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Texas Fever LbNA #44872

Owner:Boots Tex
Plant date:Dec 3, 2008
Location:
City:Baird
County:Callahan
State:Texas
Boxes:1
Found by: Silver Eagle
Last found:Feb 17, 2012
Status:FFFFFFFFa
Last edited:Dec 3, 2008
1874 Captain John T. Lytle and several cowboys left South Texas with 3,500 head of longhorn cattle and a remuda of saddle horses. Five years later, the route Lytle cut out of the prairie to Ft. Robinson, Nebraska, had become the most significant cattle trail in history – the Great Western Cattle Trail. Though less well known than the Chisholm Trail, the Great Western Cattle Trail was longer in length and carried cattle for two years longer than the Chisholm. The Great Western saw over seven million cattle and horses pass through Texas and Oklahoma to the railheads in Kansas and Nebraska, therefore, developing the cattle industry as far north as Wyoming and Montana. A typical head would move 10 -12 miles a day and included the trail boss, a wrangler, and a cook. The drive from South Texas to Kansas took about two months at a cost of $1000 in wages and provisions. At the end of the trail, cattle sold for $1.00 to $1.50 per head. In Texas, feeder trails from the Rio Grande led to the trailhead near Bandera and the Great Western passed through, Kerrville, Junction, Brady, Coleman, Baird, Albany and Fort Griffin. It is believed that the main streets of Throckmorton, Seymour, and Vernon run north and south because of the trail. Several factors, such as barbed wire, beefier cattle breeds, and settlement of the frontier contributed to the demise of the Great Western Cattle Trail, but a principal cause was the “Texas Fever” controversy. Texas Fever was a disease to which Texas Longhorn were immune, but which they carried northward and which decimated northern cattle herds, giving rise by 1885 to quarantines in many states and territories which banned the importation of Texas cattle during warm months. Kansas eventually banned Texas cattle entirely. The last reported drive on the Great Western Trail was made in 1893 by John Rufus Blocker to Deadwood, South Dakota.

Directions:
Ross Cemetery is located on Highway 283 just north of I-20 at Baird, Callahan County, Texas. Look for the gate on the west side of the highway.

To the box:
Drive in on the main cemetery road, passing the pavilion on the right. After passing the flag pole, turn left at the next road. Park in front of the Tisdale marker on your right. The Longhorn, Texas Fever, is hiding in the multi-trunked tree behind and to the right of Joseph Carroll Tisdale.