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The Winnipeg Tribune
Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada Jan 3, 1918
CANADIAN BISON FOR WAR RELIEF
Member of U.S. Society Says Canada Plans To Use Animals For Food
PITTSBURGH, Pa, “The bison, or buffalo, is the most valuable animal in the world,” declared Ernest Harold Baynes, the founder and one of the three, honorary members of the Bison society, at the Schenley hotel. “Its flesh is almost indistinguishable from beef of cattle; its wool can be woven into stockings, gloves, and other fabrics easily, and the garments will wear like iron, while a robe made from its hide brings a price equal to that of the whole carcass of a good sized steer. The wool from a bison is far stronger and just as soft as that from sheep, and the only drawback to it as a commodity is that it must be made into colored fabrics, for the wool is of a brown color that cannot be bleached without damaging It.
“The Canadian government,” continued Mr. Baynes, “appreciates the value of the bison, both as a source of food and for its wool and hide. The government has a buffalo reservation of 122,000 acres in the vicinity of Wainwright, Alberta, on which are 2,600 buffalo, the entire acreage being fenced.’ The vast herd is rapidly increasing in number in about the same ratio as ordinary, well kept domestic cattle. The Canadian government sees in its vast herd of buffalo a great future source of food and fabric supply. “
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Boise Pemrose (ie Boies Penrose) at Zoo 1918-1920
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The Philadelphia Inquirer
Philadelphia, Pa. Feb. 21, 1918
Protest Killing of Bison
A telegram protesting against, a reported plan to kill bison in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, to feed the park’s bears, as a war economy measure, was sent today by Edmund Seymour, of this city, president of the American Bison Society, to the Park Commissioners of San Francisco. “The amount of saving that could be accomplished would be infinitesimal,” Mr. Seymour said, “and the harm done would be out of all proportion to the amount of saving effected. There are only 2000 or 3000 bison left in this “country.”
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Altoona Tribune
Altoona, Pennsylvania Feb. 2, 1918
CANADA NOW THE HOME OF THE WORLD’S GREATEST BUFFALO HERD
National. Reserve Near Wainwright Has More Than 2,000 of the Former Lords of the Plains –Is a Buffalo Paradise
By Peter P. Carney Editor National Sports Syndicate The largest herd of buffalo in the world is now owned by Canada. They form a picturesque group as they roam over the new national reserve set apart for them near Wainwright, a city that has sprung up 125 miles east of Edmonton, Alberta, Canadians recognized the feed of notion if the bison were to be preserved, and before Americans realized it they had purchased the entire herd of 600 from Michael Pablo, of Montana, who had protected them on his ranch near Ravalli.
In the Wainwright national park were placed more than 600 buffalo, which were transported across the international boundary line by train from the Pablo ranch. The rounding up and loading on the cars of this large number of untamed animals and their young was no light task, and after a long period of hard work, more than 160 of the most unruly had been left behind, having stampeded every time an attempt was made to drive them toward a corral.
The natural increase in the herd has brought the number to nearly 1,000. In the present favorable environment, it is expected that they will multiply rapidly.
History of the Herd.
The history of this herd, now the largest In the world, dates back to 1873 when a Pend Oreille Indian: captured four little bison calves two bulls and two heifers by cutting them out of a stampeded herd on the Flathead reservation in Montana.
The Indian in question gave them to the Mission of St. Ignatius, where they were kept as pets and became as domesticated as ordinary cattle. When the heifers were four years old each had a calf. From that time on they gradually increased in number, until in 1884, there were 13 head, and, finding the care of them too great a tax, the Mission decided to sell them. Ten head were bought for $250 apiece by Pablo, who was shrewd enough to see that specimens of what was even then almost an extinct animal would eventually become very valuable.
Pablos Made a Fortune.
The herd increased under his supervision, and in a few years, it became possible to sell specimens at high prices. Some idea of the average rate of increase may be deduced from the observed fact that half the cows give birth to calves every year, while twin calves are not uncommon. As a rule, the bison calf is a very hardy creature.
In 1906, Hon. Frank Oliver, then Canadian Minister, of the Interior, obtained for, the Dominion government an option on the 600 head, and they were bought for $200,000. The “round-up” lasted two months, and was carried out by 75 cowboys, and was accomplished with a loss of less than 1 per cent. Today the herd numbers 2077.
