OF THE SADDLE AND SIRLOIN CLUB 261 



of the old-fashioned steer ever exhibited, v?ith table back and 

 massive frame. Perhaps the greatest service to modern Ameri- 

 can steer showing was the strong stand he took favoring the 

 elimination of three and four-year-old steers from the shows. 

 In fact by 1885, Mr. Gillett was marketing all of his cattle 

 by the time they had reached thirty months of age. His example 

 elicited a number of noteworthy pupils and Mr. D. M. Moninger 

 of Iowa, J. G. Imboden of Illinois, and a host of others carried 

 forward the standard and precedents he had set The relief of 

 a bullock's head standing out from the keystone of the arch at 

 the main entrance to the stock yards at Chicago, is a carving 

 from a clay model of John Sherman, his first champion, named 

 for the founder of the yards. 



In September, 1876, he made his first shipment of live cattle 

 to England, one hundred head averaging 2100 pounds. Between 

 1876 and 1880 he shipped 1,300 steers to the Liverpool and 

 London markets. In 1879 one of his shipments destined for 

 Britain was diverted at New York by William Ottman & Co. 

 of the Fulton Market, at a then sensational cost of $6 per cwt. 

 These were exhibited at the Messrs. Ottman's stalls in the great 

 Durham Premium Christmas Cattle and Sheep Exhibit at the 

 Madison Square Gardens and won extreme praise. In 1881 he 

 shipped to Liverpool by the steamer "Thanemore" 122 bullocks 

 averaging 1963 pounds, that brought him a $200 average price 

 or a total of $24,400, about $5,000 more profit than Mr. Gillett 

 figured he could have made if he had disposed of them in Amer- 

 ica. The mammoth McMullen and thirty other show steers 

 featured his 1882 shipment, which consisted of 167 animals. 



His methods of outdoor feeding of steers, and of keeping his 

 cows and calves on bluegrass pasture without shelter, being fed 

 only in the severest weather, produced a very hardy strain of 

 cattle. He believed that perfect freedom and exercise in the 

 open air were necessary to produce a full and healthy develop- 



