Some More Horse Tradin'

by Ben K. Green

  We grazed our horses low and rode some of ’em part of the day as we began to get ’em gentle, and drifted into Bluffdale the next Tuesday night. A good many fellows that we met in cars or passin’ along the road had begun to ask about the price of horses and wanted to look and walk through them, but we really hadn’t had any cash buyers. There was some open land along the railroad track and over on the school ground where we camped at Bluffdale.

  We had gotten far enough along on this drive that we had left the big ranch country behind us and were driving through a mixed ranch and stock farm country where there were no big bands of range horses and the price of horses had begun to change. I didn’t really know how much the price had changed in the two hundred miles that we had covered, but I had learned at a tender age that when you priced a horse too high, you could always come down, but if you priced him too cheap, you were due to be cheated, so everytime I priced a horse I was kinda testin’ the local market.

  A fellow that was ridin’ south rode by our camp leadin’ a pretty good farm chunk kind of work mare that was about eight years old and had harness marks on her that showed she would work. He said he would like to trade her for one of those young riding horses. He picked out one of the chestnut stocking-legged horses that we had by now ridden three or four times and asked how much for him. Well, I knew he wasn’t fixin’ to buy him and that this was goin’ to be a trade deal, so I said, “Seventy-five dollars.”

  He said, “I guess I’d give about a third of it.”

  I said, “That would be about the right amount of difference between the mare you’re leadin’ and the horse you picked out.”

  He took a slobberin’ fit about what a good mare he had and I gave him a pretty big talk about how little $25 was. After he had set around and ate up a batch of Friole’s grub and drank half a pot of coffee and he could see I wasn’t weakenin’, he paid me the $25 out of his pocket. The chestnut horse was draggin’ a lead rope and was no trouble to catch so we changed halters and he left the work mare and rode on.

  Well, that helped my assortment of stock because I didn’t have any work mares and when you go to mixin’ them up, you’ve got different kinds of horses to appeal to different kinds of people and, besides, the money I got in the trade was a little more than three times what I paid for the chestnut horse, which was proof the horse market was going up as we traveled east.

  About middle of the next morning we stopped at Tolar to rest our horses and hoped we might do some more business. Sure enough, in a little while there was a fellow wanted to trade four spotted Shetland pony mares. One was real old and she was the mama and grandmama of the rest of them and they were all man-broke and kid-spoilt. I hated to trade the working mare so quick but she was one he picked out. Then he wanted one of the work mules to go with her. I didn’t much like this deal since this would leave me just one team of mules, so I got pretty hateful with him and he gave me $40 and the four Shetland ponies for the old mule and the work mare.

  I don’t think that I was as proud of these trades as Choc and Friole were because they really took on about how good we was doin’.

  I had written my daddy a postcard from Comanche, Texas, tellin’ him about what day we would reach Granbury, which was about twenty miles south of Weatherford, and sayin’ that if he had time, he could come down to see my stock. We camped on the bank of the Brazos that night just east of Granbury and Daddy drove up a little before dark. We walked around and looked at my horses and he thought I must have found a sucker out in the West where I bought ’em.

  Well, my daddy wasn’t a horse trader and didn’t pretend to be and never did give me any stagnatin’ amount of advice, and after we had a little visit, I gave him $200 to put in the bank for me when he got home. I told him I had lots of horses to turn into money and I didn’t know how long it would take, but I was going by the home place at Cumby in a few days and leave Charlie and Beauty in the pasture so I wouldn’t have to ride ’em back from the end of the trip when I sold out—wherever that was goin’ to be.

  Early the next morning a cowboy that I knew by sight rode up to the camp wagon. I hadn’t had any business with him, but he came to Weatherford to First Monday Trade’s Day and that’s where I had seen him. We visited a few minutes and I had already saddled a horse, so we rode around through the herd as they grazed.

