Cattle Drives of the West (original) (raw)
Related papers
About 40% of the alfalfa hay in the United States is produced in the 11 western US states of Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming. This region also supplies the vast majority of the seed for the nation's alfalfa plantings, and it contributes significantly to exports of alfalfa hay and seed. Western states played a crucial historical role during the development of alfalfa in the United States, as alfalfa moved from West to East in the latter half of the 19th Century. A present-day survey of western states showed a wide variety of production practices in these states, ranging from 2 to 10 cuts/year, from very dormant to very non- dormant varieties grown on soils from heavy clays to beach sands. Respondents reported water and irrigation management as key limiting factors. All but one state reported that the importance of alfalfa was increasing in their state. Alfalfa is likely to remain a key crop or increase in i...
RAILROADS AND MINING IN THE MOJAVE DESERT AND SOUTHWESTERN GREAT BASIN CALIFORNIA AND NEVADA
Proceedings of the Desert Symposium, 2024
Between 1876 and 2017 thirty-seven railroads were constructed in the Mojave Desert and southwestern Great Basin. This paper addresses the growth of railroads and their links to mining districts over time. Early transcontinental routes that were built through our study area, the Mojave Desert and southwestern Great Basin, were the Southern Pacific - San Joaquin line (1876), and the Southern Pacific (SP) line that linked Mojave to Needles (1883). The SP connected with the Atlantic and Pacific (A&P) at Needles (Topock), which had been built from the east to west from Albuquerque. These two lines both reached Needles at nearly the same time. The Southern Pacific sold their line to the A&P in 1884. In 1885 the California Southern Railroad (a subsidiary of the Santa Fe) connected at Barstow with A&P, creating a new line to the port in San Diego through the Cajon Pass. In 1905 the San Pedro-Los Angeles and Salt Lake (which was purchased in 1921 by the Union Pacific) was completed from Salt Lake City to the port of Los Angeles using some track agreements with the Santa Fe for their line between Colton and Barstow. The Carson and Colorado (C&C) was originally planned to connect Carson City with Fort Mojave on the Colorado River. That destination changed to Tonopah, then Candelaria and finally to Keeler in the Cerro Gordo Mining District. The transcontinental railroads provided a transportation framework from which a network of railroads was later connected. These later railroads primarily served individual mines and mining districts. Following the 1848 discovery of gold in Coloma, California on the American River, gold was discovered all along the western slope of the Sierra Nevada– as far to the northwest as the Klamath Mountains. By the late 1850s other mineral deposits were discovered east of the Sierra Nevada, eventually eastward into Nevada, the Mojave Desert, and Arizona. Construction of the main lines through our study area immediately provided transportation that was less expensive than the mule teams that predated them. Several short lines were built to mineral deposits that were close to the main lines, however distance and demand required the construction of several significantly longer rail lines. There were two long-line railroads dedicated to reaching the Bullfrog (Rhyolite) mining district: Las Vegas and Tonopah (1905) and Tonopah and Tidewater (T&T, 1907). The T&T’s primary destination was the Lila C. Mine in the Greenwater Range east of Death Valley. Changes in United States monetary policy in 1893 and the exhaustion of high-grade deposits led to booms and busts that affected the railroads. Competition from trucks and automobiles also contributed to a reduction in demand for railroad services. Many went bankrupt or were assimilated or merged to survive. During WWII almost all the mining-dedicated railroads in the Mojave Desert and Great Basin were scrapped for much-needed iron to support the war effort. With a few exceptions, today only the original transcontinental lines remain in operation. The Golden Age of the mine railroads that linked remote parts of this area is but a distant memory.
Humanimalia, 2019
The nearly three hundred thousand men, women, and children who trekked across the North American continent in the mid-nineteenth century looking for a better life in the American West depended on animals to successfully make the journey. As Diana Ahmad demonstrates in Success Depends on the Animals, when these Americans hitched wagons heavy with supplies and belongings to teams of oxen, horses, or mules, they also took with them certain cultural values and preconceptions about the animals on
Traders and Raiders: Aspects of Trans-Basin and California-Plateau Commerce, 1800-1830
The Journal of California and Great Basin Anthropology, 1981
Traders and Raiders: Aspects of Trans-Basin and California-Plateau Commerce, 1800-1830 THOMAS N. LAYTON F OLLOWING introduction of the horse into the northern Rockies in the late seventeenth century, Indians there became mobile middlemen linking the Pacific-Plateau and Middle-Missouri trade systems (Wood 1972). By the end of the eighteenth century, Cahforniahad become integrated into this network by a northern and an eastern route. The northern slave route hnked with The Dalles on the Columbia River and incorporated an intermediate node at Yainax Butte near the California-Oregon border. The eastern trans-Great Basin route linked California with the Rockies via the Humboldt River and incorporated an intermediate node at the Humboldt Sink. Cahfornia horses and manufactured goods may have been the major commodities on this route. The documentation for long-distance commerce by horsemen in Cahfornia and the Great Basin is scattered, fragmentary, and of mixed quality. However, when the pieces are juxtaposed, a definite pattern can be discerned.
