A History of the Beef Cattle Industry in the Inland Empire - transcript (duplicate).

Abstract

"...It is hard to over-emphasize the importance of the cattle business in the west. When the Civil War ended the soldiers wandered home after Appomattox the Lone Star State boasted of 5,500,000 cattle. During the conflict the Southern Armies needed meat and needed it badly but the Union forces closed the dates from the Confederacy by an effective blockade. In the North the cattle industry prospered as the Northern armies offered a large and steady outlet for all salable stock and the prices rose until steak sold for forty cents a pound."