Roosevelt's Ranches: The Maltese Cross and the Elkhorn [first edition]

In the 1880s, Theodore Roosevelt established two large cattle ranches in the heart of the beautiful North Dakota Badlands. Each ranch had its own personality. The Maltese Cross was the real center of his ranching operations, while the famous Elkhorn was his refuge, a place where he could grieve the loss of his wife and his mother, heal his soul, and write his books. This was the heyday of the open-range ranching era on the northern plains, a time of 1500-mile cattle drives, massive roundups, terrifying stampedes, outlaws, and vigilantes. Roosevelt reveled in all of it, but the importance of his ranches goes far beyond the fact that for a few years they were home to one of our most popular presidents. The western adventure that began only as a plan to shoot a buffalo lasted fourteen years and left Theodore Roosevelt a changed man. Roosevelt became the most important conservationist in the history of the Presidency. His commitment to conserving our natural resources was formed between 1884 and 1887 when he lived and ranched in North Dakota. The ranches are significant for another reason too, for here this privileged young man learned an invaluable lesson about understanding and getting along with regular folks. The cowboys in the Dakota Badlands cared not at all that he was wealthy, that his name was Roosevelt, or that he was a member of the New York State Assembly. They cared if he was honest, if his word was good, and if he held up his end on a long cold night of riding the big circle on the roundup. Accident of birth mattered not at all. Ability, merit, grit, and hard work counted for everything. Roosevelt took these lessons to heart and they served him well. He had arrived as a dude but he left as a leader. No wonder he said, years later, that if it had not been for his years in North Dakota, he never would have become president of the United States.