Top Secret Files: The Wild West: Secrets, Strange Tales, and Hidden Facts about the Wild West

By Stephanie Bearce

Bandits, lawmen, six shooters, bank robberies, and cowboys were all a part of the Wild West. But so were camels, buried treasure, and gun-slinging dentists. Dive into strange tales like the mysterious Cave of Gold, filled with ancient skeletons, and Rattle Snake Dick's lost fortune. Discover the truth about notorious legends like Jesse James, Buffalo Bill, former spy-turned-bandit Belle Star, and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Then, learn why it's unlucky to have a dead man's hand when playing cards and how to talk like a real cowpoke. It's all part of the true stories from the Top Secret Files: The Wild West. Take a look if you dare, but be careful! Some secrets are meant to stay hidden...

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sourcebooks
• Release date: Oct 15, 2015
• ISBN: 9781618215123

Book preview

AUTHOR

VAQUEROS TO COWBOYS

Imagine looking out across the Texas prairie and seeing hundreds of longhorn cattle roaming the plains—all free for the taking. Hundreds, thousands of cattle just wandering the grasslands, getting nice and fat on nutritious green grass. If a person could figure out how to round them up and get them to market, they would be worth a fortune.

Spanish settlers brought thousands of head of cattle to New Mexico in 1598. The cattle roamed the open range and because there were no fences, some of the cattle eventually wandered off from the larger herds. Over the next 400 years, the cows had calves and the numbers of wild cattle increased into the thousands.

Vaqueros were hired by wealthy Mexican caballeros (gentlemen) to round up the cattle and herd them hundreds of miles from the ranges of Texas and New Mexico to the market in Mexico City.

The vaqueros had to be skilled horsemen. They knew how to ride fast to race down a wandering steer. They swung braided rope lariats in the air and caught wandering cattle in their noose. With their wide-brimmed sombreros, leather chaps, and jangling spurs, to be a vaquero was a respected profession. It required skill and training. It also required physical strength and agility, brains, and common sense.

In 1821, the first Anglo settlers arrived in Texas. It must have seemed like winning the lottery to these people—they came to settle the land and found it populated with thousands of cattle free for the taking. The English-speaking men quickly learned from the vaqueros. Some of the Texas ranchers hired the vaqueros to help round up cattle. The Texans called their cattle handlers cowboys. They wore the same wide sombreros and leather chaps. They learned to rope, tie, and wrestle the cattle just like the vaqueros.

By the time the Civil War started in 1861, there was a flourishing cattle trade supplying meat to other parts of the United States. But just as the Civil War tore the country apart, it also hurt the cattle ranches. Cowboys rode off to join the war and the cattle roamed untended for the next 4 years.

At the end of the Civil War, the Texas cowboys and ranchers came home to find their prairies once again overpopulated with longhorn cattle. Cattle in Texas sold for only $2 per head. But in the eastern and northern United States there was a shortage of meat. In the North, one cow was worth $30!

Ranchers hired cowboys to round up the cattle and drive them north from Texas to the railroad towns in Kansas. They put the cattle in livestock cars and shipped them to the meat-hungry people in New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and other Eastern states. Even with the cost of paying the cowboys and railcars, the ranchers still made huge profits. From 1865 through the 1880s, more than 10 million cattle were herded by cowboys to the Kansas rails. It was the same thing the Vaqueros had done years before, except the cattle were driven north instead of south.

One of the most popular routes was the Chisholm Trail that went from San Antonio, TX, to Abilene, KS. Other rail towns were Ellsworth, Junction City, Newton, and Wichita, KS. Other routes like the Goodnight-Loving Trail ended in Colorado, where ranchers sold cattle to miners and the military.

A typical cattle drive had 3,000 head of cattle and was managed by 11 cowboys. Most of the cowboys were between the ages of 12 and 18. These teenagers learned the skills of herding and roping on the job and were paid about $30 a month.

