HOMESTEADERS VERSUS RANCHERS

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HOMESTEADERS VERSUS RANCHERS
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AIMS

• To study the reasons for conflict between
  ranchers and homesteaders.
• To focus on a specific conflict the Johnson
  County War.

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OUTCOME

• Discussion.
• Exam essay planning.

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TASK 1

• Use the following quotation and your own
  knowledge.
• Try to guess what reasons for conflict there were.

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TEDDY BLUE ABBOT

• There was no love lost between settlers and
  cowboys on the trail. Those jayhawkers would take
  up a claim right where the herds watered and
  charge us for the water. They would plant a crop
  alongside the trail and plough a furrow around it
  for a fence, and then when the cattle got into
  their wheat or garden patch, they would come
  cussing and waving a shotgun and yelling for
  damages. And the cattle had been coming through
  there when they were still raising pumpkins in
  Illinois.

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WHY WAS THERE TENSION?

• Land disputes.
• Fear of cattle disease.
• Access to water.
• Fences (barbed wire).
• Sheep rearing.
• Racial and religious intolerance.
• Fence cutting.
• Cattle rustling.

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JOHNSON COUNTY, WYOMING

• Good land led to ranching from the 1870s.
• Homesteaders came later.
• Ranchers were richer and had been there longer.
• Wyoming Stock Growers Association set up by
  ranchers to run the state in the ranchers
  interests the governor of Wyoming and other
  state senators were members.

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THREATS TO RANCHERS

• Economic problems (drought, falling prices, bad
  winter)
• Increasing numbers of homesteaders arriving.
• Cattle rustling the ranchers blamed this on the
  homesteaders but couldnt prove it. They hired a
  gunfighter, Frank Canton, to track down the
  rustlers.

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THE FIRST KILLINGS

• Ella Watson and Jim Averill were killed.
• Jim Ella lived on a ranchers land.
• Ella was a prostitute often paid in cattle.
• Jim wrote to a newspaper in April 1889 saying
  that ranchers were nothing but rich land
  grabbers.
• July, 1889 Ella Jim were dead.
• The ranchers were responsible they claimed Jim
  Ella were rustlers.

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INVASION

• 1892 The ranchers planned an invasion of Johnson
  County to kill a list of 70 rustlers.
• Canton, 24 gunmen other ranchers invaded.
• 5 a day and 50 for every rustler killed.

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Invaders arrive by railway.
Nick Champion Nick Ray attacked in their farm.
The invaders were spotted and the alarm raised.
The US Cavalry arrived to end the siege.
The invaders took shelter in TA Ranch.
The homesteaders besieged the ranchers.
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RESULTS

• The defeated cattle barons were brought to trial
  but never convicted for their actions.
• They were widely condemned and lost a lot of
  power.
• Homesteaders were able to continue their lives in
  peace.
• The open range began to be enclosed.

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TASK 2

• In the 2005 exam students were asked how the
  Johnson County War helped lead to the decline of
  the cowboys traditional way of life.
• Plan out an answer for this question in pairs.
• Share your answer with the other pairs on your
  table.