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Author: Michael M. Miller Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press ISBN: 0806167963 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 284
Book Description
The Texas state constitution of 1876 set aside three million acres of public land in the Texas Panhandle in exchange for construction of the state’s monumental red-granite capitol in Austin. That land became the XIT Ranch, briefly one of the most productive cattle operations in the West. The story behind the legendary XIT Ranch, told in full in this book, is a tale of Gilded Age business and politics at the very foundation of the American cattle industry. The capitol construction project, along with the acres that would become XIT, went to an Illinois syndicate led by men influential in politics and business. Unable to sell the land, the Illinois group, backed by British capital, turned to cattle ranching to satisfy investors. In tracing their efforts, which expanded to include a satellite ranch in Montana, historian Michael M. Miller demythologizes the cattle business that flourished in the late-nineteenth-century American West, paralleling the United States’ first industrial revolution. The XIT Ranch came into being and succeeded, Miller shows, only because of the work of accountants, lawyers, and managers, overseen by officers and a board of seasoned international capitalists. In turn, the ranch created wealth for some and promoted the expansion of railroads, new towns, farms, and jobs. Though it existed only from 1885 to 1912, from Texas to Montana the operation left a deep imprint on community culture and historical memory. Describing the Texas capitol project in its full scope and gritty detail, XIT cuts through the popular portrayal of great western ranches to reveal a more nuanced and far-reaching reality in the business and politics of the beef industry at the close of America’s Gilded Age.
Author: Michael M. Miller Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press ISBN: 0806167963 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 284
Book Description
The Texas state constitution of 1876 set aside three million acres of public land in the Texas Panhandle in exchange for construction of the state’s monumental red-granite capitol in Austin. That land became the XIT Ranch, briefly one of the most productive cattle operations in the West. The story behind the legendary XIT Ranch, told in full in this book, is a tale of Gilded Age business and politics at the very foundation of the American cattle industry. The capitol construction project, along with the acres that would become XIT, went to an Illinois syndicate led by men influential in politics and business. Unable to sell the land, the Illinois group, backed by British capital, turned to cattle ranching to satisfy investors. In tracing their efforts, which expanded to include a satellite ranch in Montana, historian Michael M. Miller demythologizes the cattle business that flourished in the late-nineteenth-century American West, paralleling the United States’ first industrial revolution. The XIT Ranch came into being and succeeded, Miller shows, only because of the work of accountants, lawyers, and managers, overseen by officers and a board of seasoned international capitalists. In turn, the ranch created wealth for some and promoted the expansion of railroads, new towns, farms, and jobs. Though it existed only from 1885 to 1912, from Texas to Montana the operation left a deep imprint on community culture and historical memory. Describing the Texas capitol project in its full scope and gritty detail, XIT cuts through the popular portrayal of great western ranches to reveal a more nuanced and far-reaching reality in the business and politics of the beef industry at the close of America’s Gilded Age.
Author: J. Evetts Haley Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press ISBN: 080615005X Category : History Languages : en Pages : 308
Book Description
Among the famous ranch brands of Texas are the T Anchor, JA, Diamond Tail, 777, Bar C, and XIT. And the greatest of these was XIT—The XIT Ranch of Texas. It was not the first ranch in West Texas, but after its formation in the eighteen-eighties it became the largest single operation in the cow country of the Old West and covered more than three million acres, all fenced. The state of Texas patented this huge rectangle of land, at the time considered by many to be part of "the great American desert," to the Capitol Freehold Land and Investment Company of Chicago, in exchange for funds to erect the state capitol building in Austin. This "desert" became a legend in the cattle business, and it remains today a memory to thousands who recall the era when mustangs and longhorns grazed beneath the brand of the XIT. The development and operation of this pastoral enterprise and its relation to the history of Texas is the subject of this great and widely discussed book by J. Evetts Haley, now made available to readers every· where. It is the story of a wild prairie, roamed by Indians, buffalo, mustangs, and antelope, that became a country of railroads, oil fields, prosperous farms, and carefully bred herds of cattle. The XIT Ranch of Texas is the epic account of a ranching operation about which many know a little but only a few very much. It is the one volume that, more than any other, portrays the early-day cattle business of the West.
Author: Ivan Cates Publisher: ISBN: 9781934486351 Category : Cowboys Languages : en Pages : 88
Book Description
Modern-day look at the lands that comprised the XIT Ranch of Texas in the 1800's. Author Ivan Cates traveled with friends and family to the ranches and sites to document through photographs, sketches, and personal narrative the changes while reviewing the history and stories of the ranch with connections to the Texas State Capitol building. Over 20 pages of black and white photographs, original songs, and historic maps make this an excellent resource.
