The Outlet

Andy Adams (1859–1935) was born to pioneer parents in Indiana, worked in Texas for ten years driving cattle, and settled in Colorado Springs, where he began writing his "real" stories of cowboys in the West.

While still in his teens, Adams ran away from home. He eventually made his way to Texas, where he found work as a cowboy. From 1882 to 1893, Adams witnessed firsthand the golden era of the Texas cattle industry, a time when the cowboys ran cattle on vast open ranges still relatively unrestricted by barbed wire fences. In 1883, he made the first of many cattle drives along the famous cattle trails running north from Texas to the cow towns of Kansas. As farmers began to challenge the ranchers for control of the land, Adams witnessed the gradual fencing-in of the cattle country that would eventually end the short age of the open range. He made his last cattle drive in 1889.