Oklahoma City doesn’t quite know what to make of its stockyards. Most roads skirt the area, as if the manure and lowing of cattle were relics. The yards are smelly and noisy. Trucks carting tons of manure tumble through Stockyard City. Mud-caked trailers bounce in under a gate with a bleached cow skull.

The city misses a bet in taking this complex off its tourist destinations. It remains open to the public and the world’s largest cattle auction would be exotic to easterners. They even have a destination restaurant, The Cattleman Cafe, where pork and chicken don’t figure prominently in the fare.

In an amphitheater seating a hundred or so, bidders watch the cows being tugged through to a small moat, where they bellow, at least the ones with spirit. Buyers who’ve seen a few hundred thousand cattle bid for the herd; those without a good price go back home or end up as hamburger. The Cattleman Cafe gets its beef extremely fresh.