The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 58, July 1954 - April, 1955 Page: 334
650 p. : ill., maps (some col.), ports. ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Southwestern Historical Quarterly
On the whole, British investments in Texas lands and livestock
proved quite unprofitable. Drought, winter's cold, cattle thieves,
grass fires, the depression of the 189o's, and the hostility of Texas
farmers, small cattlemen, and politicians toward the "cattle bar-
ons" were among the major hazards they confronted.5
Because of its possible bearing upon the current economic for-
eign policy of the United States, the last factor mentioned prob-
ably deserves to be emphasized. As early as January 31, 1884, the
Dallas Daily Herald loudly complained of the growing land
monopoly and of corporations speculating in Texas land, "the
great source of life of many stockholders who live in Scotland,
France, and England" and "rule with the sway of lords that vast
domain, gathering wealth without labor and without price,"
fencing the public domain, using the grass "without paying one
dollar for rent," while "we ... stand idly by." "Such open handed
plunder . has never been witnessed since William the Con-
queror divided out the English farms among the Norman bar-
ons." On February 6, 1884, the same journal repeated its com-
plaint and warned that the major part of West and Northwest
Texas was "alarmingly passing into the control of a few wealthy
men and corporations, largely non-resident and ... alien to the
United States, to be held without population as grazing ground.
And this, too, by fencing lands belonging to others." On August
13, 1887, the Tascosa Pioneer declared that settlers had been "ex-
cluded from an immense and fertile section as if the studied pur-
pose were to give the Panhandle and West Texas over to a system
of perpetual landlordism with cattle grazing the only occupation."
On December 3, 1887, the Pioneer quoted a grand jury of one of
the Northwest Texas counties as follows: "The great state of
Texas, in her greed for money, accepts bids from concentrated
capital for the use of her public lands, to the detriment and
bought from H. W. Cresswell, a Canadian, was known in Texas as the Bar C's
Ranch; the Cedar Valley Land and Cattle Company owned the T Anchor Ranch;
and Texas Land and Cattle Company owned the Horseshoe Ranch.
5The hazards are described by the authors mentioned in note 2, above, and by
Lewis Nordyke in his Cattle Empire: The Fabulous Story of the 3,000,000 Acre XIT
(New York, 1949). The XIT was owned by the Capitol Freehold Land and In-
vestment Company. Its huge tract was acquired in payment for the building of
the Texas Capitol. See also J. Evetts Haley, The XIT Ranch of Texas and the
Early Days of the Llano Estacado (Chicago, 1929), and Clay, My Life on the
Range, 268-277.334
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 58, July 1954 - April, 1955, periodical, 1955; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101158/m1/401/: accessed May 5, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.