348 A HISTORY OF HEEEFOED CATTLE 



T. L. Miller the Great Promoter. — ^Early in 

 the "seventies" a Chicago business man who was 

 destined to exert a far-reaching influence upon the 

 fortunes of the Hereford in the west became inter- 

 ested. This was the late T. L. Miller, whose farm at 

 Beecher, Will Co., 111., soon afterwards became the 

 center of the greatest American activity in the Here- 

 ford trade. 



Mr. Miller was bom at Middletown, Conn., on 

 April 7, 1817. In 1842 he went to Cuyahoga Falls, 

 0., where he was in business until 1856, when he re- 

 moved to Chicago, 111. Here he was in the fire and 

 life insurance business until about 1870. He had 

 bought the first 320 acres of his farm at Beecher, 

 from the United States Government. Afterwards he 

 added to it until he had 540 acres at Beecher ^nd 

 207 acres 3 miles to the north. He commenced to 

 improve the farm with buildings in 1862. His near- 

 est railroad station then was Monee, on the Illinois 

 Central. In 1870 the Chicago, Danville & Vincennes 

 Railroad was built, and Mr. Miller bought about 340 

 acres of additional land to the west of that already 

 acquired and laid out the village of Beecher. He 

 closed out his business in Chicago and went to live 

 on this Highland Stock Farm in March, 1870. A 

 few years later he laid the foundation for his herd of 

 Hereford cattle. 



William Powell, an Englishman who later on bred 

 and handled Herefords extensively on his own ac- 

 count, both in Ulinpis and Texas, was jointly inter- 

 ested with Mr. Miller in some of his earlier ventures 