Trail bosses were cowboys who had experience, but they were also young men. Most of them were just in their twenties. Trail bosses had to manage all of the younger cowboys, or waddies as the trail bosses called them. Trail bosses were also expected to locate water and good grass for the cattle on the trail, handle the money, purchase supplies, pay tolls, and keep an eye out for predators. A trail boss was often paid $100 a month. The average worker earned $15 per month in 1866. Cooks were almost as important as the trail bosses. They earned $75 per month for keeping the cowboys riding on a full stomach.

Riding the trail was sometimes just plain boring. The cattle walked in a line munching grass as they walked. The cowboys didn’t hurry them, because the more they ate, the more weight they gained and cattle were sold by the pound. Most cattle gained weight eating their way to market. It could take anywhere from 25 to 100 days to herd the cattle to town.

The idea of cowboys galloping along shooting guns is actually just a myth shown in movies and on television. The young cowboys were not allowed to carry guns while they were on the trail. Firearms were kept under the watchful eye of the cook and stored in the chuck wagon. The trail boss carried a gun to protect the cattle against wild animals and very rarely to warn off rustlers.

Once the cowboys reached the rail yards and the cattle were loaded, they received their pay. The temptation to spend their money in town was huge. There were saloons, gambling, and pretty girls to squander their money on. Smart cowboys saved most of their pay. They knew they wouldn’t get paid again until they had ridden home and then done another trail ride. It was a seasonal job because they couldn’t move the cattle in bad weather. Many young cowboys finished the trail ride and went back home to work on the family farm or attend school. For some, it was the adventure of a lifetime. For others, it was the start of their career as a cowboy.

The Calf Sack

Rancher Charles Goodnight had a special wagon built to carry any calves that were born along the trail. Because the calves could not keep up with the adult animals, they rode in the wagon during the day. At night, they stayed with their mothers. Problem was, a mother cow knows her calf by its smell, so with several calves on the wagon the smells got mixed up and the mothers wouldn’t nurse them.

Goodnight solved this problem by having the cowboys place each calf in a numbered sack each morning. At night, they were taken out of the sack and stayed with their mothers. This method worked. The calves kept their individual scents and the cows nursed their calves.

Cowboys seated around chuckwagon at campsite, 1887

CHUCK WAGON CHARLIE

Charles Goodnight is given the credit for inventing the chuck wagon. Before the chuck wagon came into use, cowboys had to eat what they could

Reviews for Top Secret Files

[lisa.schureman · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I received this as a LibraryThing giveaway. The usual suspects are present; Grace O’Malley, Blackbeard, Black Bart (formerly John Roberts) Henry Avery, Mary Read, & Anne Bonny plus a few I was unfamiliar with, such as Cheng I Sao, Jeanne de Clisson, Sadie the Goat, Stede Bonnet, William Dampier, and a very brief mention of Captain Kidd. Most pirates had very brief and violent careers, but there are a few exceptions in this list. Grace O’Malley died an honored Irish chieftain at the age of 70, Henry Avery quit while he was ahead, Cheng I Sao made a deal with the Chinese Emperor, kept her plunder and was made “Lady by Imperial Decree”, William Dampier was a better scientist than pirate and ship’s captain, retiring from the sea at age 60. He is cited in the Oxford English Dictionary more than 80 times for the new words he introduced to the English language. None of these pirates said “Arrr”. It showed up in the 1930s when Lionel Barrymore played a pirate. In the few documents written by a very few literate pirates they used the same phrases as other sailors of their time. No pirate wanted to end up like Captain Kidd. Hung twice, his body tarred for preservation, and then hung in chains in the Thames estuary. A fun and interesting little book.

[redheadish · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

We love all things Pirates! This book is a great source of information on the time era when pirates ruled the high seas and there whereabouts treasure hunters might find some interesting facts too.

