If you can’t beat ‘em

By "The Cowboy" Jim Gray

On May 1, 1869, Z. Taylor announced in the Dallas Herald that he was opening the Texas Store in Abilene. The opening was, in effect, the acceptance that his hometown of Junction City could not compete with the sensation created by Joseph McCoy at Abilene.

When McCoy began to promote the idea of a cattle market west of the settled country of Missouri and eastern Kansas the concept was so revolutionary that he was readily dismissed as a dreamer.

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