Changes

==Career==

==Career==

In 2007, William T. Hagan published ''Charles Goodnight: Father of the Texas Panhandle,'' only 147 pages long but the first re-examination in some seventy-five years of Goodnight's life.  Early in the 1870s, Goodnight resided in Pueblo, [[Colorado]], where he engaged in cattle and [[real estate]] and became part owner of an opera house.  Thereafter, he became the dominant rancher in the Texas Panhandle, specifically the grass and water-rich Palo Duro Canyon south of [[Amarillo]]. He discusses Goodnight’s experimentation with cattalo (hybrid of cattle and bison) and the clash with the short-term state Senator Temple Houston (1860-1905) in a dispute over fencing the grasslands, a policy which aided large ranchers. Hagan describes Goodnight as “a dem]anding boss, approaching every task himself with all the energy he could muster, and he expected the same … from those under his direction”.<ref>Hagan, p. 11.</ref> Whatever tasks were pending, Goodnight “thought that he was able to do it better than his [ranch] hands, and usually could." <ref>Hagan, p. 50.</ref>  In his last years, Goodnight still tried to finish all work that day, rather than postponing the less critical duties to maximize his declining physical energy.  Though Goodnight had a profane tongue and drank moderately on occasion, he would fire any hand caught drinking, gambling, or fighting.  Any abusing horses would also encounter his powerful displeasure.<ref name=wthagan/>

In 2007, William T. Hagan published ''Charles Goodnight: Father of the Texas Panhandle,'' only 147 pages long but the first re-examination in some seventy-five years of Goodnight's life.  Early in the 1870s, Goodnight resided in Pueblo, [[Colorado]], where he engaged in cattle and [[real estate]] and became part owner of an opera house.  Thereafter, he became the dominant rancher in the Texas Panhandle, specifically the grass and water-rich Palo Duro Canyon south of [[Amarillo]]. He discusses Goodnight’s experimentation with cattalo (hybrid of cattle and bison) and the clash with the short-term state Senator Temple Houston (1860-1905) in a dispute over fencing the grasslands, a policy which aided large ranchers. Hagan describes Goodnight as “a dem]anding boss, approaching every task himself with all the energy he could muster, and he expected the same … from those under his direction”.<ref>Hagan, p. 11.</ref> Whatever tasks were pending, Goodnight “thought that he was able to do it better than his [ranch] hands, and usually could." <ref>Hagan, p. 50.</ref>  In his last years, Goodnight still tried to finish all work that day, rather than postponing the less critical duties to maximize his declining physical energy.  Though Goodnight had a profane tongue and drank moderately on occasion, he would fire any hand caught drinking, gambling, or fighting.  Any abusing horses would also encounter his powerful displeasure.<ref name=wthagan>

Hagan examines the partnership between Goodnight and Oliver Loving (1812-1867), who solidified the Goodnight-Loving Trail, and then with the equally strong-willed Irishman, [[John George Adair]], an arrangement that probably succeeded only because Goodnight and Adair were rarely in each other’s company.  Paraphrasing J. Frank Dobie, Hagan finds the secret of Goodnight’s wealth.  A steer of eight hundred pounds brought $64 in Kansas, but the animal was barely worth $10 in Texas.  So a herd of 750 animals would net more than $40,000, a huge return in the 1870s before the age of the income tax.  The entrepreneurial Goodnight also invented the chuck wagon, his original version drawn by twenty oxen and carrying provisions for 18 men for the 600-mile cattle drive.<ref name=wthagan/>

Hagan examines the partnership between Goodnight and Oliver Loving (1812-1867), who solidified the Goodnight-Loving Trail, and then with the equally strong-willed Irishman, [[John George Adair]], an arrangement that probably succeeded only because Goodnight and Adair were rarely in each other’s company.  Paraphrasing J. Frank Dobie, Hagan finds the secret of Goodnight’s wealth.  A steer of eight hundred pounds brought $64 in Kansas, but the animal was barely worth $10 in Texas.  So a herd of 750 animals would net more than $40,000, a huge return in the 1870s before the age of the income tax.  The entrepreneurial Goodnight also invented the chuck wagon, his original version drawn by twenty oxen and carrying provisions for 18 men for the 600-mile cattle drive.<ref name=wthagan/>