St. Louis to San Francisco along the California Trail; he returned to Europe in 1855 with large profits.[citation needed]
In 1853-1854, together with his business partner, Washington Malone, Tom Candy Ponting drove the first herd of Texas Longhorn cattle from Texas to New York City, the longest cattle drive in American history.[8]
In the early years of the American Civil War, Texans drove cattle into the Confederate states for the use of the Confederate Army. In October, 1862 a Union naval patrol on the southern Mississippi River captured 1,500 head of Longhorns which had been destined for Confederate military posts in Louisiana. The permanent loss of the main cattle supply after the Union gained control of the Mississippi River in 1863 was a serious blow to the Confederate Army.[9]
The war blocked access to eastern markets. During the Civil War, the Shawnee Trail was virtually unused.[1] Texas cattle numbers grew significantly in that period, and after the war could not be sold for more than $2 a head in Texas.[6][10] By 1866 an estimated 200,000 to 260,000 surplus cattle were available.[1]
In 1865 at the end of the Civil War, Philip Danforth Armour opened a meat packing plant in Chicago known as Armour and Company, and with the expansion of the meat packing industry, the demand for beef increased significantly. By 1866, cattle could be sold to northern markets for as much as $40 per head, making it potentially profitable for cattle, particularly from Texas, to be herded long distances to market.[11]
Cattle drive era
Map of major cattle trails between 1866-1890
The first large-scale effort to drive cattle from Texas to the nearest railhead for shipment to Chicago occurred in 1866, when many Texas ranchers banded together to drive their cattle to the closest point that railroad tracks reached, which at that time was Sedalia, Missouri. However, farmers in eastern Kansas, still concerned that transient animals would trample crops and transmit cattle fever to local cattle, formed groups that threatened to beat or shoot cattlemen found on their lands. Therefore, the 1866 drive failed to reach the railroad and the cattle herds were sold for low prices.[12] There were other drives northward without a definite destination and without much financial success. Cattle were also driven to the old but limited New Orleans market, following mostly well-established trails to the wharves of Shreveport and Jefferson, Texas. In 1868, David Morrill Poor, a former Confederate officer from San Antonio, drove 1,100 cattle from east of San Angelo into Mexico over the Chihuahua Trail. This event, the "Great Chihuahua Cattle Drive," was the largest cattle drive attempted over that trail up to that time, but the market was much better in Kansas than in Mexico, so most drives headed north.[13]
By 1867, a cattle shipping facility owned by Joseph G. McCoy opened in Abilene, Kansas.[14] Built west of farm country and close to the railhead at Abilene, the town became a center of cattle shipping, loading over 36,000 head of cattle in its first year.[15] The route from Texas to Abilene became known as the Chisholm Trail, named for Jesse Chisholm who marked out the route. It ran through present-day Oklahoma, which then was Indian Territory, but there were relatively few conflicts with Native Americans, who usually allowed cattle herds to pass through for a toll of ten cents a head. Later, other trails forked off to different railheads, including those at Dodge City and Wichita, Kansas. By 1877, the largest of the cattle-shipping boom towns, Dodge City, Kansas, shipped out 500,000 head of cattle.[16]
Other major cattle trails, moving successively westward, were established. In 1867 the Goodnight-Loving Trail opened up New Mexico and Colorado to Texas cattle. By the tens of thousands cattle were soon driven into Arizona. In Texas itself cattle raising expanded rapidly as American tastes shifted from pork to beef. Caldwell, Dodge City, Ogallala, Cheyenne, and other towns became famous because of trail-driver patronage.[17]
The Chisholm Trail was the most important route for cattle drives leading north from the vicinity of Ft. Worth, Texas, across Indian Territory (Oklahoma) to the railhead at Abilene. It was about 520 miles long and generally followed the line of the ninety-eighth meridian, but never had an exact location, as different drives took somewhat different paths. With six states enacting laws in the first half of 1867 against trailing cattle north, Texas cattlemen realized the need for a new trail that would skirt the farm settlements and thus avoid the trouble over tick fever. In 1867 a young Illinois livestock dealer, Joseph G. McCoy, built market facilities at Abilene, Kansas, at the terminus of Chisholm Trail. The new route to the west of the Shawnee soon began carrying the bulk of the Texas herds, leaving the earlier trail to dwindle for a few years and expire.[18]
