Cattle Drives
One of those routes, known as the Chisholm Trail, passed through Williamson County
Chisholm Trail Days:
October San Gabriel Park, Georgetown
Come on down for some free and family-friendly Western-style FUN! Learn about the early days of cattle drives and cowboy life in Williamson County through activities, reenactments and a live longhorn cattle drive.
To find out more, visit thier website: www.upthechisholmtrail.org.
Williamson County's cattle driving roots
by Chris Dyer
In the latter half of the 19th Century, cattlemen rounded up longhorns by the millions in Texas, cropped their ears, branded their hides, and drove them north across the Indian Nations into Kansas along the Chisholm trail to the rail heads to be shipped back east.
Somewhere along the way, without intending to do more than work for a hard day's pay and board, they launched the legend of the American cowboy.
The cattle drives followed three major routes through what is now Oklahoma and Kansas.
One of those routes, was known as the Chisholm Trail.
Cattle trailing was the principal method of getting cattle to market in the late nineteenth century. It provided Texans with a practical, economical means of marketing surplus livestock.
The Williamson Museum Presents
view the Trial Drive photos
While some form of mobile kitchens had existed for generations, the invention of the chuckwagon is attributed to Charles Goodnight, a Texas rancher who introduced the concept in 1866. Chuck was then a slang term for food. Chuckwagon food included easy-to-preserve items like beans and salted meats, coffee, and sourdough biscuits. Food would also be gathered en route. In Texas, it is said that chili peppers were planted along the cattle trails to serve for future use. It was said A good chuck wagon cook was hard to find and harder to keep.
Here's Some Chuck Wagon Links
Interesting Links
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In the decades following the Civil War, more than six million cattle were herded out of Texas in one of the greatest migrations of animals ever known. These 19th-century cattle drives laid the foundation for Texas’ wildly successful cattle industry and helped elevate the state out of post-Civil War despair and poverty.
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Cattle trailing was the principal method of getting cattle to market in the late nineteenth century. It provided Texans with a practical, economical means of marketing surplus livestock.
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The Chisholm Trail was the major route out of Texas for livestock. Although it was used only from 1867 to 1884, the longhorn cattle driven north along it provided a steady source of income that helped the impoverished state recover from the Civil War
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Soon after the cattle drives began, stockmen and farmers in Missouri, incensed at outbreaks of "Texas fever," demanded that Texas cattle be banned from the state.
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These maps show rough approximations of the routes taken by the three major cattle trails that ran from Texas north through the Indian Nations into Kansas and beyond.
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The Shawnee Trail Early Cattle Trails Blazed Way for First Settlers