cattle industry, early US

In US history, the cattle industry that developed on the Great Plains after the end of the American Civil War (1861-65); the industry boomed rapidly until its sudden demise in the late 1880s. It started in 1866 with the long cattle drives undertaken by cowboys across the Plains from Texas to shipping points on the Transcontinental Railroad, and culminated in the open range system, where stock ranged over vast unfenced grazing grounds belonging to wealthy ranchers, or cattle barons. However, the industry's popularity contributed to its downfall as competition, over-supply, and over-grazing led to falling prices, and left the barons unable to withstand the decimation of their herds during the severe winter of 1886-87. After 1887 cattle ranching continued on the Great Plains, but on a smaller scale, with less cattle and fewer ranchers.

The rise and fall of the industry was linked to a number of factors in the history of the American West, including the Transcontinental Railroad, the Indian reservation system, the settlement of the homesteaders, and the work of enterprising individuals. Its growth was one of the reasons that the USA was able to take control of the region from the Plains Indians.

Development of the cattle drive The cattle industry of the Plains had its roots in the southern state of Texas. Texas Longhorn cattle were descended from the cattle introduced by the Spanish settlers of the 17th and 18th century. Although large areas were given over to cattle ranching, the industry was only partially developed to trade with the growing cities of the eastern USA before the American Civil War.

During the Civil War, the cattle were left to roam freely around Texas, and their numbers increased dramatically. When the cattle industry pioneer Charles Goodnight left his ranch in 1861 it had just a few hundred cattle. By 1866 these had multiplied to over 8,000. Goodnight now had a large herd of potentially valuable cattle and he needed somewhere to sell them. He went into partnership with rancher Oliver Loving, and the two cattlemen spotted an opportunity to make money from the US Army, the Plains Indians, and the reservation system. They drove their cattle from Texas northwards through New Mexico and on to Colorado Territory. Here they stopped near the town of Cheyenne and sold their herd of Longhorns to the US Army to feed both the soldiers and the Navajos on the Bosque Rodeo Indian Reservation. The two ranchers made huge profits and news of their success soon spread among the cattlemen of Texas. Goodnight and Loving had demonstrated that it was possible to make large amounts of money by selling Texas-raised cattle to the rest of the USA and the era of the cattle drive began. The next two years saw the first explosion in the cattle industry.

Establishment of the cow towns A Chicago meat dealer, Joseph McCoy, realized that the Texan cattlemen faced major problems reaching their market. It was impossible to drive cattle to the cities in the East because they would have to travel through highly populated areas. Texan Longhorns carried Texas Fever, a disease that killed other cattle; they required large amounts of grazing and water; and they threatened to trample farmers' crops. McCoy's solution was to use the railroad to ship the beef to the cities. He found a town named Abilene in Kansas, situated on the newly-built Kansas-Pacific Railroad, bought up the town, and turned it into the centre of the cattle industry. Cattlemen could use cowboys to drive their cattle north to Abilene through unpopulated areas and then sell them to the buyers at Abilene who would ship the beef to the East where demand was growing, fuelled by the Industrial Revolution. By 1871 over 600,000 cattle a year were arriving in Abilene. The vital connection between suppliers and purchasers had been made. The cattle industry flourished, although the growth of rival cow towns such as Elsworth, Hays, and Dodge City made McCoy bankrupt in the 1870s.

Development of the open range system Although the development of the cow towns overcame the problem for the cattlemen of crossing farmers' lands, the increasing numbers of homesteaders in the 1860s caused conflict on the Great Plains. Following the Homestead Act of 1862 and the end of the American Civil War in 1865, families were moving onto the Plains by the thousands. The settlers began to block the trails with their farms, and were competing with the cattle drives for precious water supplies; in the long run their presence would cause the end of the cattle drive. The solution to this problem was the open range system, pioneered by Texan rancher John Illif in Wyoming in 1867.

No private individuals owned the vast Plains in the 1860s and 1870s. The region belonged to the US government and, as such, was public property. Cattle barons, as they became known, were able to gain control of thousands of hectares of former American Indian lands to graze their cattle. There were no competing animals for the scarce water supplies as the North American buffalo, or bison, were being removed from the Plains by over-hunting. The ranches were known as the open-range because cattle were able to wander over wide areas of unfenced grazing land all year round. Illif set up the first open range ranch in Wyoming Territory in 1867 to supply beef to the Union Pacific Railroad crews who were moving through the area. He bought $45,000 of cattle from Charles Goodnight and sold them for a huge profit. Once word spread of the available profit, ranchers from all over the USA moved in for the easy money.

Collapse and bankruptcy of the cattle industry Ease of profit and the popularity of the open range contributed to the collapse of the system and its industry by the end of the 1880s. As millions of cattle were placed on the unfenced Plains, competition for grass and water became fierce, and there were range wars between cattle barons, small ranchers, and homesteaders over access to the water holes. Cattle barons were forced to invest in barbed wire as a fencing method to keep control of their water supplies, but to meet this cost they were forced to sell large numbers of cattle, and this resulted in falling prices. At the same time the over-supply of beef caused by the number of cattle on the Great Plains was adding to the fall in prices. Meat quality was also deteriorating. With millions of cattle on the Plains by the mid-1880s, overgrazing led to a deterioration in the grasslands. Poor grazing affected the quality of the meat produced, reducing demand and lowering the price paid by the cities of the East even further. Just when the market for beef was at its lowest ebb, disaster struck in the form of winter blizzards and summer drought between 1886 and 1887.

The winter of 1885-86 left many cattle weakened, and the price of beef was still low. Many cattle barons panicked and flooded the market with beef, creating a further fall in prices. A severe drought caused by an extremely hot summer on the Great Plains further weakened the cattle, although the open range system was not yet finished. The final blow to the open range system in its original form was the harsh winter of 1886-87. Temperatures fell to −50°C and millions of cattle died. With no water to drink or grass to graze, they starved to death. The cowboys could not get out to distribute fodder as the blizzards were too bad. Most cattle barons, already struggling owing to the expense of fencing and the collapse in prices during the 1880s, went bankrupt. Many of their herds were wiped out, and those animals that were left were in such poor condition as to be worthless in the marketplace.