  When we stopped under the shade of a big pecan tree, he began to tell me that he was a little short of money or he would be glad to buy some horses. He went on to say that he was going to have a good deal of work to do horseback this summer and he wished he could buy two good young horses. He pointed out the ones he wanted on credit and said he would pay me that fall.

  Well, I hadn’t had much experience in the credit business, but I had lots of horses that hadn’t cost much. While we were talking, a bright idea struck me and I said, “How about takin’ those two horses and another one that I’ll pick out and you break and have the use of the three of ’em and sometime in September you can have your pick of the three for breakin’ the other two for me.”

  He liked this deal. It would give him plenty of horses to ride through the summer and wind up with one in the fall without being out any money. We roped out his horses and shook hands over the trade. Friole and Choc had camp-broke and we started the day’s drive.

  We camped on Mary’s Creek the next night. By now, me and Choc had about fifteen head of young horses we could catch and saddle without having to snub ’em. Early the next morning before we left Mary’s Creek, a Mr. Charlie Corn came by and said he had heard we was camped down there with a bunch of horses and he needed some young horses for his cowboys.

  We walked around through the bunch and I pointed out the ones that had been rode a few saddles, and the ones that were unbroke, and I told him that those that had been rode were about $10 a head higher than the ones we hadn’t done any work on. He said that would mean about $25 and $30 a head. I said, “I’m glad you ain’t doin’ my figurin’. That would be about $35 and $45 a head.”

  He said, “I’ve got cowboys that don’t have enough to do. How about me buyin’ six unbroke ones and pickin’ ’em for $30 a head?”

  I didn’t think he could hurt the bunch much by pickin’ ’em because they were all pretty much the same and you always stood a chance that he might accidently take a bad one. He wasn’t tryin’ to jaw me too much on my $35 price, so I sold him six head for $180. As he picked them, he came to the blue roan horse and said, “His head is skinned up. Did he ride good?”

  I said, “To tell you the truth we caught him, but we didn’t get around to ridin’ him.”

  He said, “Well, I wouldn’t want to pay any extra for him being caught, but I would take him in the bunch.”

  I had to frown at Choc to keep him from bustin’ out laughin’, but we made the deal. As he pointed out his horses, we worked ’em back to the end of the bunch and drove ’em about two miles and turned them into his ranch pasture gate.

  We traveled slow that day and got way up high on a prairie west of Fort Worth where they were layin’ out the streets for what was to later be Ridglea addition. The grass was good and there was more people passin’ by and I thought we ought to graze the horses there a day or two and maybe sell some of ’em to the people that lived in the Town Where the West Begins.

  This herd of horses on the west townsite of Fort Worth didn’t create much commotion and we didn’t have any lookers much less buyers. However, our horses filled up good on that blue-stem sage and were rested for the drive through Fort Worth. Early one morning we headed ’em right down Camp Bowie Boulevard and went across the Trinity River bottom.

  As we topped out on the other side of the ridge, we were gettin’ into a pretty prominent kind of residential district. We turned ’em down a street to the south until we hit a street running east and west parallel to the railroad track. We drove ’em on east on this street running north of the depot and at the south end of the business district and dropped off of the hill where the main tow
n is and followed the main highway from Fort Worth through Arlington and Grand Prairie.

  We were up on a high strip of country where there were very few houses and no business district and were grazin’ our horses in the late afternoon close to the Trinity Portland Cement plant. There was some small pastures around this cement plant with great big fine fences and cement fenceposts. I saw a company car comin’ out from the main plant with a sign on the side of it, so I loped up and waved and hollered until the man stopped.

  He was a nice kind of fellow and got out of the car and looked up the road at my horses. I told him I was huntin’ a place to pen ’em for the night and he pointed to a gate to one of these small pastures and told me it would be all right to turn them in there for the night if we were moving on the next morning. I told him that would sure be a fine place to camp with ’em inside those high fences and asked him what it would cost to pasture my stock and camp there for the night. He said, “Don’t worry about it, son. When the man catches up with you that owns them, he can come over to the office and see about that.”

