In history classes when I was young, you would hear about how the Plains Indians would use every part of the buffalo for something or other, and the "senseless slaughter" of the Plains buffalo by the white people.
It wasn't "senseless" slaughter. There was nothing on the Plains except buffalo and grass, and humans can't eat grass. If your objective was to get rid of the Indians, the best way to do it was to eliminate the buffalo, leaving the Indians with a choice of moving or starving.
Indians drove entire buffalo herds over cliffs, and yet white man is the one who is guilty of killing them all off.
That tale of using every part of the buffalo but the bellow is bullroar anyway. It was not uncommon for the Indians to stampede massive herds of bison over cliffs, then to pick off the animals that had been injured by the fall. And it was highly unlikely that a single tribe could even begin to process the thousands of animals killed in such wholesale fashion, let alone to use every part of them.
It’s just more “Dances with Wolves” mythology.
Pork was more popular than beef here in Easter NC generations ago because it cost less. I remember my friend who grew up during those times tell me that the only part of the hog that they threw away was the squeal.
****the “senseless slaughter” of the Plains buffalo by the white people.****
It makes for a good story but before the Indians had the HORSE they would drive whole herds of buffalo over cliffs, use what they could and leave the rest to rot.
Indians on a war raid would often kill a buffalo, eat part of the hump and leave the rest to rot.
The senseless slaughter by the White Man did take place, but in order to open the plains for farmers. Could you immagine what a herd of half a million buffalo would do to our farm land from Texas to Canada? Could we even have the modern cities on the high plains without the elimination of the buffalo? They would have to issue BUFFALO STAMPEDE ALERT on all the interstates and highways between Illinois and the Rockies.