Hardin and Riley Cattle Operations
Hardin and Riley: Cattle Kings of the Oregon Frontier
Before Harney County had roads, railways, or even a name, two men were carving out a cattle empire on its vast, wind-swept plains. James Hardin and Amos Riley didn’t just raise cattle—they helped shape the early economic backbone of Central and Eastern Oregon.
Hardin was born in Kentucky in 1830, and by 1853, he had crossed the plains with his family in an ox-drawn wagon, settling in Sonoma County, California. A natural entrepreneur, he quickly made his mark in the cattle business, driving herds across the plains six times before the completion of the transcontinental railroad. By 1859, he'd opened a general store in Petaluma, and two years later partnered with Amos Riley—an investor from Maryland who brought capital and business savvy to the operation.
While Hardin wrangled cattle and blazed new trails, Riley financed their expansion, helping to open additional stores across northern California. By 1870, the partners sold off their mercantile businesses to focus entirely on ranching. Hardin, already managing a vast herd in Nevada’s Quinn River Valley, was soon dubbed the “Cattle King of Humboldt,” running over 30,000 head of cattle in a region newly connected to eastern markets via the railroad at Winnemucca.
The duo's ambitions led them north. In 1875, they established the Double-O Ranch on the northwest edge of Harney Lake—one of the first permanent pioneer settlements in what would become Harney County, Oregon. The ranch became a central post along long-distance cattle trails competing with Texas herds for the new grazing empires of the Northern Plains.
But the frontier wasn’t quiet. In 1878, during the Bannock War, Native forces burned the original Double-O Ranch buildings. That same year, the only pitched battle of the conflict occurred just north of the ranch, near Silver Creek. Despite the destruction, Hardin and Riley rebuilt. The war—and its devastating aftermath for the Northern Paiute people—reshaped the political landscape of eastern Oregon, and the cattlemen carried on, expanding their reach into new territory.
Their herds spread from Harney Valley into the remote ranges of Twelvemile Table in Crook County. A post office was established at each end of their domain—one called Hardin and the other, Riley—each a small but lasting mark of their presence on the land.
Hardin and Riley were among the largest cattle operations in the West at the time, rivaled only by giants like Glenn and French, John Devine, and Miller and Lux. Yet the partnership eventually shifted. In 1892, Hardin sold his Oregon holdings to Riley, who—though not a hands-on rancher—occasionally visited while delegating management to trusted overseers like Ike Foster.
By 1903, Riley sold the Double-O Ranch to William “Bill” Hanley, a new-era cattleman who modernized the operation and turned the ranch into a rustic retreat for friends, politicians, and industrialists. The curtain quietly closed on the Hardin and Riley chapter. James Hardin passed away in 1905, followed by Amos Riley in 1908.
Today, the ghost of their empire lingers in place names and weathered ranch fences. What began as cattle trails and scattered posts grew into a regional industry that helped settle Oregon’s high desert. Hardin and Riley may not be household names, but their legacy is etched into the rangeland—two unlikely partners who gambled on the frontier and helped shape a rugged corner of the American West.