  The horses were a little leg weary from the day’s drive and there had been a right smart of traffic. We had choused them off the pavement and along the bar ditches pretty steady all day and they hadn’t had time to graze, so when I threw this big swingin’ gate back, it was easy to point the herd into the pasture. There was a windmill and a water tank a short way from the gate where Friole pulled the wagon and started making camp for the night.

  Next morning this nice man that had told me we could camp there drove down to the wagon early enough to have breakfast with us. He was a good fellow and I guess had some stock in his background because he seemed to enjoy walkin’ through the herd of horses and pickin’ out various ones to comment on. When he had had about his third cupful of coffee, I said, “That man that owns the horses would be glad to settle with you for the night’s grazin’.”

  He said, “I thought he would be here this morning.”

  As I pointed to myself I said, “He’s been here all the time.”

  By this time he knew my given name and he said, “Ben, a kid like you don’t own this many horses.”

  It took some convincing on the parts of Choc and Friole and they explained to him the distance we had come and that they were actually my horses and that we had started to East Texas to sell them. This fellow was a little past middle age and he sure began to get interested in this horse drive. He asked, “Do you all aim to go through Dallas with them?”

  I told him I had been comin’ from Cumby to Fort Worth all my life and I didn’t know any way to get west of Dallas except to come through it or to get east of Dallas except to go through Dallas, and it must be the shortest way. I added the shortest way is the way you go with horses. He first laughed a little at that remark and then he said, “Ben, don’t you think you’re goin’ to get into a whole lot of trouble taking these horses through Dallas?”

  Me and Choc, being the wild rough young cowboys that we were, didn’t know that there was anyplace that we couldn’t drive a herd of horses, and I answered him by sayin’, “Nope, I don’t see how that herd of horses could cause me and Choc any trouble. We’re ridin’ good, shod, hard-fed, young horses that can outrun and outturn and outhandle any broncs or plainer kinds of horses and I don’t see how they could give us any trouble that we can’t handle. For a small bet, I think we could drive a few head of horses into the Jefferson Hotel and put ’em in the elevator for you.”

  With this batch of braggin’ he kind of backed off and didn’t say anything more about us havin’ trouble with horses, but I could sure tell by lookin’ at him that he didn’t believe we could drive them half through Dallas without any trouble. I asked him again about payin’ him and he said that this was the best breakfast he had since he moved to town twenty years ago and we didn’t owe him nothin’ for spending the night.

  When he got in his car and drove off, he said, “I sure wish you luck on gettin’ through town, but if I were you I would wait a little while till all these people going to work get out of the way.”

  I waved at him and hollered “Much obliged” as he drove off. Choc turned to me and said, “That feller thinks me and you are green hands at drivin’ horses, don’t he?”

  I said, “I guess so, but this ain’t a big enough bunch of horses to get away from me and you in just one town no bigger’n Dallas.”

  He kind of grinned at that and we went to saddlin’ up and Friole had already broke camp and was harnessing up his mules. We hollered a few times and boogered these horses together and turned them into the road with Friole trottin’ his mules to the camp wagon as he whistled some kind of Mexican tune.

  We headed them east several miles on Davis Street. Sometimes we had as many cars mixed up in the herd as we had horses, but the cars that were meetin’ us could pull over to one side and we would pass them. The cars that were goin’ the same way we were were tryin’ to work their way through the herd, but traffic wasn’t really causin’ us any particular trouble. When we came to Zangs Boulevard, we turned them north, and after we passed a park on the east side of the boulevard, this street made a curve and there was a down hill slope towards the Oak Cliff Viaduct. It’s easy to get a herd of horses to move faster on a down slope, so we gave ’em a pretty fast push, intendin’ to get them on the viaduct between the concrete banisters before they had time to think about it.

