Children of the West Books

In Teddy’s Cattle Drive, Marc Simmons tells the story of E. C. Teddy Abbott, an eleven-year-old Nebraska boy whose first cattle drive takes place during the 1870s. Teddy’s father purchases a herd of beef cattle in Texas and reluctantly allows his son to accompany him to Texas to drive the cattle to their ranch in southeastern Nebraska along the Chisholm Trail. After arriving in Texas, his father decides to take the train back to Nebraska instead of accompanying the Longhorns north, leaving Teddy in the care of the sage trail boss, Vito Cross, whom Teddy wants to impress. Teddy is thrust into cowboy life with few skills and is forced to use his own ingenuity to learn the traits necessary for living on the trail. Teddy helps prepare the meals and wrangle loose horses during the day. Before the cattle drive reaches Nebraska, Teddy has worked hard to prove his worth to the band of experienced cowboys and most of all, to his father. Ronald Kil’s illustrations add another dimension to Simmons’s descriptions of Teddy’s cattle trail adventures.