For a brief interlude in American history between the passing of the Indian
and the buffalo and the entry of the farmer and the barbed-wire fence, the
Great Plains witnessed the most picturesque industrial drama ever staged – the drama
of the open range and the cattle ranch. If the Southern planter could once claim
that cotton was king, the Western cattleman could proclaim with equal fervor
that grass was king. For the time being, at least, the plains were one limitless,
fenceless, gateless pasture of rich, succulent, and ownerless grass that was there
for the taking. Within an incredibly short period the herds of bison had been
replaced and outnumbered by the herds of cattle. This vast expanse of grassland, populated mainly by longhorn cattle
and hardworking cowboys, became the domain of a group of entrepreneurs who
decided that they could make money in cattle. These were the hardheaded
businessmen who built the Western livestock industry. They were known as the
cattle barons, a term they detested, and they ruled enormous fields that as of 1883 held half of the West’s 23 million cows.
In background these businessmen varied widely. A would-be baron often
started as a cowboy himself – perhaps one of the men who had drifted into the
brushlands after fighting in the Texas Revolution of 1836. Or he might be a
refugee from a burned-out farm in the Old South. Or he might be an Easterner
seeking a new life and fortune on the frontier. In any case, he was likely to be an
adventurous man, accustomed to hard work and violence and ready for both.
These men were alike in another respect: they kept their eyes fixed on the profit-
and-loss statement. And in so doing they managed to establish a business – and
a way of life – that the world would see only once in the Old West they ruled.