The typical drive comprised 1,500–2,500 head of cattle. The typical outfit consisted of a boss, (perhaps the owner), from ten to fifteen hands, each of whom had a string of from five to ten horses; a horse wrangler who handled the horses; and a cook, who drove the chuck wagon. The wagon carried the bedrolls; tents were considered excess luxury. The men drove and grazed the cattle most of the day, herding them by relays at night. Ten or twelve miles was considered a good day's drive, as the cattle had to thrive on the route. They ate grass; the men had bread, meat, beans with bacon, and coffee. Wages were about $40 a month, paid when the herd were sold.[1]
The Chisholm Trail decreased in importance after 1871 when, as a result of the westward advance of settlement, Abilene lost its preeminence as a shipping point for Texas cattle. Dodge City, Kansas became the chief shipping point for another trail farther west, crossing the Red River at Red River Station, Texas. The extension of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway to Caldwell, Kansas, in 1880, however, again made the Chisholm Trail a most important route for driving Texas cattle to the North, and it retained this position until the building of additional trunk lines of railway south into Texas caused rail shipments to take the place of the former trail driving of Texas cattle north to market.[19]
The most famous cattle towns like Abilene were railheads, where the herds were shipped to the Chicago stockyards. Many smaller towns along the way supported open range lands. Many of the cow towns were enlivened by buffalo hunters, railroad construction gangs, and freighting outfits during their heyday. Cattle owners made these towns headquarters for buying and selling.
Cowboys, after months of monotonous work, dull food, and abstinence of all kinds, were paid off and turned loose. They howled, got shaved and shorn, bought new clothes and gear. They drank "white mule" straight. Madams and gambling hall operators flourished in towns that were wide open twenty-four hours a day. Violence and ebullient spirits called forth a kind of "peace officer" that cattle towns made famous—the town marshal. James Butler Hickok, Wyatt Earp, and Bat Masterson were among the best-known cattle town marshals. The number of killings was, however, small by the standards of eastern cities.[20]
End of the open range
Waiting for a Chinook by C.M. Russell. Overgrazing and harsh winters were factors that brought an end to the age of the open rangeIntroduction of barbed wire fences marked the closure of the open range.
Expansion of the cattle industry resulted in the need for additional open range. Thus many ranchers expanded into the northwest, where there were still large tracts of unsettled grassland. Texas cattle were herded north, into the Rocky Mountains and Dakotas.[21] In 1866, Nelson Story used the Bozeman Trail to successfully drive about 1000 head of Longhorn into the Gallatin Valley of Montana.[22] Individual cattle barons such as Conrad Kohrs built up significant ranches in the northern Rockies. In 1866, Kohrs purchased a ranch near Deer Lodge, Montana[23] from former Canadian fur trader Johnny Grant. At its peak, Kohrs owned 50,000 head of cattle, grazing on 10million acres (4 million hectares) spread across four states and two Canadian Provinces, and shipped 10,000 head annually to the Union Stock Yards in Chicago.
Later, however, continued overgrazing, combined with drought and the exceptionally severe winter of 1886–1887 wiped out much of the open range cattle business in Montana and the upper Great Plains. Following these events, ranchers began to use barbed wire to enclose their ranches and protect their own grazing lands from intrusions by others' animals.
In the 1890s, herds were still occasionally driven from the Panhandle of Texas to Montana. However, railroads had expanded to cover most of the nation, and meat packing plants were built closer to major ranching areas, making long cattle drives to the railheads unnecessary.[24]
Modern cattle drives
Modern day cattle drive, 1987
Smaller cattle drives continued at least into the 1940s, as ranchers, prior to the development of the modern cattle truck, still needed to herd cattle to local railheads for transport to stockyards and packing plants. Today, cattle drives are primarily used to round up cattle within the boundaries of a ranch and to move them from one pasture to another, a process that generally lasts at most a few days. Because of the significance of the cattle drive in American history, some working ranches have turned their seasonal drives into tourist events, inviting guests in a manner akin to a guest ranch to participate in moving the cattle from one feeding ground to the next. While horses are still used in many places, particularly where there is rough or mountainous terrain, the all-terrain vehicle is also used. When cattle are required to move longer distances, they are shipped via truck.
