The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-08-11
(The End.)
GROWING DEMAND FOR STEER
HORNS.
Many Pairs Now Being Used for Orna-
mental Purposes.

mental Purposes.
From the Kansas City (NIo.) Times.
OF the hundreds of thousands of cattle
brought into Kansas City alive every year
and either taken out dead or not taken
out at all in any recognizable form, it is
TO be presumed that the majority have
horns. These horns are not a part of the
frozen. canned, corned, and otherwise pre-
served carcasses of beef that leave the
city in the unending procession Of yellow
freight cars. Neither are they piled up
anywhere in the packing house district
as they used to pile up buffalo horns out
west awaiting the coming of the agent
who bought them for fertilizers. Then,
what becomes of the tons of horns that
are brought into Kansas City every year
through the medium of the stock yards?
In the first place. it is not to be suppos-
ed that so utilitarian a business as that
carried on within the walls of the big
packing houses would suffer an important
element to go to waste. Some one has
said that WIN a steer enters the doors
of a Kansas City packing house there is
no part Of him that Is not put to some
important use, except, perhaps the ami
mails expiring below. At any rate, the
horns of a Texas steer form no inconsid-
cradle part of mis- fighting weight. and if
they could not be put to some remunera-
tive use, the packers would soon insist
upon having more steer and less horn.
Years ago. when Missouri was little
more than a densely wooded wilderness,
and Kansas did not exist, there was ono
article that the frontiersman invariably
possessed. His hut might be lowly and of
unhewn logs, his bunk a miserable make
shift, and his chairs and table of the ut
most simplicity. but by the door there
hung the inevitable gun rack in the shape
of pair of branching antlers, and across
these reposed the settlers trusty rife. In
many cabins there were perhaps several
MAJ nitcent pairs of antlers, and others
could be had for the exercise of a little
skill and courage.
But the passage of time and advancing
civilization have changed all this. What
might then be had almost for the asking
has become an expensive luxury. The
rife of the settler has given place to the
umbrella or cane of the modern citizen.
His primitive shot pouch and powder horn
have had to make way in the front hall
for the silk hat and Immaculate gloves.
But the demand for a rack is still active
and unfulhlled. The citizen of the rural
southwest can no longer afford or is una
BILE to procure the proud antlers of the
deer, and in their place is compelled to
take the horns of a lowly and luckless
steer.
A gentleman stood on the platform at
the union station one night last week, and
counted no less than six pairs of mounted
horns in the hands of as many sturdy cit
liens of Kansas. Texas, and Oklahoma.
The horns were beautifully polished. and
bound with purple plush and yellow rib
bon. Each pair was intended for a con-
spicuous place in some southwestern bank,
store. Office or home, and each owner be-
lieved that he had the best bargain of the
lot.
Across the street on Union avenue stood
A. Haskins, a crippled boy. He has been
in the business of polishing and selling
horns for several years. HIS sales, he
says, frequently average fifteen pairs of
horns a week. He knows of several other
horn polishers who frequent various parts
of the city. None of them does much less
business than that of the Union avenue
stand. In the exchange building at the
stock yards there is quite an extensive
stand of the same kind, where mounted
horns of any desired shape or size may be
bought at from 81 to $40 a pair. The pur-
chasers are cattlemen or those interested
in the cattle business. In this way hun
dreds OF pairs of horns are sold every
year.
Up to a few months ago II was pos
sible for the polishers to get all the horns
they wanted at the packing houses at 10
cents per pair. Since then the price has
been advancing. until it is now Is and 20
cents pound The cause of this ad-
vance is said to be contracts made with
the agent of eastern novelty manufac-
turing concerns, by which tons of the re-
fuse horns are sent to New York and New
Jersey to be used in the manufacture Of
knife handles, combs. trinkets, furniture
parts, and a multitude of other things.
And this is really what becomes of most
of the horns that the cattle bring TO Kan
sas City.