Range of 107,000 Acres.
Although kept within the boundaries of the reserve the bison can hardly be said to be in confinement. Their stamping ground covers an area of 107,000 acres 165 square miles. It is 25 miles in an air line the longest way across. A wire fence eight feet high and 73 miles long incloses it.
When the fence was completed it was found that 12 wild deer and one elk had been fenced in. Eighteen small lakes and a number of streams are within the park. Prairie chickens, ducks and other game find a resting place here undisturbed by the hunter.
The park is truly a buffalo paradise. The grounds bear every evidence that in other days they have been a favorite haunt of the lords of the plains. Everywhere are outlines of old buffalo trails and wallows. These wallows now being reopened by the new denizens and once again the trails are being marked by the hoofs of the bison. The grasses are the kind that the buffalo specially like. As the ordinary span of a buffalo’s life is one hundred years, it may be that some of the herd are revisiting scenes of their youth.
U.S. Now at Work.
Aroused by the loss of these buffalo, the United States has established a national bison range in the Flathead Indian reservation in Montana, comprising 12,800 acres, near the towns of Ravalli and Dixon, and it was stocked by the American Bison society. Some animals for a nucleus may be obtained from a herd of about 80, owned by the Conrad estate near Kalispell.
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The Times Dispatch
Richmond, Virginia Feb 22, 1918
SAVES BISONS’ LIVES
Mayor of San Francisco Orders park Commissioner to Defer Slaughter.
SAN FRANCISCO. February 21.The lives of the nine buffalo bulls in Golden Gate Park, which were to have been slain as a food conservation measure, were saved to-day by Mayor Rolph, who offered to give any one a buffalo who would agree to take care of It. A day or two ago the Mayor ordered the park commissioners to hold up their plans for killing the bisons.
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San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco, California Feb 22, 1918
Friends Urge Sportsman to Take Bison Park Animals Would Find ‘Happy Home” on Big Ranch
The Board of Park Commissioners has offered to give nine bison to any person that will take the cute little beasts from Golden Gate Park and give them a roomy home care and lots of food.
A.King Macomber the multi-millionaire sportsman has a 30,000-acre ranch near Hollister. Part of it has been made into a golf course and part is devoted to corrals and pasture for thoroughbred horses but, a part big enough for nine buffalo to move about in comfort remains in the primeval state dear to the hearts of bison of the old school.
Friends of Macomber have suggested that the nine bison would lend to his ranch and air of the old-time West. The only wild animals now on 30,000 acres that once were the habitat of many branches of the kingdom of beast are birds. Macomber’s friends are urging him to add buffalo.
According to members of the Park Commission, the bison at Golden Gate Park have become quite civilized, they would have sense enough not to wander over the golf course or pick quarrels with Macomber’s horses.
The buffalo would appreciate Macomber’s kindness according to Park policemen and others that have come to know them well. Occasionally one of the old bulls stands mournfully in a corner of the corral and tears drop while he sees a vision of the good old days when there were no pens and a buffalo could go where he liked.
The boundless woods and plains would be past the thing to put the pride of ancestry back in the hearts of these bison” a policeman said yesterday “ and they are no trouble to keep.”
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The Des Moines Register
Des Moines Iowa April 14, 1918
Bison Family Exhibit
In a large glass case, a bison family is on exhibition. The great bull was one of the herd of bison kept by C. F. Singmaster at Keota, Ia. It is a monster animal. It weighed 2,100 pounds when it was killed, and with its great head and shaggy mane presents a somewhat terrifying aspect. The most interesting member of the group is the tiny bison calf, which was one day old when it was trampled to death by the rest of the herd. “So far as I know,” says Professor Stepan, “this is the only bison group in the country containing a specimen so young.”
The value of this exhibit is $8,000 according to the professor. It appears that museum exhibits of this kind all have a market value and that lists of them are sent out to collectors from time to time quoting prices just as is done with any other commodity.
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San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco, California 26 May 1918
Rancher Planning To Produce a New Type Beef Cattle Gets Buffalo Bulls From G G Park to Cross With Durham Stock
HAMILTON CITT May 25, If the plans of Frank Weston a farmer and stock raiser with extensive holdings Ii the river district north of here are carried to fruition a new type of beef cattle will have been Introduced among Californias herds
Weston has received two yearling buffalo bulls from the Golden Gate Park bison herd and announces that they are to be bred to Durham cows in his big herd.