Events intended to promote the western lifestyle may incorporate cattle drives. For example, the Great Montana Centennial Cattle Drive of 1989 celebrated the state of Montana's centennial and raised money for a college scholarship fund as 2,400 people (including some working cowboys), 200 wagons and 2,800 cattle traveled 50 miles in six days from Roundup to Billings along a major highway.[26] Similar drives have been sponsored since that time.
Cowboy culture
Theodore Roosevelt (shown on horseback,1898) helped popularize the image of the American cowboy through his writings.
The cowboy's distinctive working gear, most of it derived from the Mexican vaquero, captured the public image. High-crowned cowboy hat, high-heeled boots, leather chaps, pistol, rifle, lariat, and spurs were functional and necessary in the field, and fascinating on the movie screen. Increasingly the public identified the cowboy with courage and devotion to duty, for he tended cattle wherever he had to go, whether in bogs of quicksand; swift, flooding rivers; or seemingly inaccessible brush. He rode with lightning and blizzard, ate hot summer sand, and was burned by the sun. Theodore Roosevelt conceptualized the herder as a stage of civilization distinct from the sedentary farmer—a classic theme well expressed in the 1944 Broadway hit "Oklahoma!"—Roosevelt argued that the manhood typified by the cowboy—and outdoor activity and sports generally—was essential if American men were to avoid the softness and rot produced by an easy life in the city. The cow towns along the trail were notorious for providing liquor to the cowboys; they usually were not allowed to drink on the trail itself.[27]
Image and memory
During three decades it had moved over ten million cattle and one million range horses, stamped the entire West with its character, given economic and personality prestige to Texas, made the longhorn historic, glorified the cowboy over the globe, and endowed America with its most romantic tradition relating to any occupation.
The best known writers of the era include Theodore Roosevelt, who spent much of his inheritance ranching in the Dakotas in the 1880s, Will Rogers, the leading humorist of the 1920s, and Indiana-born Andy Adams (1859–1935), who spent the 1880s and 1890s in the cattle industry and mining in the Great Plains and Southwest. When an 1898 play's portrayal of Texans outraged Adams, he started writing plays, short stories, and novels drawn from his own experiences. His The Log of a Cowboy (1903) became a classic novel about the cattle business, especially the cattle drive. It described a fictional drive of the Circle Dot herd from Texas to Montana in 1882, and became a leading source on cowboy life; historians retraced his path in the 1960s, confirming his basic accuracy. His writing is acclaimed and criticized for both its fidelity to truth and lack of literary qualities.[28]
Cattle drives on television and film
Cattle drives were a major plot element of many Hollywood films and television shows, particularly during the era when westerns were popular. One of the most famous movies is Red River (1948) directed by Howard Hawks, and starring John Wayne and Montgomery Clift. Like many such films, Red River tended to exaggerate the dangers and disasters of cattle driving. More recently, the movie City Slickers (1990) was about a guest ranch-based cattle drive. In the 1958 film Cowboy, Glenn Ford stars as a hard-living trail boss with Jack Lemmon as a citified "tenderfoot" who joins the drive.
The long running TV show Rawhide (1959–1965), starring Eric Fleming and Clint Eastwood, dealt with drovers taking 3000 head along the Sedalia trail from San Antonio, Texas to the railhead at Sedalia. Episode four of the 1970s miniseries Centennial, titled The Longhorns, featured a cattle drive from central Texas to northeastern Colorado. The 1980s miniseries Lonesome Dove, based on a Pulitzer Prize winning novel of the same name, centered on a cattle drive from South Texas to Montana.
