and Mountainman
Jim Bridger at Pioneer Square in Westport in Kansas City. In 1848, Alexander Majors started hauling overland freight on the
Santa Fe Trail. On his first trip, he set a new time record of 92 days for the 1564-mile (2500 km) round trip. Eventually he employed 4,000 men, including a 15-year-old lad named Billy Cody, later known as
Buffalo Bill. Cody became one of his most famous Pony Express riders. In 1853, Majors was awarded federal contracts to haul supplies to
United States Army posts along the Santa Fe Trail. Majors helped establish the
Kansas City, Missouri stockyards. This became a center of marketing and shipping beef from Texas and the Southwest by railroad to the East Coast and Midwest. In 1854, he teamed up with
William B. Waddell and
William Hepburn Russell. Majors was responsible for the freighting part of the business, Waddell was to manage the office, and Russell was to use his Washington DC contacts to acquire new contracts. Waddell chose be a silent partner, so the firm was initially called "Majors and Russell". In the 1850s, their firm Russell, Majors and Waddell and the short-lived Pony Express were major businesses, contributing to the growth of Kansas City. Majors was very religious and had a Bible issued to every man in the freighting company. Majors' Overland Stage Company was part of a wide network that reached into the frontier West. Fifteen years later, changes in transportation had put the company out of business. On the Missouri side of State Line at 81st Street, Majors built a two-story frame farmhouse in 1855 (later a museum). From there, wagon trains headed west loaded with goods from his warehouse located on the Missouri River. In Westport, Majors operated a meat-packing plant. It supplied the trains with cured pork, soap and candles. For 15 years Majors and his far-flung interests were highly successful. ==See also==