5. Roosevelt predicted the disasters which befell his ranches in 1886-87
In one of the books Roosevelt wrote about life in the Dakotas, Hunting Trips of a Ranchman, he predicted that the boom in the cattle industry in the Badlands region of the Dakotas was doomed to collapse. In his view, there were simply too many cattle being bred for the land to sustain, though he was one of the ranchers participating in the industry. The growing season of 1886 was abbreviated by late spring and early winter, and during the winter cattle died by the thousands, with ranchers possessing inadequate fodder to feed them. Roosevelt was away that winter, traveling in Europe with his new wife, Edith Carow Roosevelt.
When he returned to the United States he learned of the financial disaster which had erased his investments in ranching and cattle, and he began to divest himself of both, though he continued to invest in cattle from the herds of his neighbors. The experiences he had in the Dakotas, and his widely read writings of them, established his reputation as a man of action, possessed of physical and moral courage, dedicated to the well-being of others. He re-entered New York politics rejuvenated, remarried, and determined to advance his political career as a leader of the progressive movement then took hold in American politics.