The Texas Longhorn is an American breed of beef cattle, characterized by its long horns, which can span more than 8 ft (2.4 m) from tip to tip. It derives from cattle brought from the Iberian Peninsula to the Americas by Spanish conquistadores from the time of the Second Voyage of Christopher Columbus until about 1512. For hundreds of years the cattle lived a semi-feral existence on the rangelands; they have a higher tolerance of heat and drought than most European breeds. It can be of any color or mix of colors. In some 40% of the cattle it is some shade of red, often a light red; the only shade of red not seen is the deep color typical of the Hereford.
Montague County is a county located in the U.S. state of Texas, established in 1857. As of the 2020 census, its population was 19,965. The county seat is Montague. The county was created in 1857 and organized the next year. It is named for Daniel Montague, a surveyor and soldier in the Mexican–American War.
A cowboy is an animal herder who tends cattle on ranches in North America, traditionally on horseback, and often performs a multitude of other ranch-related tasks. Cattle drives ensure the herds health in finding pasture and bring them to market. The historic American cowboy of the late 19th century arose from the vaquero traditions of northern Mexico and became a figure of special significance and legend. A subtype, called a wrangler, specifically tends the horses used to work cattle. In addition to ranch work, some cowboys work for or participate in rodeos. Cowgirls, first defined as such in the late 19th century, had a less-well documented historical role, but in the modern world work at identical tasks and have obtained considerable respect for their achievements. Cattle handlers in many other parts of the world, particularly South America and stockmen and jackaroos in Australia, perform work similar to the cowboy.
Charles Goodnight, also known as Charlie Goodnight, was a rancher in the American West. In 1955, he was inducted into the Hall of Great Westerners of the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum.
King Ranch is the largest ranch in the United States. At some 825,000 acres it is larger than both the land area of Rhode Island and the area of the European country Luxembourg. It is mainly a cattle ranch, but also produced the racehorse Assault, who won the Triple Crown in 1946.
The Chisholm Trail was a trail used in the post-Civil War era to drive cattle overland from ranches in Texas to Kansas railheads. The trail was established by Black Beaver, a Lenape guide and rancher, and his friend Jesse Chisholm, a Cherokee merchant. They collected and drove numerous cattle along the trail to Kansas, where they could be shipped east to achieve higher prices. The southern terminus was Red River Station, a trading post near the Red River along the northern border of Texas. The northern terminus was a trading post near Kansas City, Kansas. Chisholm owned both of these posts. In the years of the cattle drives, cowboys drove large herds from ranches across Texas to the Red River Station and then north to Kansas City.
The Texas Road, also known as the Shawnee Trail, Sedalia Trail, or Kansas Trail, was a major trade and emigrant route to Texas across Indian Territory. Established during the Mexican War by emigrants rushing to Texas, it remained an important route across Indian Territory until Oklahoma statehood. The Shawnee Trail was the earliest and easternmost route by which Texas Longhorn cattle were taken to the north. It played a significant role in the history of Texas, Oklahoma, Missouri, and Kansas in the early and mid-1800s.
Joseph "Cowboy" McCoy was a 19th-century entrepreneur known for promoting the transport of Longhorn cattle from Texas to the eastern United States.
The Abilene Trail was a cattle trail leading from Texas to Abilene, Kansas. Its exact route is disputed owing to its many offshoots, but it crossed the Red River just east of Henrietta, Texas, and continued north across the Indian Territory to Caldwell, Kansas and on past Wichita and Newton to Abilene. The first herds were probably driven over it in 1866, though it was not named until Abilene was established in 1867.
The Great Western Cattle Trail is the name used today for a cattle trail established during the late 19th century for moving beef stock and horses to markets in eastern and northern states. It is also known as the Western Trail, Fort Griffin Trail, Dodge City Trail, Northern Trail and Texas Trail. It ran west of and roughly parallel to the better known Chisholm Trail into Kansas, reaching an additional major railhead there for shipping beef to Chicago, or longhorns and horses continuing on further north by trail to stock open-range ranches in the Dakotas, Wyoming, Montana, and two provinces in Canada. A full-length drive from the trailhead south of Bandera, Texas took almost one hundred days to reach its destination in Kansas.
