cow town

noun

1
: a town or city that serves as a market center or shipping point for cattle
2
: a usually small unsophisticated town within a cattle-raising area

Examples of cow town in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web
These examples are automatically compiled from online sources to illustrate current usage. Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
If Great Bend failed to achieve the notoriety of Dodge City or other cow towns, Moses’s fellow citizens gave him much of the credit. Katy Roberts, Washington Post, 29 July 2024 And while Livingston is far from a cow town — more like a fancy-fly-rod-and-real-estate town — Campione still stands out. Melissa Clark, New York Times, 18 Sep. 2023 In the sporting world, all eyes were on tiny Shelby, Montana, a two-block cow town where on July Fourth heavyweight champion Jack Dempsey, the Manassa Mauler, would defend this title against Tommy Gibbons. Andrew Wolfson, The Courier-Journal, 30 June 2023 In proud but struggling little communities throughout rural Northern California, grand old hotels hark back to when these places were booming Gold Rush towns, timber towns and cow towns. Laura Blasey, Los Angeles Times, 30 May 2023 Peoria morphed from cow town to boom town, tripling in population to about 190,000 today. Tom Krasovic, San Diego Union-Tribune, 25 Mar. 2023 Daruszka, who speaks on rail topics at libraries and local historical societies, is leading a campaign to make more people aware of how railroads fueled Chicago’s explosive growth from frontier cow town to America’s third largest city. Susan Degrane, chicagotribune.com, 4 Nov. 2021 Not a shining city on a hill, but a little cow town in the mountains. Erin Sood, Dallas News, 1 July 2021 Residents rolled their eyes at the depictions of Marshall as a cow town in the wave of pre-draft stories on Lance. Eric Branch, San Francisco Chronicle, 13 May 2021

Word History

First Known Use

1885, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Time Traveler
The first known use of cow town was in 1885

Dictionary Entries Near cow town

Cite this Entry

“Cow town.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cow%20town. Accessed 14 Nov. 2024.

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