California State Parks, Colorado Desert District, 2009
Livestock have grazed on the grasslands of Southern California from the time the first Europeans arrived in the 1700s until the present day. Within a few years of the establishment of the first Spanish missions, thousands of horses, cattle, and sheep grazed on the coastal mesas, inland valleys, and mountain foothills. After the Mexican revolution in 1821 and the subsequent secularization of the missions, the California rancheros continued raising livestock on the open range. Thus, during the Spanish and Mexican periods, from the 1770s until the 1840s, the base economy of California depended on open-range cattle. During this time, cattle were primarily raised for their hides, some used locally, but the majority brought by the thousands to the coastal ports and traded to Americans for transport to the United States East Coast. After the American takeover of California in 1848 and the discovery of gold in Northern California the following year, the cattle industry continued to prosper by producing meat to feed the thousands of emigrants and gold-rushers in Northern California. Although impacted by droughts in the 1860s, the cattle meat industry continued to be viable until the 1880s. In the late nineteenth century, as a result of the rampant promotion of Southern California by land speculators and several years of exceptional rains that supported dry-land farming, much of the prime agricultural land of Southern California was homesteaded by American farming families. These farmlands were the former free-range livestock pastures of the Spanish, Californio, and earliest American settlers. Although dry spells at the end of the century forced many families to give up dry farming and some farm areas reverted to livestock grazing, most of the livestock industry was concentrated in the interior of Southern California by the turn of the twentieth century. Many of these lands were the former ranchos of the Mexican period that had transferred to American ownership from the 1860s through the 1880s. Large tracts such as Jamul, Cuyamaca, Cuyamaca, Laguna, Santa Maria (Ramona), San Vicente, Santa Ysabel, San José (Warner's), and San Felipe continued as large cattle enterprises into the twentieth century. During the late nineteenth century and early twentieth century, there were new challenges to maintaining a viable ranching enterprise that necessitated constant flexibility, egotiation, and adaptation. One recurrent theme is the movement of cattle throughout the inland ranges to take advantage of seasonal pasturage and to meet business needs. Another recurrent theme of this period’s ranching history is the interpersonal negotiation and cooperation that were inherent in such a flexible and adaptive system. Twentieth-century ranching in Southern California was significant economically. However, it was also interwoven with a vibrant social system that maintained the family and friendship ties within which the economic system operated. After World War II, increasing population and escalating land values put tremendous pressure on the Southern California cattle industry. The few remaining coastal ranches, such as Peñasquitos and Rancho Bernardo, were sold in the 1960s and 1970s for residential and commercial development. Many of the inland ranches were subdivided to distribute to children and grandchildren. Children who had no interest in continuing ranching in Southern California often sold their portions. In contrast to the coastal situation, the backcountry ranches have primarily been sold to land preservation conservancies and public agencies. It is the premise of this study that the story of ranching in the San Diego region is important historically. Equally important, however, the ranching story contains important lessons for today’s world. First it is the story of a foundation economy for Southern California’s “cow counties” explaining much about how the San Diego county region developed into its present form. Second, it is a story of how an industry adapted to the variable environmental conditions in the San Diego region. Third, ranching history tells the story of incredibly hardy and resourceful people who, faced with challenges and shortages, figured out a way to “make it work.” Thy were the original recyclers. Fourth, ranching is the story of how economic, social, and family ties blended together to form the fabric of a community, a concept that is particularly relevant to today’s fragmented society. And finally, ranching has left an indelible imprint on the environment that, for better or worse, needs to be acknowledged, understood, and considered in land management planning. For these reasons, which will be further explored in the pages of this report, ranching history and its physical remains on the landscape are important cultural resources that need to be preserved in the San Diego region.