Author: Cordia Sloan Duke Publisher: Pickle Partners Publishing ISBN: 1787208001 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 382
Book Description
The fabulous XIT Ranch has been celebrated in song, story, and serious history. This book of reminiscences of old XIT cowmen puts on record the everyday life of the individuals who made the ranch run. During her years as a ranch wife, Cordia Sloan Duke wrote a diary; excerpts from her written recordings are here brought together with the reminiscences of the ranch hands. Their forthright, yet picturesque, discussion of ranching hardships and dangers dissipates Hollywood and TV glamorizing, and instead they relate in honest cowboy language what actually happened inside the XIT’s 6,000 miles of fence. “Joe Frantz, one of Texas’ most able writers, has taken the diary of Mrs. Cordia Sloan Duke, widow of XIT’s division manager, plus the terse and pithy reminiscences she collected from former XIT cowboys, and turned them into a unique, readable and realistic account of the cowboy’s way of life.”—New York Times Book Review “This book, with all the merit of being an organized and beautifully presented story, is more than a social history; it is source material, resting on the firm bedrock of first-hand accounts. Hence, while it joins in many libraries and collections several shelves of other cowboy books, it will always be on the top shelf with a select few that have made real contributions to the history of the American West. As a man should be measured by his own standards, and an event in terms of its own time, a book should be evaluated in relation to its purpose. By this standard, as well as by comparison with other books in its library classification, 6,000 Miles of Fence is a success.”—Southwestern Historical Quarterly
Author: Cordia Sloan Duke Publisher: University of Texas Press ISBN: 0292789378 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 286
Book Description
The fabulous XIT Ranch has been celebrated in song, story, and serious history. This book of reminiscences of old XIT cowmen puts on record the everyday life of the individuals who made the ranch run. Their forthright, yet picturesque, discussion of ranching hardships and dangers dissipates Hollywood and TV glamorizing. They relate in honest cowboy language what actually happened inside the XIT's 6,000 miles of fence. Cordia Sloan Duke, wife of an XIT division manager, Robert L. Duke, many years ago realized that only those who had experienced ranch life could depict it with deep understanding. As the young wife of a rising young ranch hand, she kept in her apron pocket a notebook and pencil, recording all manner of interesting details as they caught her attention. This diary was the nucleus for the present book. Conceiving of an account of life on the XIT as presented by XIT cowboys, Mrs. Duke set about drawing from reticent, sometimes reluctant, ranch hands the impressions of the XIT (occasionally written down by their more literate wives or daughters) which they had retained through the years. Cordia Sloan Duke and Joe B. Frantz have organized the reminiscences around key aspects of ranch life, retaining the language of the cow hands.
Author: Anne Haw Holt Publisher: ISBN: 9780998387703 Category : Languages : en Pages : 70
Book Description
This is the wild story of how Texas traded land for their Texas capitol building. This is the paper that inspired Anne's Ten In Texas novel. "The acquisition of three million acres of rangeland in the Panhandle, the construction of a state capitol building, and the creation of the XIT Ranch is a big, fantastic story that could only happen in Texas. Timing made the XIT possible. Spanish cattle, railroad building, technological and business innovation, settlers seeking a better life in the west after the Civil War, and the millions of acres of land owned by the state of Texas came together to create one of the largest ranches in the world."
Author: William T. Hagan Publisher: University of Oklahoma Press ISBN: 0806183950 Category : Biography & Autobiography Languages : en Pages : 178
Book Description
Charles Goodnight was a pioneer of the early range cattle industry—an opinionated and profane but energetic and well-liked rancher. Goodnight’s story is now re-examined by William T. Hagan in this brief, authoritative account that considers the role of ranching in general—and Goodnight in particular—in the development of the Texas Panhandle. The first major reassessment of his life in seventy years, Charles Goodnight: Father of the Texas Panhandle traces its subject’s life from hardscrabble farmer to cattle baron, giving close attention to lesser-known aspects of his last thirty years. Goodnight came up in the days when much of Texas was free range and open to occupancy by any cattleman brave enough to stake a claim. Hagan shows how Goodnight learned the cattle business and became one of the most famous ranchers of the Southwest. Hagan also presents a clearer picture than ever before of Goodnight’s business arrangements and investments, including the financial setbacks of his later life. As entertaining as it is informative, Hagan’s account takes readers back to the Palo Duro Canyon and the Staked Plains to share insights into the cattleman’s life—riding the range, fighting grass fires, driving cattle to the nearest railhead—the very stuff of cowboy legend and lore. This fascinating biography enriches our understanding of a Texas icon.
Author: Dede W. Casad Publisher: Createspace Independent Publishing Platform ISBN: 9781479267583 Category : Texas Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
When the Texas State Capitol burned to the ground in 1881, Texas was land rich but cash poor. The state advertised 3,000,000 acres of land in the Panhandle of Texas for the price of a new state house. John Farwell, a merchant from Chicago, seized the opportunity and made the deal; three million dollars for three million acres of West Texas, where only stray cattle and Indians occupied the land. Farwell's Folly is the story of the development of that land into the XIT Ranch, the largest cattle ranch in the world, stretching across ten counties and requiring 6,000 miles of fencing. It has been more than 30 years since a book has come out on the famous XIT ranch of Texas. Now Texas writer Dede Casad brings this mystique of this historic ranch out of the tumble weeds of West Texas into the modern age for readers who love to read about the often forgotten tales of early Texas. Several earlier books chronicled the rise and fall of the XIT Ranch, but Casad has also roped in colorful stories of the first cowboys, cattle rustling and cattlemen as entrepreneurs, and tied them into the historical fiber of Texas. The idea of a man who lived in Chicago purchasing three million acres of undeveloped territory in Texas, sight unseen, takes one's breath away, even in this day and time. Was it wise or as Casad suggests-folly? That's the story you don't want to miss.
Author: Cordia Sloan Duke Publisher: ISBN: Category : Ranch life Languages : en Pages : 217
Book Description
The fabulous XIT Ranch has been celebrated in song, story, and serious history. This book of reminiscences of old XIT cowmen puts on record the everyday life of the individuals who made the ranch run.
Author: Michael M. Miller
Author: Michael M. Miller
Author: J. Evetts Haley
Author: Ivan Cates
Author: J. Evetts Haley
Author: Cordia Sloan Duke
Author: Cordia Sloan Duke
Author: Anne Haw Holt
Author: William T. Hagan
Author: Dede W. Casad
Author: Cordia Sloan Duke