[julieaduncan · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I found this book thoroughly interesting and can see several ways to use it in a classroom setting. The book details information about how sailors became pirates and debunks our preconceived ideas of what they said and did. It also gives short biographies of famous pirates and recounts archaeological finds of sunken treasure. Interesting sidebars as well as crafts and activities extend the learning. Any child interested in pirates will devour this book! Having said that, I'm not sure what age to recommend read this book. The reading level is fairly high and the font is rather small, causing me to lean toward later middle school. However, the activities and crafts are geared toward younger readers. As a result, I'm thinking this would be best for advanced readers in fourth-sixth grade.

[nataliesw · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book for kids on pirates contains a lot of interesting material on ships and weapons, some good infographics — flags and knots, for example — and refers to quite a few pirates of whom most kids and many adults won't have heard, such as William Avery and Henry Dampier. It's entertainingly written; it's a good place to start. Some of the information, however, is incomplete or stilted, and the author's assertions somewhat unsupported. An example is the otherwise good discussion of pirates' clothing--in particular the abrogation of sumptuary laws by pirates who wore quality clothing stolen from aristocrats. "Pirates became heroes to people throughout England when they began wearing velvet coats stolen from rich nobles" is simplistic, though the author does qualify that to "one of the reasons that pirates were cheered by everyday people" later in the paragraph. I was glad to see discussion of privateers late in the book.The section on pirates' language and vocabulary is fun and informative, but discussion of accent ("aargh" and the like) refers the reader only to the movies, when there has also been a long discussion of West Country (Bristol, Devon, Cornwall, etc.) and perhaps some Irish origins of many of the pirates portrayed in those films. The discussion of the Chinese woman pirate Cheng I Sao mentions her husband in passing as a "sea robber"; that he was the original pirate chief is glossed over. It's a little misleading, too, to say that the events took place "at a time when American women didn't have the right to vote and many women could not even own property." While that is certainly true, it was also the case for most women everywhere, not least the women of China. In terms of the Chinese language, it's unclear why the book's editor retained two different romanizations, Zheng Yi, the husband, in Pinyin, and Cheng I Sao, the wife, in traditional Wade-Giles, though "Zheng Yi" and "Cheng I" are the same name, that of the husband (which the author does state). Quite a few of the illustrations are from deviantart sites, quite a few unsophisticated though cute; most are attributed to the sites at least, if not to the actual artists. Some pictures appear to have been borrowed from commercial materials, altered, and not clearly attributed. Clip art is heavily used. Where historical art is reproduced, it is sometimes attributed (p. 10, for example); sometimes not (p.4, p.51, p.63, p.67, p.76). The editor or proofreader should also have caught the typo on p. 23: "Pirates pieced [sic] their ears..." The book's bibliography contains some useful-looking books as well as some websites from which information and activities were "retrieved." These include National Geographic and Huffington Post; I do appreciate these, since they show kids that one can find references to one's interests all over the place. Maybe I'm just old-school, however, about some aspects of using online materials, but I don't feel a wikipedia entry is a complete reference. I'm of two minds about "If you want to learn more about the everyday life of a pirate, watch this video created by history.com. But be warned—it's got some gross information!" followed by the url. I have to say, I DID go watch it!

[jenn.s · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

My son (11) prefers non-fiction for his reads so it wasn't difficult to get him to read this one. He read it during a car trip while I listened to an audiobook, or at least tried to. He loved telling me about the new things he learned while reading this book then asked if he could take it to school. Of course I obliged his request. Seeing him happy with a book in hand is all I needed. I looked through the book briefly and liked the layout and how everything is presented. This would make a great book for a child's library, or an adult who likes an easier way to learn about pirates. I can see this being a popular book in a school library as well. I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review. This in no way influenced my opinion.

[amysing75 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a well written book on pirates. Informative, with good illustrations. It takes care to point out that much of modern day pirate lore is stories and myths, with very few written historical records. My 14 year old son found this book to be "an enjoyable read, but geared for younger kids".

[semperfi121 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a great addition to any history buff or pirate fiend's library. Entertaining and informative, this series always offers an engaging look at the chosen topic. I love the activities included that help connect the present with the past. I especially enjoyed the correction of pirate lingo and the instructions to build a catapault.