The First Cash Crop to Rise up from the Earth”

This story is about children, and others, picking up bison bones to put in a pile for no other reason than things like fertilizer, a lust for sugar, and greed. 

We will begin here … 

From Bloomberg article linked below: ‘ … homesteaders gathered the buffalo bones. It was easy work: Children could do it. Carted to town, a ton of bones fetched a few dollars. Sent to rendering plants and furnaces in the big industrial cities, that same ton was worth between $18 and $27. Boiled, charred, crushed or powdered, it was worth as much as $60."

“In many areas, farmland literally had to be cleared of buffalo bones. Bones removed from grasslands made for easier plowing, and there was money to be made at the same time. From Steven Rinella, author of American Buffalo: ‘For many, buffalo bones were the first cash crop to rise up out of their newly acquired dirt.’”

Yet there in the haunting photo are the remains of the four-legged majestic creatures, the most efficient “natural fertilizing living machines” that brought the vast plains alive with grasses, prairie blooms, and other lush, abundant plant, insect, and animal life. The massive millions of grazing hooves atop the land, helped ensure the aquifer below was protected, abundant, and clear with roots stretching ancient layers deep, acting as nature’s precisely-designed purification system. 

Then Homesteaders came with their plans, or more aptly the plans made for them by the U.S. government, that had already sectioned off parcels of land that became the future agriculture system across the nation that I am experiencing today in York County, Neb. too. The tentacles of control upon us all from the start were already deep and I would argue that not even white men (the only legally really free people in our country at its fruition) were not really free either. 

Don’t tell me those overlords thinking they were some sort of gods managing bone collections didn’t know any better. They did. The executioners of the project knew exactly what they were doing. The only ones who get a pass were the children, gathering bones, for a desperate pittance to keep the harsh lives of their homesteader families going. 

So, what’s this history lesson all about? Today. 

This writing features two article links you need to read in entirety and one picture of two entitled fools standing like spineless cowards on their mountain of organized crime against humanity and the land. 

The first excerpts below are from a “Farm Progress” article by Chris Bennett: www.farmprogress.com/farming-equipment/buffalo-bone-fertilizer-forgotten-days-of-agriculture

“There was once a source of agricultural fertilizer considered too abundant to ever run out. It lasted all of 20 years.”

“When America’s first transcontinental tracks divided the country in 1869, the railway spine also served to split the buffalo herd in half. Just two years later, Josiah Mooar, a Great Plains buffalo hunter, filled an order of 500 hides for a British tannery. He shipped 57 surplus hides to his brother (John Mooar) in New York City describes what happened next: “… advance word of the novel cargo reached New York, and John was beset by curious onlookers — including several fur traders. He sold the hides nearly on the spot and soon sent his brother an order for 2,000 more. The tanners had discovered that buffalo hide made ideal machinery belting, crucial in the midst of a burgeoning industrial age.”

“Market demand first devoured buffalo hides and meat — and then bone. A massive bone harvest was under way. Wagons or handcarts — the bones were hauled to rail lines by the ton, and piled in stacks, ‘ … mounds often 15 feet high and twice as wide, stretching as far as a mile.’”

And then there’s how the Indigenous people to this soil handled things. I mean, it begs the question, who really was civilized here?

Next excerpts are from this article: www.bbc.com/future/article/20241203-the-bison-skulls-photo-revealing-americas-dark-history

“Despite the bisons' usefulness, estimates put the Native American hunters' took less than 100,000 a year, hardly making a dent on the early 1800s population of between 30 and 60 million bison.”

“By 1 January 1889, there were just 456 pure-breed bison left in the US – and 256 of them were in captivity, protected in Yellowstone National Park and a handful of other sanctuaries.”

Oh, and the military always knows humanitarianism the best don’t they?

“Lieutenant Colonel Dodge – told a hunter: ‘Kill every buffalo you can! Every buffalo dead is an Indian gone.’”

“Depriving the Native Americans of their bison meant they were forced to move onto the new reservations the Western army had established for them, in order to grow food to survive. The army's tactics worked … Within one generation, the average height of Native Americans who had relied heavily on bison and so were most impacted by the slaughter dropped by more than an inch (2.5cm). By the early 20th Century, child mortality was 16% higher, and the income per capita among bison nations has remains 25% lower compared to nations that weren't so reliant on bison.”

My takeaway: 

So, how do we find hope with a foundation of slaughter set like that? We find it inside the light within ourselves to pursue agriCULTURE and community building that does not pursue scenarios like children and others gathering bones to pile up, grind into something we don’t need, and then sold back to us. 

It’s really quite easy to grasp when we consider protecting, preserving, and renewing what keeps us alive instead of killing it. 

The earth has room for countless people. Let’s grow food, graze and raise animals rightly, feverishly protect and remedy our freshwater supply, and live life with fecundity. 

We have done severe damage. Now it’s about tirelessly learning from the vast diversity and shared humanity we can find in one other, putting hope in action, and loving one another. 

We can pursue abundance through practices that cause life to bloom or  be killed off. We cannot go back, but we can go forward, seeing the hearts, minds, and souls of each other. In seeing that shared humanity we can, Creator-willing, save what’s left and make abundant what lies ahead. 

We have two paths before us, one is right and ripe with countless options. The other is wrong with death at the end along with acres upon acres of dusty, depleted soil and not a drop of water left to drink. All that and a pile of bones … our own.  

Photo source: Detroit Library.

Another excerpt from the BBC article quoted above: “The infamous image of bison skulls was taken at the Michigan Carbon Works, a refinery that processed bones. There, the bison bones were processed into charcoal that the sugar industry used to filter and purify sugar – the bones were also used as glue and fertiliser.”

Wondering where there’s hope? You can find some #Hope for the #Heartland here: www.grazemastergroup.com/hope-stories