Editing Murdo MacKenzie

{{Short description|Cattle baron}}
{{for|the leader of the Free Church of Scotland|Murdo MacKenzie (minister)}}
[[File:Matador chuck wagon.jpg|thumb|upright=1.25|Murdo MacKenzie (black hat) and cowboys at the Matador Ranch chuck wagon, 1891]]
'''Murdo MacKenzie''' (April 24, 1850 – May 30, 1939) was twice (1891–1901 and 1922–1937) manager of the Scots-owned Matador Land and Cattle Company, and founding president of the American Stock Growers Association, for whom he testified before congress and the [[Interstate Commerce Commission]]. His testimony led to passage of the [[Hepburn Act]] of 1906 which eased railroad fares for western shippers.

President [[Teddy Roosevelt]] appointed him to the [[National Conservation Commission]] in 1908, and it was Mackenzie, then manager of the Brazil Land, Cattle and Packing Company, with whom Roosevelt stayed when he visited [[Brazil]] in 1913.

==Biography==
MacKenzie was born near [[Tain, Scotland|Tain]], [[Ross-shire]], [[Scotland]], where he attended parish school and graduated from the [[Tain Royal Academy]] in 1869. He served in a law office and in the British Linen Bank, then as factor for [[Sir Charles Ross, 9th Baronet|Sir Charles Ross]]'s estate at [[Balnagown Castle]]. He married Isabella Stronach MacBain in 1876 and fathered five children with her. Among these was his son, David G. (Dode) MacKenzie, who, in December 1909, was shot in LeBeau, South Dakota, while also working for Matador. 

He sailed to the United States in 1885 to accept an offer to manage the Prairie Land and Cattle Company in [[Trinidad, Colorado]]. After becoming a [[naturalized citizen]], he was elected mayor of Trinidad in 1891, before accepting the directorship at Matador.

He died, aged 89, in 1939 in [[Denver, Colorado]], where he is buried.

The town of [[Murdo, South Dakota]] was named for Mackenzie.<ref>{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=REtEXQNWq6MC&pg=PA993 | title=Historical Gazetteer of the United States | publisher=Routledge | date=May 13, 2013 | access-date=30 November 2013 | author=Hellmann, Paul T. | pages=993| isbn=978-1135948597 }}</ref>

In 1981, he was inducted into the [[Hall of Great Westerners]] of the [[National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum]].<ref>{{cite web |title=Hall of Great Westerners |url=https://nationalcowboymuseum.org/hall-of-great-westerners/ |website=National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum |access-date=November 22, 2019}}</ref>

==In popular culture==
MacKenzie appears as a character in the fictional [[Scrooge McDuck]] comic book, ''[[The Buckaroo of the Badlands]]'' (1992), set in 1882-1883, in which the poor, newly hired Scrooge, helped by Theodore Roosevelt, rescues a championship bull belonging to MacKenzie. At the beginning of ''[[Raider of the Copper Hill]]'' (1993), set in 1884, Scrooge leaves Mackenzie to prospect for copper while his former employer drives his herd to Texas.

==Notes==
{{Reflist}}

==References==
* Clarke, Mary Whatley, (June 1951) "Murdo Mackenzie", ''Cattleman''.
* Douglas, C. L., (1939/1968) ''Cattle Kings of Texas'' Dallas: Baugh; reprinted Fort Worth: Branch-Smith.
* Hayter, Delmar J. {{Handbook of Texas|id=fmabf|name=Murdo MacKenzie}}
* Pearce, W. M. (1964) ''The Matador Land and Cattle Company''. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press.
* Pearce, W. M. {{Handbook of Texas|id=aqm01|name=Matador Land & Cattle Company}}
* Blasingame, Ernest "Ike", (1958) "Dakota Cowboy: My Life in the Old Days". Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press.

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:MacKenzie, Murdo}}
[[Category:1850 births]]
[[Category:1939 deaths]]
[[Category:19th-century Scottish businesspeople]]
[[Category:20th-century Scottish businesspeople]]
[[Category:19th-century mayors of places in Colorado]]
[[Category:People from Tain]]
[[Category:American cattlemen]]
[[Category:Scottish emigrants to the United States]]
[[Category:Naturalized citizens of the United States]]