Boom of Sheep Industry!
Madison Brown 1st
How sheep raising became an important part of the ranching industry
In South Texas, sheep had been raised for many years. The colonists there bred heavy sheep from the East with the lighter Mexican variety. This doubled the sheep's weight, and it tripled the amount of cotton produced!
The real boom in the sheep industry
It began right before the civil war. George Wilkins Kendell was a newspaper reporter, and he set up a 5000-acre ranch east of Boerne. He encouraged people to come to Texas to raise sheep even though he had problems with disease, drought, and Native Americans.