Weston says he believes the hybrid caused by the crossing of the bison with the Durham cattle will prove a superior beef – producing animal.
According to Superintendent McLaren of the Golden Gate Park Zoo, the crossing of the buffalo with certain breeds of cattle has been effected in the Eastern states but has not been attended by marked success. Despite this, however, Weston is determined to make the experiment and paid for the crating and transportation or the young buffalo bulls, now grazing with his Durham flock of cattle
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The Roberts Herald
Roberts Illinois June 19, 1918
Saving Bison, Elk and Antelope
The United States had within its big-game reservations in the Northwest last July, when the official count was made, 246 head of buffalo, 184 of elk and 49 of antelope. The bison herd on the National range in Montana had Increased to 194 from 37 placed on the range in the fall of 1909. Antelope are harbored at the Wind Cave preserve in South Dakota, where the small herd is steadily increasing. Antelope born on the range are wilder and apparently hardier than those transferred to the refuge, and it is believed that in time a satisfactory herd of these beautiful and rapidly disappearing animals will be built up.
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Wise County Messenger
Decatur Texas July 5, 1918
Canada Breeds Buffalo
An advisory board on wild life protection has recently been appointed by the Canadian government, and special efforts will be made to preserve the fur-bearing animals and big game that constitute the chief natural resource of the Northwest territories. In this connection, it is interesting to learn that more than 8.000 head of bison are now under government protection in Canada. These Include about 2.400 in the herd, originally of 750 head, purchased in the United States in 1907. And kept in the buffalo park at Wainwright, Alberta; and a wild herd of about 500 in the Peace River region, southwest of Great Slave lake. The Canadian government is carrying on experiments in crossing bison with domestic cattle.—Scientific American Magazine
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The Missoulian
Missoula, Montana July 25, 1918
WANT FLATHEAD PROJECT HELPED
State Council of Defense Asks Government to Hurry Work
TO USE BISON RANGE
Urge Opening of Reserve to Stockmen as Result of Dad Drouth
. Resolution urging the government to complete the Flathead reclamation project and to open the national bison reserve near Ravalli to limited stock grazing were passed by the Montana State Council of Defense in Helena Tuesday, according to word received here yesterday. Both resolutions were introduced by Stanley Scearce of Ro-nun,. Ronan, who attended the meeting as a representative of the Missoula County Council of Defense.
At the same meeting, the state council urged that the federal government extend financial aid to Montana farmers damaged by drouth. This resolution was introduced by the presidents of the various farm bureaus and other business interests in the drouth-stricken areas of the state.
Would Coat $3,000,000.
The Flathead resolutions are especially important, as they suggest practicable means of extending needed aid to the farmers of the Flathead country. Completion of the reclamation project would give irrigation to a large additional area. Only about $3,000,000 is needed, it is estimated, to finish the project. The resolution in regard to the reclamation work follows:
“Whereas, It has come to the attention of the state council of defense that the former Flathead Indian reservation has a government Irrigation project something over one-half completed, which when completed, will materially add to the grain and food production of this state, and it being represented and made known to us that said project has a practical irrigable area of 120,000 acres and that ditches and laterals are already laid to serve some 80,000 acres and that a sum of $3,600,000 has already been appropriate and expended, and it being estimated that a $3,000,000 additional appropriation would complete same, and it being known that of the acreage above cited as being already served with ditches a certain amount of additional storage is required before sufficient water can be supplied, and it being shown that if a prompt appropriation is made that same will be placed in a highly and intensified productive stage.
“It is, therefore, concluded that this would be a good war measure as well as fulfilling a solemn obligation entered into with these settlers who went upon the land eight years ago.
“The results of using water on the 1917 and 1918 crops have shown high productiveness of this soil for cereals and hay, and the project has the endorsement of all engineers and soil experts who have investigated it, and it is, therefore, urgently requested by the state council of defense that congress speedily appropriate sufficient funds to complete same.”
Should Open Reserve.