  Now, the Oak Cliff Viaduct is about a mile long and was the first big viaduct crossing the Trinity River bottom ahookin’ Oak Cliff and points west across to main Dallas and all points east. I don’t know how far up in the air it is, but it’s plenty high because lookin’ down from the top of it at a railroad car below, the railroad car don’t look much bigger than a Studebaker wagon.

  There was a lot of cars meetin’ us and goin’ on by and there had begun to be a few cars behind us that had to slow up, but we were ridin’ in a lope and the herd was movin’ in a long, swift trot when we met a new T Model truck full of crates of somethin’ with a wagon sheet tied to the front of the bed and afloppin’ in the breeze at the back, and that floppin’ and poppin’ wagon sheet stopped the herd. As they pulled to turn back, me and Choc built a fence around them ahorseback.

  We had lost Friole and the camp wagon, but I could see him back toward the end of the bridge with cars all around that ball of little snorty West Texas mules and there wasn’t a chance for them to run away because there was no place for them to go.

  We had the traffic stopped goin’ both ways and these horses were millin’ in the middle of the bridge and of all the honkin’ and hollerin’ and help we were gettin’ from them people sittin’ behind steerin’ wheels, you never saw the like.

  We were just about over the middle of the river channel, and after about ten minutes of this horse fright, there was motorcycle policemen comin’ from every direction. One of ’em rode up kind of close to me and went to hollerin’, askin’ where the man was that owned these horses. Between fightin’ horses and wavin’ and hollerin’, I told him he was talkin’ to him. He said, “Kid, you don’t own much more than the shirt on your back. Where’s the man that owns these horses? Is he back there in that wagon?”

  I said, “You can go see.” I thought that would be a way to get one of these motorcycles out of the way.

  He rode back and by now Old Friole was scared to death and couldn’t speak a word of English, but he waved and made signs and pointed back to me. Another one of them motorcycle policemen was explainin’ to me the traffic law and that I had the bridge blocked and I would have to move the horses. I was cowboy’n’ all the time, hollerin’ and squallin’ and workin’, and hollered back, “If you would move some cars, I could move some horses.”

  By now you could see cars stacked back to the west on Zangs Boulevard and you could see cars stacked back to the east past the depot. About that time, a train engine ran under the bridge somewhere and blowed the whistle. This bunch of West Texas ranch horses didn’t know what that noise was,
nor where it came from, but if they could have gone straight up, they would sure have got away from it.

  The concrete banister on the viaduct was about three or four feet high and when that train whistle blew a second time, one of them wild, bald-faced, stocking-legged chestnut horses came out of the mill and cleared that railing. I stood in my stirrups and looked over the banister. She was fallin’ through the air so fast that her mane and tail was stickin’ straight up. I hollered at Choc, “I guess we had one too many, anyhow.”

  At quick glance I saw several more horses comin’ across the bridge that was fixin’ to follow suit and go over the rail. I spurred old Beauty right into ’em and squalled right loud, and when I did, I pushed three head onto the footbackers’ sidewalk which was built along the concrete banister. When they started threadin’ down that sidewalk that gave me an idea. As I started down the sidewalk, I hollered and pushed these three to keep them goin’ and squalled at Choc to pour the rest of them in behind me.

  A motorcycle policeman was meetin’ them and I squalled at him to get out of the way. He didn’t have time to turn that thing around so he pulled it out of the way while we pushed a hundred head of horses by him.

  There was a park about a block big east of the depot and south of the Jefferson Hotel. I broke my horse into a run when I hit that grass and headed off the horses in front of me and threw them into a mill and held them there while Choc brought the rest of them down the sidewalk.

  Range or gentle horses chum up in small bunches and graze and stay together and when one gets away from the others, they start nickerin’ back and forth to locate one another. Now while these horses were in the excitement and milling in a bunch on the viaduct, they weren’t making any extra noise, but when they got strung out single file for a half mile comin’ down that footwalk off the viaduct, a lot of them got separated from one another and began to nicker in almost plaintive tones of excitement for their runnin’ mates.