The Abilene Trail was a cattle trail leading from Texas to Abilene, Kansas. Its exact route is disputed owing to its many offshoots, but it crossed the Red River just east of Henrietta, Texas, and continued north across the Indian Territory to Caldwell, Kansas and on past Wichita and Newton to Abilene.
What was the cattle trail that reached Abilene Kansas?
the Chisholm Trail
The first cattle drive reached Abilene in August 1867. On September 5, 1867, the first load of cattle were shipped via rail from Kansas. The trail would eventually be called the Chisholm Trail.
Did the Chisholm Trail go through Abilene Texas?
Chisholm Trail, 19th-century cattle drovers’ trail in the western United States. Although its exact route is uncertain, it originated south of San Antonio, Texas, ran north across Oklahoma, and ended at Abilene, Kansas.
Where was the end of the trail for cattle drives from Texas?
End of the open range
Texas cattle were herded north, into the Rocky Mountains and Dakotas. In 1866, Nelson Story used the Bozeman Trail to successfully drive about 1000 head of Longhorn into the Gallatin Valley of Montana.
Why did the Chisholm Trail end?
The XIT Ranch arose when the Texas legislature granted the Capitol Syndicate of Chicago three million acres for building a new Capitol. The Chisholm Trail was finally closed by barbed wire and an 1885 Kansas quarantine law; by 1884, its last year, it was open only as far as Caldwell, in southern Kansas.
Where did the Goodnight-Loving Trail end?
Cheyenne, Wyoming
The trail runs from Young County, Texas, southwest to Horsehead Crossing on the Pecos River, then northwards to Fort Sumner, New Mexico, through Colorado and ends in Cheyenne, Wyoming.
What finally ended the Texas cattle trade?
The drives continued into the 1890s with herds being driven from the Texas panhandle to Montana, but by 1895, the era of cattle drives finally ended as new homestead laws further spurred settlement.
Which towns were along the Chisholm Trail?
Through Oklahoma, the route of U.S. Highway 81 follows the Chisholm Trail through present-day towns of El Reno, Duncan, Chickasha, and Enid. Historians consider the Chisholm Trail to have started either at Donna or San Antonio.
Where did most drives on the Chisholm Trail end?
Eventually the Chisholm Trail would stretch eight hundred miles from South Texas to Fort Worth and on through Oklahoma to Kansas. The drives headed for Abilene from 1867 to 1871; later Newton and Wichita, Kansas became the end of the trail.
What was the name of the first cattle drive trail in Texas?
Chisholm Trail
The first cattle drives from Texas on the legendary Chisholm Trail headed north out of DeWitt County about 1866, crossing Central Texas toward the markets and railheads in Kansas. The trail was named for Indian trader Jesse Chisholm, who blazed a cattle trail in 1865 between the North Canadian and Arkansas rivers.
What were the two major cattle trails?
Edward Piper blazed the first documented cattle trail in 1846, when he drove a thousand head from Texas and sold them in Ohio. Another early route, known initially as the Kansas Trail and later as the Shawnee Trail, opened in the 1840s. The full route ran from Brownsville in southern Texas north through Dallas.
What was the largest cattle drive in history?
In reality, the largest cattle drive on record took place on Aug. 24, 1882, and only covered the distance from about Tulia to Canyon. And, after each individual cow was counted as it passed through a gate at the end of the drive, there were 10,652 head — a cattle drive record that has stood for 140 years.
How much did a cowboy make on a cattle drive?
about $25 to $40 a month
The average cowboy in the West made about $25 to $40 a month. In addition to herding cattle, they also helped care for horses, repaired fences and buildings, worked cattle drives and in some cases helped establish frontier towns.
Who was a famous female rancher in Texas?
Texas Rancher and Pioneer Female Trail Driver. In the mid-1800s, cattle ranching was becoming big business in Texas, but not all ranchers were men. Margaret Borland was one of the very few frontier women who ran ranches and handled her own herds.
What trail went from Texas to Montana?
The Great Western Cattle Trail
The Great Western Cattle Trail (sometimes called the Western Trail or the Texas Trail) became the longest, most significant route. Eventually, the trail went into what are now western South Dakota, North Dakota, eastern Wyoming and Montana.
How many cattle went up the Chisholm Trail?
During its heyday, between 1867 and 1884, some five million cattle and an equal number of mustangs were moved along the trail – the most significant livestock migration in history.
Where did the Shawnee trail end?
It crossed the Red River at Rock Bluff, near Preston, and led north along the eastern edge of what became Oklahoma, a route later followed closely by the Missouri-Kansas-Texas Railroad.
Does the Goodnight-Loving Trail still exist?
The route was later extended to Cheyenne, Wyoming. The arrival of the railroads to western Texas in the early 1880s made the long cattle drives unnecessary, and the trail was to all purposes abandoned. Its role in Texas history and legend is celebrated in Larry McMurtry’s 1985 novel Lonesome Dove.
Where did the Sedalia trail start and end?
The Sedalia Trail (also referred to as the Texas Road and the Shawnee Trail): Moving the herd from San Antonio to Sedalia, Missouri. Usually cattle were collected around San Antonio, Texas, then moved northerly through Austin, Waco, and Dallas, crossing the Red River near Preston, Texas, at Rock Bluff.
What ended the cattle drives?
The last years of the cattle drive brought low prices for cattle ranchers. Low prices led to little or no profit and contributed to the end of the cattle driving era.
When was the last cattle drive?
When The Last Cattle Drive appeared in 1977, the comic tale of a prickly Kansas rancher’s quixotic bid to drive a herd of cattle from Hays to Kansas City became an unlikely best seller and Book-of-the-Month-Club selection.