Of only a little less importance to Flathead farmers is the resolution asking that the bison reserve be opened to grazing. The resolution points out that while farmers are in dire need of forage the government is reserving 17,000 acres of choice grazing land for a herd of 200 bison and elk. Without harm to the wild animals, it is said, horses and cattle to the number of five, or ten thousand could be fed there. The resolution concludes:
“It is hereby recommended that said reserve be made available for the bona fide settlers residing within the said district to pasture during the coming fall and winter horses and cattle not exceeding ten bead to each settler at a nominal fee of 25 cents per head, said applications to be approved by the local county council of defense under the supervision of the superintendent of said reserve.
It is believed that this is a necessary and patriotic war measure, that similar precedents have been established in Croat Britain and France where their public parks have been used for similar purposes, and it is urged that owing to the crop failures above referred to, that the settlers resident adjacent thereto are in great need of this help, that it will materially aid in carrying over their stock and putting in a crop during the season 1919. It is urged that immediate action be taken upon this important mention, that full protection be given to the purpose for which this reserve was set aside, that the perpetuity of the animals be in no way impaired and that immediate relief be granted.
Federal Aid to Farmers.
The other farm resolution points out the distressing situation in the northern Montana counties, caused by two successive dry years and asks the government to give aid. The farmers are in serious straits, the resolution say, and the local banks and merchant, as well as the state, have reached the limit of credit inasmuch as “food will win the war,” it is urged that the government give aid to the affected farmers in some way.
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Conrad Independent
Conrad, Montana Aug. 1, 1918
FIGHTING TO SAVE THE VANISHING REMNANTS OF THE VAST HERDS OF BUFFALO THAT WERE MIGHTY FACTOR IN WINNING THE WEST
A century ago there were from twenty to thirty million buffalo in the western portion of the American continent.
Today there are less than 1,500 in the United States, 500 of which are in Montana.
The building of the Union Pacific and other of the earlier transcontinental lines was made possible only because of the great available supply of buffalo meat.
The slaughter of the buffalo was the most rapid and terrible story of extinction of a great species of the animal kingdom in the history of the world.
Today in the federal bison reserve in Montana and in the Yellowstone National Park an effort is being made to breed sufficient of the former monarchs of the plains to leave a handful for posterity to gaze upon.
In the southwestern part of the Flathead Indian reservation, at the Junction of the Pend d’Oreille and Jocko rivers, is the National Bison park, the smallest of Montana’s national parks, but of peculiar interest in connection with the history of the state and of vital importance in the fight being made by a few thinking people to preserve and build up for posterity a herd of these former monarchs of the plains.
Upon the beautiful uplands of the Flathead, where the buffalo once roamed in countless thousands, the government purchased 18,000 acres of land and designated it as a national park and game preserve for the propagation of native bison, and a herd of nearly 200 head of buffalo now inhabits the tract.
The climax to the rolling, upland country is the continental divide. A high hill, “Quilseeh,” the Salish word for Red Sleep, rises to an imposing height about the center of the park and thence the land slopes downward in every direction. To the south it extends to the Jocko river; to the west to the Pend d’Oreille river; to the north to Mission creek, and eastward to the Mission valley. From these uplands one may see the beautiful and historic Jocko valley billowing away in gentle swells toward the horizon which is barred by the Mission mountains, a castellated range glowing royal blue in the rarified air, until, rising upward, its ultimate peaks are transfigured by chastening snow.
A Montana Paradise
The general altitude of the Bison park is high and the contour uneven, its surface being cloven by deep ravines. A perpetual water supply is furnished by perennial springs and streams. The ravines are well wooded with yellow pine, tamarack, and Douglas fir, and within their depths, which hold the moisture, grass grows as high as the waist of a man and knee-high upon the slopes, while springtime weaves into the green warp the gay and multi-colored pattern of wild flowers. The gulches are not only a grazing ground, but in winter, when blizzards drive their white hosts of snow across mountain range and valley, fastening the earth in an armor of ice, which takes away at once the footing and the food of animals, the buffalo may find protection in the sheltered recesses.
This country, too, is rich in romance and history. Here the Flathead Indians have dwelt until encroaching civilization has beaten them back. Every gulch and ridge bears a name preserving a fragment of fading tradition in a tongue which reaches our ears in lessening whispers. Thus a ridge and gulch are known as “Inskaltesshin,” or “A Dead Dragon;” another ridge is “Wheewheetlchaye,” or “Many Grizzly Bear,” named for a chief of the Pend d’Oreille Indians; and so on through the catalog of landmarks.