A cattle drive is the process of moving a herd of cattle from one place to another, usually moved and herded by cowboys on horses.
A remuda is a horse herd from which ranch-hands select their mounts. The word is of Spanish derivation, meaning 'remount', i.e.: "change of horses", and is in common use in the American West.
The Goodnight–Loving Trail was a trail used in the cattle drives of the late 1860s for the large-scale movement of Texas Longhorns. It is named after cattlemen Charles Goodnight and Oliver Loving.
Nelson Story Sr. was a pioneer Montana entrepreneur, cattle rancher, miner and vigilante, who was a notable resident of Bozeman, Montana. He was best known for his 1866 cattle drive from Texas with approximately 1000 head of Texas Longhorns to Montana along the Bozeman Trail—the first major cattle drive from Texas into Montana. His business ventures in Bozeman were so successful that he became the town's first millionaire. In 1893, he played a prominent role in the establishment of the Agricultural College of the State of Montana by donating land and facilities. He built the first Story Mansion on Main Street in Bozeman in 1880 and later built today's Story Mansion at the corner of Willson and College for his son, T. Byron Story in 1910. In his later years, he became a prominent real estate developer in Los Angeles, California.
Black Beaver or Se-ket-tu-may-qua was a trapper and interpreter who worked for the American Fur Company. He served as a scout and guide as he was fluent in English, as well as several European and Native American languages. He is credited with establishing the California and Chisholm trails.
In the Western United States and Canada, open range is rangeland where cattle roam freely regardless of land ownership. Where there are "open range" laws, those wanting to keep animals off their property must erect a fence to keep animals out; this applies to public roads as well. Land in open range that is designated as part of a "herd district" reverses liabilities, requiring an animal's owner to fence it in or otherwise keep it on the person's own property. Most eastern states and jurisdictions in Canada require owners to fence in or herd their livestock.
A cattle town was a frontier settlement in the Midwestern United States that catered to the cattle industry. The economies of these communities were heavily dependent on the seasonal cattle drives from Texas, which brought the cowboys and the cattle that these towns relied upon. Cattle towns were found at the junctions of railroads and livestock trails. These towns were the destination of the cattle drives, the place where the cattle would be bought and shipped off to urban meatpackers, midwestern cattle feeders, or to ranchers on the central or northern plains. Cattle towns were made famous by popular accounts of rowdy cowboys and outlaws who were kept under control by local lawmen, but those depictions were mostly exaggeration and myth.
William B. Slaughter was an American rancher, cattle driver, banker and county judge. Born into a ranching family, he drove cattle and ranched in New Mexico before acquired a ranch in Sherman County, Texas. He founded local banks in Texas and New Mexico, and he was tried but acquitted on suspicion of faulty loans. He retired in San Antonio, Texas.
The Texas Trail, better known as the Texas Road but also known as the Shawnee Trail, Sedalia Trail or the Kansas Trail, was a historic cattle trail which was used to drive cattle from Texas to the railhead for the Union Pacific Railway in Kansas, then by rail to Ogallala, Nebraska and other locations on the in Nebraska. This emerged as an alternative to the Chisholm Trail which had brought cattle to Abilene, Kansas and other locations on the Kansas Pacific Railroad, and Dodge City on the Atchison & Topeka Railway.
George Washington West (1851–1926) was a Texas rancher. He was one of the first cattlemen to drive longhorns to the Kansas railhead. He was reported to have commanded one of the longest recorded cattle drives, which started at Lavaca County and ended at the Canadian border. He founded the towns of George West, Texas, and Kittie, Texas. both in Live Oak County.
References
1 2 3 4 5 Skaggs, Jimmy M. The Cattle-Trailing Industry: Between Supply and Demand, 1876–1890 (University Press of Kansas, 1973)[pageneeded]
↑ Kennedy, Michael S. (1964). "Tall in the Saddle-First Trail Drive to Montana Territory". Cowboys and Cattlemen-A Roundup from Montana The Magazine of Western History. New York: Hastings House Publishing. pp.103–111.
