104 PRINCIPLES OF RURAL ECONOMICS 



quickly and almost as cheaply as they could be driven overland. 

 The following table from the report of Joseph Nimmo shows 

 the estimated number of cattle driven northward from Texas 

 over the old cattle trail from 1866 to 1884 : 



1866 .... 260,000 1876 .... 321,000 



1867 .... 35,000 1877 .... 201,000 



1868 .... 75,ooo 1878 .... 265,000 



1869 .... 350,000 1879 .... 257,000 



1870 .... 300,000 1880 .... 394,000 



1871 . . . . 600,000 1 88 1 . . . . 250,000 



1872 ..... 350,000 1882 .... 250,000 



1873 .... 465,000 1883 .... 267,000 



1874 .... 166,000 1884 .... 300,000 



1875 .... 151,000 



But cattle ranching did not begin to decline with the decline 

 of the cattle trail. The corn belt has had a great deal to do 

 with the development of the Western cattle-ranching business. 

 This corn belt lies immediately contiguous to the ranching coun- 

 try. Consequently the movement of cattle in more recent years 

 has been eastward from the Western ranges rather than northward 

 from Texas. During the latter part of the period we are now con- 

 sidering, that is, in the early eighties, cattle began to be shipped 

 in large numbers from the Western ranges into the corn-growing 

 regions of eastern Kansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri, and Illinois, 

 to be fattened upon the corn crops. It was therefore in the 

 heart of the corn country rather than in the range country that 

 the packing houses were built for the slaughtering of animals 

 and the curing of meat products. Kansas City, St. Joseph, 

 Omaha, Chicago, and St. Louis became great packing cities. 

 Owing to the practice of allowing hogs to fatten on the drop- 

 pings of the corn-fed cattle, pork came to be, in a measure, a 

 by-product of the beef-producing industry. 



Dairying. As previously stated, the beginning of the modern 

 factory system of manufacturing butter and cheese was made just 



