Western Trail

The ridge the trail crossed here, the Brady Mountains, runs from west to east across Concho and McCulloch counties and reaches 2,021 feet. Salt, Cow and Onion gaps break it. When the Fort Worth and Rio Grande Railway reached Brady in 1903, ending the need for long drives from this county, it built a fenced and watered cattle trail 100 miles long from Sonora to Brady to feed its stock pens, and cut the trail back to Menard when the tracks got there. The county's earlier move from open range to fences had brought only a few fence-cutting incidents.

What the plaque says

Western Trail Through this gap in hills called "Brady Mountains" passed the western cattle trail, also known as "Dodge City Trail", "Fort Griffin Trail", or "The Beef Trail". Said to have originated in 1876, this was the last of the old-time Texas cattle trails, those east of here having been closed by farmers. Large numbers of cattle were driven up this trail 1876 to 1886--over 200,000 head in 1881 alone. This trail started near Brownsville and came up to San Antonio, then northwest through or near Uvalde and Kerrville. Skirting the Nueces River, it came over the divide, crossing headwaters of the South Llano River, fording San Saba River at pegleg crossing, going downriver about six miles, then turning north. Near Brady, feeder trails came from Fort McKavett and points west, and from San Saba, to the east. After leaving Cow Gap (likely so named from Cow Creek, about 500 yds. W of this marker), it went northwest and over the Colorado at "Beef Crossing" in Waldrip's Bend, then to Coleman, Baird, Fort Griffin and Vernon, spanning Red River at Doan's Crossing. Northward through Indian country it went to Dodge City, Kans., and later into Wyoming and Montana. This trail was of great worth to the territories it traversed. (1970)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Presidio de San Saba — 34 mi
  The ruins of the largest Spanish presidio in Texas, built in 1757 to guard a mission to the Lipan Apache, where the Comanche and their allies first turned back Spain's frontier.

More markers nearby

• Curtis Airfield — 6.7 mi
• General Ben McCulloch, C.S.A. — 8.9 mi
• McCulloch County — 8.9 mi
• Rochelle Depot — 10 mi