The Indians feel a warm and loving interest in the buffalo. Indeed the history and fate of both are strangely akin. Both in their peculiar domain were rulers of the inland continent; both were driven back and conquered by the white man, and both are now existing by the mercy and what too many white men would call “charity” of their old-time foe.
The Famous Pablo Herd
One of the greatest mistakes the government has made in recent years was the passive allowing of the sale of the great Pablo herd of buffalo on the Flathead reservation to the Canadian government when 400 fine buffalo were shipped across the line to the Canadian buffalo reserve. The sale of the Pablo herd was forced upon its owner, whose ranges were on the Flathead Indian reservation, by the lands being thrown open to settlement. Pablo and his partner, Allard, tried in vain to dispose of the animals to the United States, but failing, with the loss of his range merely a matter of time and financial ruin threatening him, the animals were sold at last to Canada.
However, it was the sale of the Pablo herd which aroused the people of the United States, through a consciousness of a great loss, and brought about the agitation for a national bison park.
The Pablo herd was estimated to number 625 buffalo. All but ten were purchased by Canada, but owing to their extreme wildness and the consequent difficulty of bringing them from remote and inaccessible fastnesses where they had ranged for years, only 400 were delivered in the original shipment which took place in the autumn of 1907. At the same season during the next year, the most skilled cowboys of the Flathead country assembled to participate in an event which proved to be one of the most spectacular of late years in the west the roundup of the buffalo “outlaws.”
Buffalo Are Frenzied
Miles of fence were built to corral and thus capture the animals, but the frenzied beasts, as though conscious that they were being driven from their native soil, stampeded and the greater number escaped. Once more, in 1909, the most expert horsemanship and roping by the finest cowboys of the state failed to round up the last, lingering renegades of the famous band. They had earned their freedom. The scattered remnant of what was our greatest herd still roams the untrodden wilds of the range of the Little Bitter Root.
Pablo started his herd in 1880 with about 30 buffalo saved from the ravages of slaughter on Wild Horse Island in Flathead lake.
The tragic history of the buffalo is an interesting one. These beasts were found roaming the western wilderness as early as 1585 by Coronado; they were seen by the first settlers in the Carolinas, and toward the end of the 18th century they lived in a wild state in Kentucky. They were encountered by the million by Lewis and Clark and by all other explorers who blazed the western trails. The number of buffalo in the great west less than a century ago was estimated at from 20,000,000 to 30,000,000.
Through the 60’s and 70’s enormous herds numbering hundreds of thousands were seen by the gold seekers crossing the plains. From days so remote that no record exists the Indians had hunted buffalo for meat without depleting their numbers, but with the coming of the white men their doom was sealed. Vast as were these primeval herds, they were forced to yield to a greed which could not be sated. Large numbers were killed merely for their tongues, which were considered a great delicacy, and their hides. One house in St. Louis bought 250,000 skins in 1871. From 1872 to 1874 millions of buffalo were killed. Some were slaughtered for food, some for commercial purposes, hundreds of thousands in the sheer wanton lust to kill.
” Railroads Spell Their Doom
The building of the first transcontinental railroads caused the slaughter of at least 250,000 buffalo for the food supply of the working crews. Many authorities have stated that the construction of the Union Pacific and Northern Pacific was made possible only through the then seemingly inexhaustible supply of buffalo meat. Not only did the flesh of the animals sustain life, but their hides protected workers and travelers from the keen winter blasts and furnished coats and shoes impervious to the deadening cold.
Finally, when trains traversed the wilderness, the tracks were lined with bleaching bones. The great barren wastes, haunted by spectral coyote and wheeling vulture, were one vast graveyard of unburied dead. And still, commerce was not done. Even these bones, the last poor remnants of the former undisputed kings of the prairies, were shipped east by trainloads for carbon. It was estimated that the bones shipped east would have filled enough cars to make one continuous train more than 7,000 miles long enough to more than fill two tracks from New York to San Francisco.
Some idea of the terrible swiftness of the decline of the buffalo may be gained by taking the statistics of the Kansas, Pacific and Santa Fe roads, which tell us that in the year 1874, more than ten million pounds of these bones, more than a million and a quarter pounds of buffalo hides and. over six hundred thousand pounds of buffalo meat were transported to the eastern market.
