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Xit, A Story Of Land, Cattle, And Capital In Texas And Montana MICHAEL M. MILLER

Xit, A Story Of Land, Cattle, And Capital In Texas And Montana

MICHAEL M. MILLER

Other works by MICHAEL M. MILLER

Publication: University of Oklahoma Press, 2020, Norman

First edition 8vo. Gray cloth, titles stamped in gilt on the spine, xiii [blank], 268 pp., acknowledgments, illustrated from photographs, portraits, maps, charts, notes, bibliography, index. Tells the story behind one of the most productive cattle operations in the West. The legendary XIT Ranch is a tale of the business and politics at the very foundation of the American cattle industry. "The Texas state constitution of 1876 set aside three million acres of public land in the Texas Panhandle in exchange for construction of the state's monumental red-granite capitol in Austin. That land became the XIT Ranch, briefly one of the most productive cattle operations in the West. The capitol construction project, along with the acres that would become XIT, went to an Illinois syndicate led by men influential in politics and business. Unable to sell the land, the Illinois group, backed by British capital, turned to cattle ranching to satisfy investors. In tracing their efforts, which expanded to include a satellite ranch in Montana, historian Michael M. Miller demythologizes the cattle business that flourished in the late-nineteenth-century American West. The XIT Ranch came into being and succeeded only because of the work of accountants, lawyers, and managers, overseen by officers and a board of seasoned international capitalists. In turn, the ranch created wealth for some and promoted the expansion of railroads, new towns, farms, and jobs." As new, unread copy in dust jacket.

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