Marker to commemorate cattle drive days

CULBERTSON -- The Culbertson Community Improvement Program and the Nebraska Humanities Council plan a ceremony to place a marker commemorating cattle drives through Hitchcock County Sunday, Nov. 4, at 3:30 p.m.

The marker will be placed at the corner of Highway 17 and Wyoming Street, at the Culbertson ambulance barn, in remembrance of cattle drives that followed "The Western" trail from Texas to Canada between 1874 and 1894.

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The cattle drives entered Hitchcock County from the southeast, turned north at about the location of the Willard Hoyt farm and east of the Stone Church and the Grove Cemetery, and then ambled into Culbertson.

The Rotary Clubs of Vernon, Texas, where the Western begins, started the marker project as a "Rotary Centennial" project, and the McCook Rotary Club has helped in the planning of the Culbertson marker ceremony.

Marla Matkin, a speaker with the Nebraska Humanities Council, will present a program called "Cattle Towns and Soiled Doves," portraying a lady of the times called "Contessa."

"Contessa" describes frontier cowtowns and the "painted ladies" and other characters who inhabited them. She brings to mind a time when "men lived by their guns and women lived by their wits."

Matkin's presentation is made possible by the Nebraska Humanities Council and the Culbertson Community Improvement Program.

The day's activities will also include a presentation by a representative of today's cattle industry, a question-and-answer period and refreshments.

The public is invited to attend.