...... 



On \ 



hand red rthe 



in be 

 parcL 



liau tanned, were offer 

 York at ] md qual- 



ity, but iu Mc 

 Hides. — Next in imp own 



eommerc -r this head ~hich 



for any reason did not po . y to a robe, and were 



therefore fit only for conversion . r por- 



tion consisted of the n which the hair was of poor 



quality and the skin itself too thick and b< -eing 



made into a soft, pliable, - mainin_ 



tiun of the hides marketed were from buffaloes killed in spring and sum- 

 mer, when the body and hind-quai :e almost nak-L A 

 the quantity of .summer-killed hides marketed was n . : . 

 it vas only the meanest and most unprim the 51 ud army 

 of buffalo-killers who were mean enough to kill buffaloes iu summer 

 simply for their hides. I me time summer-killin, 



iced on the southern range to an extent 

 alarm to the great body of more res] 



frowned upon so severely that . • -_ _ : :»*rnd 



it wise to abandon it. 



Bones. — Next in importance to robes and hid :liebone 



the utilization of which was rend.-. rig roa 



of the buffalo plains. Under the influence of the 1 the 



extremes of heat and cold, the flesh remaining up 



disintegrated, and fell to dust, leaving the bones of atire 



skeleton as clean and bare as if they had I 



some powerful chemical I the 



live buffaloes begin to grow s the miles 



suggested the idea of rinding a use for them. A market was readily 

 found for them iu the East, and the prices paid per ton were sun: 

 to make the business of bone-gather; remunerative. The bulk 



of the bone product was converted into phos - pur- 



poses, but much of it was turned into carbon for use in the renuin 

 sugar. 



The gathering of bones became a common industry as early as 1872, 

 during which year 1,135,300 pounds were shipped over the Atchison, 

 Topeka and Santa Fe* Railroad. In the year foil g the same 

 shipped 2,743,100 pounds, and in 1874 it handled 6,914,950 pounds more. 

 This trade continued from that tune on until the plains have been 

 gleaned so far back from the railway lines that it is uo longer profitable 



