goodnight loving trail

• Business partners charles goodnight and oliver loving recognised gaps in the beef market for new populations in the west
• In 1866 government mismanagement was leading to starvation in the navajo indians on reservations near fort summer 
• Goodnight and loving established the goodnight loving trail through hostile comanche territory to supply reservations they with 18 cowboys drove 2.000 cattle north.
• Huge commercial success they sold 800 cattle for $12,000 4 times what they would have got in texas
• Loving sold the remaining 1,200 to john iliff to start his ranch 
• Oliver loving was killed in 1867 by a comanche attack but goodnight carried on 
• Eventually goodnight was driving cattle hundreds of miles north to colorado and wyoming by the 1870s the wyoming cattle business was booming