Malone, John William. An Album of the American Cowboy. New York: Franklin Watts, Inc., 1971. ISBN9780531015124
Further reading
Allmendinger, Blake. The Cowboy: Representations of Labor in an American Work Culture. (1992). 213 pp.
Alonzo, Armando C. Tejano Legacy: Rancheros and Settlers in South Texas, 1734–1900 (1998)Archived 2012-06-27 at the Wayback Machine
Atherton, Lewis E. The Cattle Kings (1961), influential interpretive study
Carlson, Paul Howard, ed. The Cowboy Way: An Exploration of History and Culture (2000) excerpt and text search
Cattle Raisers Association of Texas. History of the cattlemen of Texas: a brief resume of the live stock industry of the Southwest and a biographical sketch of many of the important characters whose lives are interwoven therein (1914, reprint 1991). 350 pp. online
Clayton, Lawrence; Hoy, Jim; and Underwood, Jerald. Vaqueros, Cowboys, and Buckaroos. (2001) 274 pp.
Corkin, Stanley. "Cowboys and Free Markets: Post-World War II Westerns and U.S. Hegemony," Cinema Journal, Vol. 39, No. 3 (Spring, 2000), pp.66–91, focus on Howard Hawks's "Red River" (a cattle drive) and John Ford's "My Darling Clementine" (on Tombstone); in JSTOR
Corkin, Stanley. Cowboys as Cold Warriors: The Western and U.S. History. (2004). 273 pp.
Dale E. E. The Range Cattle Industry (1930)
Dary, David. Cowboy Culture: A Saga of Five Centuries. (1981). 336 pp. excerpt and text search
Dippie, Brian W., ed. Charlie Russell Roundup: Essays on America's Favorite Cowboy Artist. (1999). 328 pp.
Draper, Robert. "21st -Century Cowboys: Why the Spirit Endures." National Geographic, December 2007, pp.114–135
Dykstra, Robert R., and Jo Ann Manfra. "The Circle Dot Cowboys at Dodge City: History and Imagination in Andy Adams's The Log of a Cowboy," Western Historical Quarterly 33 (2002): 19–40,
Evans, Simon; Carter, Sarah; and Yeo, Bill, eds. Cowboys, Ranchers, and the Cattle Business: Cross-Border Perspectives on Ranching History. (2000). 232 pp.
Frantz, Joe B., and Julian E. Choate. The American Cowboy, The Myth and the Reality ( 1955)
Gard, Wayne. The Chisholm Trail (1969), the standard scholarly history;online
Hawks, Howard, director. Red River (1948), influential Hollywood film starring John Wayne and Montgomery Clift
Iverson, Peter. When Indians Became Cowboys: Native Peoples and Cattle Ranching in the American West (1997) excerpt and text search
Jordan, Terry. North American Cattle-Ranching Frontiers: Origins, Diffusion, and Differentiation (1993) online editionArchived 2011-04-27 at the Wayback Machine
Jordan, Terry. Trails to Texas: Southern Roots of Western Cattle Ranching (1981)
Keese, G. Pomeroy. "Beef," Harper's new monthly magazine. July 1884 vol. 69, Issue 410 pp.292–302 online, strong on economic themes
Lanning, Jim and Lanning, Judy, eds. Texas Cowboys: Memories of the Early Days. (1984). 233 pp.
Logsdon, Guy, ed. "The Whorehouse Bells Were Ringing" and Other Songs Cowboys Sing. (1989). 388 pp.
McCoy, Joseph G. Historic Sketches of the Cattle Trade of the West and Southwest (1874, reprint 1940). McCoy opened the first railhead to large shipments of Texas cattle in 1867.
Saunders, George W. et al. The Trail Drivers of Texas, ed. by J. Marvin Hunter (1925, reprint 1985), by far the most valuable source for individual experiences on the long drives. excerpts and text search[permanent dead link]
Savage, William W., Jr. The Cowboy Hero: His Image in American History and Culture. (1979). 179 pp.
Skaggs, Jimmy. The Cattle Trailing Industry: Between Supply and Demand, 1866–1890 (1973), pathbreaking economic study
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