Today there are less than 1,500 buffalo In the United States, some 500 of which, are in Montana.
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Great Falls Tribune
Great Falls, Mont. Aug. 12, 1918
GOVERNMENT WON’T OPEN BISON RESERVE
Chief of Bureau Insists That Feeding Stock There Would Wipe Out Wild Game.
Special to The Daily Tribune. Helena, Aug. 11. Until conditions reach that stage where it is necessary to sacrifice everything in order to conduct the war, the bureau of biological survey is opposed to opening the game refuges of the country to domestic livestock, writes Edward Nelson, chief of the bureau, to Secretary Charles D. Greenfield of the state council of defense, concerning the resolutions adopted by the state council asking that the Flathead bison reserve be opened. Mr. Nelson states that reserve contains 1,800 acres and not 37,000 acres as the resolutions stated.
“Within the last few months,” he writes, “the matter of the utilization of the Montana bison range for grazing cattle has been proposed by several organizations. While it is true that there is considerable grazing within the inclosure of the Montana bison range, which is not utilized by the game animals yet to open this range to cattle would unquestionably completely destroy the bison range for its purpose of a game refuge.
“The bison herd in this range was donated” by private individuals with the understanding that they be provided with range and properly safeguarded. The introduction of cattle here would not only jeopardize this herd by the possibility of spreading diseases, but the general disturbance of the herd thru the presence of cattle and the work of handling them would have the most detrimental effect. In addition to the bison herd, there is the nucleus of an antelope herd being built up, which would certainly be completely destroyed if large numbers of cattle were introduced on this range. The welfare of elk and deer would also be jeopardized. In other words, the whole purpose, of the bison range would be destroyed.
“If the United States were in a condition where it became necessary to sacrifice everything in order to conduct the war. I should raise no objection to the utilization of the bison range for cattle. But no such desperate emergency now exists, and I consider it would be a most deplorable mistake to permit the use of this range for the purpose indicated.
“The government has set aside five large game reserves, of which the Montana bison range is one. in order that we may insure the perpetuation for the future of some of the most striking forms of the wild life which were formerly so abundant in the west. It appears to me that until the war needs become overwhelming: it should be a patriotic duty to safeguard such game preserves against destruction. It is certain that if they are occupied during the war, and thus practically destroyed, it will be a practical impossibility to replace them.”
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The Alma Record
Alma, Michigan Aug 15, 1918
“WILD LIFE OF MICHIGAN” AT STATE FAIR
3 pictures included in this article, unfortunately, they are not legible.
No. 2 – “ Wahhalla” the first American bison bull born in Michigan in over 1,000 years.
Following the bison or American buffalo, formerly a resident and again being bred in Michigan wilds.
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Buffalo Morning Express and Illustrated
Buffalo, New York Sep 16, 1918
Exhibit of bison for new home of Science society.
In old days the buffaloes had their stamping ground on Buffalo creek.
For the new “building of the Buffalo Society of Natural Sciences in Elmwood avenue, which is rapidly nearing completion, a new and interesting exhibit is being prepared by the taxidermist of the society, Mr. Santens. It is a group of six bison made from a dozen specimens one of which came from the game preserve of Austin Corbin in New Hampshire and the others from the Buffalo zoo. They represent all ages from the young calf to the full-grown adult bull. Each animal will be in perfect pelage, will be seen as he would exist in the wild state. He is being mounted after the latest method, the skins being tanned and placed on papier-mache models-instead of being stretched.ott plaster cast. The models are made by Mr.Santens and show excellent craftsmanship.
The new group is of especial interest because in the old day the buffaloes had their stamping ground on immigration journeys on Buffalo creek.
“In fact,” says Dr. Lee H. Smith, resident of the society, “it was from this buffalo wallow that the creek and the city have taken their names. In 1897 I had a conversation with Levi Morsman, who had spent all his life here and was then more than 90 years old and he told me that his father had taken him when he was a boy to a place “on Buffalo” creek: were the bison had a wallow. He said he remembered that his father had shown him where one animal had recently rolled in the mud and said that it was from that stamping ground, used each year by the buffaloes, that the creek and this city, got their names. Levi Morsman was a careful and truthful man and I am certain that his statement as to where Buffalo got its name is true.”
