878 THE PEOPLE'S FARM AND STOCK CYCLOPEDIA. 



XI I. 



CATTLE HERDINO.* 



,EFOKE giving my experience in cattle herding in Kansas, 

 I wish to give some facts concerning the cattle business of 

 this great State. While more or less cattle had been raised 

 in the State previous to that date, it was not until 1866 that 

 the trail was opened from Texas, and a year later that the ad- 

 vance guard of the great army of cattle reached Kansas. Dur- 

 ing the summer of 1866 a number of capitalists who had faith 

 in the future cattle business hired a party of experienced herd- 

 ers and frontiersmen, and sent them from Abilene, Kansas, to 

 Texas, to seek out the best route for a cattle trail. This party 

 selected the best crossings for the numerous streams, and 

 avoided, as far as possible, any stretches of barren lands. They 

 also made arrangements with the Indian tribes along the route 

 by which the herds were allowed to pass through their country. 

 The first herd was taken through by a guide, and henceforward 

 the trail was as easily followed as the great national road from 

 Washington city to St. Louis. 



I am indebted to the North Topeka Mail for the following, 

 relative to this business : In 1866 the drive north commenced, 

 arid it is generally supposed that during that year, 260,000 

 head passed from Texas to the Indian Territory, destined for 

 points in South-western Missouri. The following year the drive, 

 though considerably less, in point of numbers, was the first 

 made to any established shipping point in Kansas. Abilene, on 

 the Kansas Pacific Railroad, was the place at which about 35,- 

 000 head were delivered during the year 1867. Here the 

 Texas Long-horn obtained the first foothold on Kansas soil. Ab- 

 ilene was the drovers' market for three or four years subse- 



Contributed by EDWIN W. BROWN. 



