58 Yards West to Routes of Historic Trails

Charles Rath came to the hide trade from long years on the plains. Born near Stuttgart in 1836, he ran away west about 1853 to freight for William Bent, ran a trading post at Walnut Creek in Kansas and moved his business to Dodge City in 1872, where his hideyard often held 70,000 to 80,000 hides at once. After the Red River War he opened stores at Fort Griffin and at Mobeetie, and in 1876 a post of poles and hides near the Double Mountains. He died in Los Angeles in 1902.

What the plaque says

During the mass slaughter of buffaloes in the Panhandle, two trails arose to meet the needs of the hunters and their ever-hungry markets. Started about 1876, both moved vast convoys of wagons across the plains. Charles Rath-- transporting gun powder, lead, tobacco, whiskey, and food staples-- blazed a road from Dodge City to the Double Mountains. In 2 years, however, the best hunting was over and the route fell into disuse. Ed Jones and Joe Plummer forged a trail from Kansas to Fort Elliott. Their route became a freight road and finally a cattle trail. (1969)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• The Citadelle Art Museum — 6.3 mi
  A 1910 Baptist church saved from demolition in 1977, made into a family home filled with art, and given to Canadian in 2009 as one of the Panhandle's few art museums.
• River Valley Pioneer Museum — 6.6 mi
  The Hemphill County museum in Canadian, a Santa Fe division town of 1887 on the river breaks that held one of the first commercial rodeos in Texas and voted itself dry in 1903.
• Canadian River Wagon Bridge — 7.6 mi
  The longest pin-connected bridge in Texas, 3,255 feet of Parker trusses across the Canadian River at Canadian, built for wagons in 1916 and reopened as a footpath in 2000.
• Gene Howe Wildlife Management Area — 8.8 mi
  Five thousand acres of sand sage and cottonwood bottomland along the Canadian River east of Canadian, bought by the state in 1950 for wildlife research and open to walkers with a permit.

More markers nearby

• Route of Marcy Trail — 1.4 mi
• Mary B. Isaacs — 6.2 mi
• First Church Bell — 6.4 mi
• First Baptist Church of Canadian — 6.4 mi