That the bison congregated at the wallow on their migratory journeys also is indicated by the bones which archaeologists have found there and which have been taken from Indian graves in that region. The basement and the first floor of the new building are completed. A second floor will now be added, but will not be used for exhibition purposes. The society plans to move in on November 1st and to take all its exhibits from the basement of the library, keeping the third floor of the library building until room can be found in the new building for the exhibition there.
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Asheville Citizen-Times
Asheville North Carolina Oct 14, 1918
FANCIER PRESENTS HERD OF BUFFALOES
SIX BISONS WILL BE SENT HERB SOON.
From the Stock of Austin Corbin, Wealthy New Hampshire Fancier – Given Through Society
A herd of six buffaloes is to be sent to the government’s Pisgah Forest game preserve, according to the announcement of the local forestry officer. The animals are to be the gift of the American Bison society, whose president. Edward Seymour has written that the bisons, will be shipped by express within the immediate future. They are from the Blue Mountain herd of Austin Corbin, a wealthy New Hampshire fancier who wants some of the animals included among those which the government has planned to maintain in Western North Carolina on a large scale.
It is not known just when the animals will arrive, but it is expected that it will be only a very short time. They will be shipped to Hominy station, from which point they will be transported in crates to the place of their future residence. Mr. Corbin’s herdsmen are experienced in shipping the animals and no doubt is entertained that the herd which has been selected for Western North Carolina will be received, here in splendid condition.
The government has about 500 acres of land fenced in for the animals pasture and the herd of buffaloes will make a welcome addition to the present flocks. There are no buffaloes there at present, plans which the government had made to send some to hominy having been interrupted by the outbreak of the war. Transportation conditions have been such that the government has made no effort to increase the number or the variety of the animals. Now, however, it Is understood. Mr. Seymour has perfected arrangements for delivering the presented herd. Some elk were sent to the pasture several months ago and the custodian recently counted two bulls, seven cows, and two calves. He believes that there are more than that within the enclosure, though. There are a good many deer there, too.
Eventually, it Is planned to make the local preserve one of the best in the country, the government having made ambitious plans for the care of the animals to be placed there. The preserve would have been stocked some time ago but for the war. The pasture is well fenced and immediately following the resumption of normal activities on the part of the forestry service, the Western North Carolina preserve will be found ready for the receipt of any animals that the government desires to send here.
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The Times Dispatch
Richmond Virginia Nov. 9, 1918
BISON FOR VIRGINIA ;
State May Be Induced to Purchase Several to Be Placed on Ranges
Virginia may be stocked with a small herd of bison. If the suggestion of William T. Hornaday, director of the New York Zoological Society, is acted on by the State
Director Hornaday stated that he knew of an available source, and that on his suggestion Louisiana and Oklahoma had turned a small herd of eight to ten beasts into their ranges, and that Wisconsin’s legislature was on the verge of following suit. The Wichita and Montana herds are of the same thriving blood mentioned by Mr. Hornaday.
The animals can be secured at $100 a head, which is only two-fifths of the lowest previous price on a bison. He suggests that eight to ten make the most successful herds, but says that seventy-five animals are available.
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Democrat and Chronicle
Rochester, New York Dec. 5, 1918
Rochester Has Six Bison
The report of the American Bison Society for 1917-1918, which was received yesterday by the Department of Parks shows that there are bison in captivity in the United States, of which fifty-five are in New York state. Of this number six are in the Rochester zoo. The .original pair of bisons were brought to this city in 1902 from Montana. Two of the bison are in Durand-Eastman Park and four in Seneca Park.
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The Wichita Beacon
Wichita, Kansas Dec 13, 1918
OKLAHOMA TO GET TEN BLUE MOUNTAIN BISONS
Oklahoma City, Dec 13. Ten of the finest specimens obtainable of bison will arrive In Oklahoma shortly from the range of the Blue Mountain Forest Association in New Hampshire, where State Game Warden G. A. Smith is at present, negotiating for their purchase. The state game and fisheries department makes the announcement that the bison are to be used for breeding purposes. Four of them will be placed on the state game preserve near Medicine Park and six will be turned out in the game Preserve in Osage County, near Bigheart, Ok.
