The Kenosha telegraph. [volume] (Kenosha, Wis.) 1860-1888, 1886-03-19


bacon-are found by the ranchers. The
cowboys principal personal expense is
tobacco. That he feels unable to get
along without, and it will cost him all
of five dollars month. So, admitting
that he has six months work, he takes
one hundred and twenty dollars home
with him to keep himself, and probably
others, through the long and rigorous
winters Of the great West. As rule.
the cowboys live in the back toWns,
far away from the railroads. This is
especially the case with those native
born, as great majority of them are.
The cowboys seen lounging around the
railroad towns are mostly young men
who have gone from the East. There
is nothing to which the great body of
the cowboys can turn their hands in
these isolated regions during the win
ter. A few are hired by hunters and
trappers to accompany them to their
hunting grounds. Some, from choice,
remain on the ranches, and help take
care of the home stock, but for this
they receive no pay, as the ranchers
have their hired men for that work.
$" 1t may easily be seen, then, that
the cowboys have a serious struggle
against actual want, and, such is the
system of the Ranchers' Society, they
dare not protest. Experience has
taught them that to ask for an increase
in wages means immediate discharge
from the service. But that is not the
worst of it. The moment manis dis
charged by any member of the Ranch
ers' Society his name is sent to every
other member. The name is turned TO
in the books of each ranch, and black
mark placed opposite it. That is called
BLACK listing the cowboy. He might
as well leave the country at once.
These facts about the Ranchers' So
ciety have only recently been found
out, and then only by the bitter expert
ences of men who had protested, in the
name of. their families, against the
starvation wages the ranchers paid
them. More than that, members of
the ranchers' clique have issued orders
to their men that they must not spend
any time in reading books or newspa-
pers. don't know what this means,
unless it is desired by the ranchers that
the cowboys shall not keep themselve
informed as to the labor movements of
the day. Such of the cowboys as are
able to read-and even to them the op-
portunity to do so rarely comes-re-
gard this order as tyrannical in the ex-
treme.
The despotic system of the Ranchers'
Society has slowly awakened the iso-
lated cowboys to the necessity of hav-
ing league of their own, or of becom-
ing members of some labor organiza-
ton, by which they may be enabled to
act in unison and compel compliance
with their just demands. They are
talking the matter up all they dare;
but, scattered as they are over hun
dreds of miles of almost uninhabited
country, the possibility of their organ
izing in special league by themselves
is remote. They have heard in a gen.
cral way of the Knights of Labor. 1t
is part of my mission here, unofficially,
to see whether the ten thousand cow
boys of the West can not be admitted
to that organization and have the ben
eft of its strong arm in fighting the en-
croachments of the millionaire cattle
owners monopoly.
"The great blizzards and snow
storms of the West are among the best
agents the big land grabbers have in
Montana, Wyoming and other Terrific
rles. In Montana especially the cattle
of all brands are turned loose in the
fall after the beef gathering has taken
place and the fat cattle sent off to
market. When winter comes on the
herds drift together until there will be
may be twenty-five or thirty thousand
cattle punched. By and by there comes
a snow storm, and the bunch grass is
covered up beneath two feeG Of snow.
The storm is sure to be. followed by a
big fall i'll temperature. The mercury
will 60 to may be thirty degrees below
zero. Then all nutriment leaves the
tall prairie grass ON which the cattle
have fed since the bunch grass was
showed under. The herd becomes
crazed with hunger, and stampede
follows. The great body of the starry
ing cattle start south like an ava
lanche, heading straight for local
tiles where homesteads have been
taken up in the greatest number.
They bear down on the settlements
and besiege the homesteaders, who
vainly try to keep them off with their
rifles. They shoot the hungry animals
down by the hundred, and sometimes
manage to hold them in check until
their ammunition is exhausted. Then
the fight must end. The cattle sweep
down on the homesteads, and not only
eat up every vestige of hay the home
steaders have stored up for their own
small herds, but tear down the houses
and outbuildings which the settler
builds out of the prairie sod, and de-
YOUR the roots of the grass that remain
succulent in the sod. Homesteads,
hundreds at time, are cleaned up by
herd of hungry cattle, quickly and
thoroughly, on single stampede.
Then the herd continues on its way.
taking the homesteader's herd of two
or three hundred with it, and leaves
him homeless, ruined man. He may
have his homestead all clear of the
Government claim, but be in debt for
cattle or supplies. He can't pay, and
the creditor comes on him, takes his
saddle and whatever he may have left.
1.-The homesteader is discouraged.
The wake of the stampeding herd is
quickly followed by the agent of big
land owner. He makes the discouraged
settler an offer for his claim, and the
settler nine time out of ten, is glad to
accept the offer. The chances are
that he will turn cowboy or hire out as
a herder for some small cattle grower
on range. The agent of the land
grabbcr may secure in this way inn
mense areas of much-coveted land for
his employer which he could get in no