Chisholm Trail History

This was the famous trail that, after the US Civil War from about 1867-1879, brought longhorn cattle from Texas to rail heads in Abilene, KS and later, as the railroads expanded, to Ellsworth, Newton, KS, Wichita, KS, Caldwell, and Dodge City.

Family Connection The Chisholm Trail went fairly directly from Wichita to Abilene and generally followed what is now Kansas Highway 15 from Newton north to Abilene. To keep trail herds separated and grass available for grazing, the trail was often many miles wide. That would make parts of the trail probably only 5-10 miles west of the eventual farm of Isaac B. Good. IB's son Irvin claimed that the trail used to go along a small creek in the section just north of the I. B. Good farm. If so, that would have been the far eastern reaches of the trail.