There were less dramatic fluctuations on the roads east of the Missouri. The Fremont, Elkhorn, and Missouri Valley, which was controlled by the Chicago and Northwestern, increased its shipments of animals from 93,626 tons for 1885-86 to 159,356 for 1886-87. The traffic in animals fell for the Chicago and Milwaukee from 372,699 tons (5.69 percent of total traffic) to 343,014 (4.67 percent); for the Chicago and Northwestern it rose from 407,443 (4.78 percent) to 418,098 (4.25 percent); for the St. Paul, Minneapolis, and Manitoba, the least important livestock road, it remained stationary at from 21,126 tons (1.5 percent) to 21,138 (1.2 percent).

In Dakota Territory shipments fall slightly, from 21,700 tons to 21,503 tons, between 1888 and 1889.

A one-year increase following a terrible winter could have reflected the dumping of surviving cattle onto the market, but the continued rise in traffic in the face of declining cattle numbers on the rangelands of Nebraska, Wyoming, and South Dakota is puzzling. In 1889 -- Thomas Oakes was not worried that the Chicago and Northwestern and the Burlington and Missouri would penetrate the region tributary to Miles City. "I do not look upon the movement with any concern, as the cattle business is done at practically cost, and if we lose it all our net revenues will not suffer materially."

Frink, Cow Country Cavalcade, 60-61.

Osgood, Day of the Cattleman, 222.

Report of Railroad Commissioners . . . 1887, 82, 233.

Report of Railroad Commissioners . . . 1886, 208.

Report of Railroad Commissioners . . . 1887, 114, 141, 168.

Report of Railroad Commissioners . . . 1886, 208.

Report of the Railroad Commissioners of the Territory of Dakota, 1888, 179-80.

Report of the Railroad Commissioners of the Territory of Dakota, 1889, 66-67.

Oakes to Earl, April 8, 1890, NP, LRR, PV, 137H.5.7 (B) 1890, PN 694.