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Black cowboys
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Main page Black cowboys in the American West accounted for up to 25 percent of workers in
Contents the range-cattle industry from the 1860s to 1880s, estimated to be between 6,000
Featured content and 9,000 workers.[1][2] Typically former slaves or born into the families of former
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slaves, many black men had skills in cattle handling and headed West at the end of
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the Civil War.[3] Though the industry generally treated black men equally to white men
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Wikipedia store in terms of pay and responsibilities, discrimination persisted, though to a lesser extent
than in other industries of the time.[1]
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Contents [hide] Black cowboys at the "Negro State
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Fair" in Bonham, Texas, in 1913
About Wikipedia 1 Background
Community portal 2 Work
Recent changes 2.1 Rodeos
Contact page 3 Discrimination
4 References
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Background [ edit ]
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Special pages After the Reconstruction of the South after the American Civil War, freed slaves were still denied land ownership and other
Permanent link rights in many states, and about 20,000 Exodusters headed west to Kansas between 1879 and 1884, with smaller migrations
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to other Western states. Many trained under Mexican vaqueros, cattle-raising Native Americans, or their former masters they
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then worked as ranch hands for wages equal to their white counterparts and offering more opportunities than existed for
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freemen in the South.[3]
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Black men, typically former slaves, children of slaves, or working in plantations, would have been exposed to kitchen work and
Create a book stables.[1] As early as 1770, regulations in Louisiana required two slaves to manage 100 head of cattle.[4] White ranchers
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could even win competitions based on the cow-handling skills of the black slaves in their possession.[5] Initially, white ranchers
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referred to white workers as "cow hands," with blacks in the same position referred to with the pejorative "cow boy." Over time
Languages the term cowboy came to apply to anyone in the industry.[5][6] Prior to the abolition of slavery, the cattle trade was considered
Add links to offer a high degree of relative freedom to slaves, who would be issued guns, often left unaccompanied on horseback for
long stretches, and trusted to return.[6]

Free black cattle drivers drove cattle from Texas to areas including Wyoming, the Dakotas, and Canada, as well as New
Mexico, Arizona, California and Oregon.[1] Some freed slaves remained with their former masters as employees.[6] As these
areas became more settled and established more practical transportation networks, the era of migrant cattle ranching came
to an end.[2]

Notable black cowboys include Bill Pickett, Nat Love, and Bose Ikard.

Work [ edit ]

Black cowhands were typically assigned to handle horses with poor temperaments
and wild behaviors, a career known as horsebreaking.[1] Other blacks in the cattle
trade were trail cooks, which could earn extra money over other cowhands,
regardless of race.[1] Trail menus from black chefs included biscuits, sowbelly, beef,
molasses, and coffee. Black chefs would also hunt deer and turkey between washing
and kitchen cleaning duties.[1] Black cowhands were also expected to perform on the
trail, and expected to sing or to pack a musical instrument.[1] Others would often
serve as bodyguards or money transporters, which has been attributed to the
unlikelihood of thieves searching a black man for large sums of money.[1]

There were also black women cowboys, though their numbers are unknown, as
income was provided to a common household rather than to individual women.
Women were unlikely to inherit a homestead or continue to work in ranching, as Nat Love
freemen and white ranchers were unlikely to work for a black woman. [7]

Rodeos [ edit ]

Popularized across the United States in 1873 by Buffalo Bill Cody, "Wild West Shows" showcased skills and characters of the
Western United States in the form of a traveling performance including rodeo roping, Native American dances, and other
acts.[5] Among these traveling shows, African-American cowboy Jesse Stahl was famous for his saddle riding, a defining
aspect of rodeos.[5] Racism was common in rodeo competitions, and terms such as harder to cover could be used to mask
 racism in rodeo competitions under the guise that white riders had more difficult horses.[5] Black rodeo riders would be
compared to animals, given nicknames reflecting African animals and using animal metaphors not found in descriptions of
white rodeo performers.[5] In response to their treatment and Jim Crow laws, Black cowboys formed "soul circuits," later
organized as the Southwestern Colored Cowboys Association, with the largest number of African-American cowboys
participated in rural communities along the coast of Texas up to the 1940s.[5]

Discrimination [ edit ]

Social life on the trail could be egalitarian, with white and black cowhands sharing sleeping quarters and even blankets.
Though white and black cowhands were social equals on the trail, traditional roles would be resumed in the presence of white
women.[1]

Traveling trail hands leading a migration of cattle were typically low-paid at the time, though better paid in the northern states.
Pay was typically negotiated per run, with large discrepancies between runs and among hires on the same run. Though
Mexican ranchers often received less than a third of white hires, little evidence suggests black hires were paid less for this
work than their white counterparts.[1] However, black employees may have been worked harder and expected to work longer
hours.[1] Evidence suggests that many black cowhands took on additional labor, such as laundry, testing stream water, taking
late night guard shifts, and being the first expected to take on rough horses.[1] Despite the existence of many all-black trail
outfits, black cowboys rarely attained rank higher than trail cook or chuckwagon. Regardless of ability, black men would be
constrained by having to negotiate with white men who might refuse to respect the authority of a black trail leader.[1] Denied
opportunities to become a foreman or range manager, many black cowhands would train white counterparts, with others
settling land with their own cattle.[1]

Traveling posed its own challenges to integration. Whereas saloons were typically segregated, whites and blacks could meet
in the middle, but restaurants were socially regulated. Traveling black men would not be seated in town restaurants where
black-only establishments had not been established, requiring black men to order food from the back door. Most black
cowhands would purchase food and prepare it on themselves on the trail.[1] Black men were banned outright from brothels,
but welcome in gambling halls.[1]

References [ edit ]

1. ^a b c d e fg h i j k l m n o p q Porter, Kenneth (1994). 5. ^ a bc de fg Patton, Tracy Owens Schedlock, Sally M.

"African Americans in the Cattle Industry, 1860s1880s".
Peoples of color in the American West ([Nachdr.] ed.).
Lexington, Mass. [u.a.]: Heath. pp. 158167.
ISBN 0669279137.
2. ^ a b
"Deadwood Dick and the Black Cowboys" . The
Journal of Blacks in Higher Education (22): 30. 1998.
doi:10.2307/2998819 . Retrieved 29 August 2017.
3. ^ a b Goldstein-Shirley, David (30 April 1997). "Black
Cowboys in the American West: An Historiographical
Review". Ethnic Studies Review. 6 (20): 30. ISSN 1555-
1881 . University of Oklahoma Press. pp. 5966.
4. ^ Broussard, Albert S. Searles, Michael N. (2016). Black
Cowboys in the American West: On the Range, on the
Stage, Behind the Badge. University of Oklahoma Press.
(2011). "LETS GO, LETS SHOW, LETS RODEO:
AFRICAN AMERICANS AND THE HISTORY OF
RODEO" . The Journal of African American History. 96
(4): 503521. doi:10.5323/jafriamerhist.96.4.0503 .
Retrieved 29 August 2017.
6. ^ a bc Liles, Deborah (2016). Glasrud, Bruce, ed. Before
Emancipation: Black Cowboys and the Livestock Industry.
University of Oklahoma Press. ISBN 9780806156507.
7. ^ Venable, Cecelia (2016). Havin a Good Time: Women
Cowhands and Johana July, a black Seminole vaquera.
ISBN 0806156503.

Categories: African Americans in the American Old West American cattlemen Cowboys

This page was last edited on 21 September 2017, at 09:12.

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