When researching locations for my second novel, Touched by Love, I visited the famed King Ranch in south Texas, between Corpus Christi and Brownsville–and fell in love with the rugged terrain and equally hardy people.

“The story starts in the mid-1830s with an eleven-year-old boy indentured by his destitute family to a jeweler in New York City.”

Sounds like one of our novels, doesn’t it? But it’s the start of the amazing story of Richard King, the King of Texas. After stowing away on a ship bound of the south of the United States, he worked his way to captain and finally steam boat owner, moving goods and passengers along the lower Rio Grande River.

Sometime in the middle of the 1800s, Captain King crossed a region of Texas known as the Wild Horse Desert. When he came upon the sweet water of the Santa Gertrudis Creek, he’d found home. King and his business partner purchased 15, 500 acres of Mexican land, a land grant known as Rincon de Santa Gertrudis. This acreage was the start of what is now the legendary King Ranch.

Based on a melding of the Southern Plantation and Mexican Hacienda styles of management, King built a dynasty near what is now Kingsville, Texas. When a terrible drought struck South Texas and Northern Mexico, King bought all the cattle from the townspeople of Cruillas, Mexico. Realizing he’d also taken their livelihood, King offered to hire all those who would move to his ranch. These expert stockmen and horsemen became known as Los Kineños–King’s people. Descendants of Los Kineños still live and work on the ranch today.

By the end of the Civil War, King’s ranch had grown to more than 146,000 acres, supporting thousands of head of his domesticated longhorn cattle. When he ran into a problem, such as the lack of quality saddles and tack for his vaqueros, he simply hired the finest craftsmen and moved them onto the ranch. [The Saddle Shop is still in operation: http://www.king-ranch.com/saddle_shop.html]

“Richard King’s sense of adventure was rivaled only by his vision and ability to seize on new business opportunities. In addition to tirelessly working to improve the ranch, he invested in building railroads, packinghouses, ice plants and harbor improvements for the port of Corpus Christi.”

“During this era, Robert J. Kleberg and King’s widow continued to improve and diversify the assets of King Ranch with agricultural development, land sales, and town building projects. In 1904, their efforts were instrumental in helping to build the St. Louis, Brownsville & Mexico Railway — as well as several towns along the newly laid track, including Kingsville. Before her death in 1925, Henrietta King had donated land and funds toward the construction of churches, libraries, and school projects (creating an oasis of community development) in this previously untamed land.”

The ranch’s innovations didn’t stop there. The number one registration in the American Quarter Horse Association Stud Book was from the King Ranch Quarter Horse program. They also produced the youhest horse ever to be inducted into the National Cutting Horse Association Hall of Fame, Mr. San Peppy. Assault, the 1946 winner of the Triple Crown, and Middleground, the 1950 winner of the Kentucky Derby and the Belmont Stakes, both came from King stock.

Today, the King Ranch is a huge operation, with more than 825,000 acres in multiply states and countries, and Running W brand appears on tens of thousands of the King Ranch’s Santa Gertrudis cattle, recognizable by their distinctive black-cherry colored hide.

If you want to know more, visit www.King-Ranch.com. Or better yet, plan a trip to the ranch. You’ll be very glad you did.

The Texas Rangers, one of the most well-known law enforcement agencies in the world, has an on-again off-again history. First established in 1823 by Stephen F. Austin to “act as rangers for the common defense, the Rangers were disbanded and reformed many times over the years, mostly at the whim of whatever politician was in power at the time. It wasn’t until 1987 that the Texas Legislature enacted a statute that made the Texas Rangers a permanent entity of the Department of Public Service.

Through those years, the Rangers have worn several different styles of badges. Contrary to legend, they didn’t start out with stars on their vests. The first Rangers carried a Warrant of Authority, signed by The Adjutant General, that granted them the right to enforce the law when and where they saw fit.

It wasn’t until 1889 that the first Texas Ranger badge was created. Made from a silver Mexican coin, this unofficial badge was made from a Mexican silver dollar by the Rangers riding the southern and western parts of the state. The five-pointed star design is thought to have come from the unofficial seal of the state first used in 1835.

It changed a bit over the years:

An official, state-issued badge didn’t come along until 1935.

And even that changed again in 1957:

In 1962, in a decision that the Director of the Texas Department of Public Safety called “going back to the tradition steeped Mexican silver badge worn by their predecessors during frontier days,” the department adopted their permanent badge.

The “wagon-wheel” design is a five-pointed star, symbolizing the “Lone Star” of Texas, supported by an engraved wheel. The oak leaves on the left side represent strength and the olive branch on the right signifies peace, just as they appear on the Texas State Seal. The center of the star is reserved for the Company designation or the rank of Sergeant or Captain or Senior Captain.

This is the star you will see on the uniform of every Texas Ranger, along with their boots, revolvers and signature white cowboy hats.

If you want to know more about the Texas Rangers, visit their website: www.texasranger.org. There’s some fascinating stuff on that site.

Whether you’re reading a western romance or watching a western movie, you’ll find that jails play some part in most of the storylines. And for good reason. Law enforcement was so crucial in the settlement of the West. There were lots of lawbreakers who had to be made to see the light so to speak.

I wrote about jails in two of my single titles and my story in the upcoming Give Me a Texas Ranger anthology that’ll release July 2010 features a jail break. I didn’t really set out to put jails in my stories. It just happened, you know kinda like not intending to gain weight happens.

There are tons of original old jails here in Texas. Some have been turned into museums, but surprisingly others are still in use after more than a hundred years. Just think how big the spiders are in those lockups and how smelly! Here’s one still being used that’s only 35 miles from where I live at Dickens, Texas.

 Some of the hoosegows resembled huge fortresses with thick walls and consisted of several stories and the sheriff and his family lived in them. These had a gallows built in.

              McCullough Co. Jail 1909                                                                                                                                 Archer Co. Jail

 Ellis Co. Jail built 1888

Others gave the appearance of being added as an afterthought. In very poor counties lacking access to funds they only had what’s called as a strap-iron jail created by strips of metal and must’ve been fashioned by a blacksmith from the looks of things. Strap-iron hoosegows were usually outdoors with no protection from the elements. Those had to have been really miserable places. The first one of these pictures below is from Mobeetie, Texas (or Hide Town which was its name first.) It was a wild and wooly place that entertained Bat Masterson and Pat Garrett among others.

The website www.texasescapes.com is a great source of information on early Texas towns and jails if you’re interested.

One special tidbit I gleaned from that site was that in some counties prisoners were farmed out to willing citizens to keep in their homes for $3.00 a day. I’d never heard that before. Of course, as you well imagine, my mind started whirling, thinking of all sorts of scenerios I could put in a story sometime!

Here’s one that was at a lawless place called The Flat, a town that sat below Ft. Griffin. In the 1870’s the commanding officer declared martial law and tried to clean up the little town that harbored men like John Wesley Hardin, Pat Garrett, Doc Holliday, Wyatt Earp. And women like Lottie Deno and Big Nose Kate. The Flat was a Butterfield Stage stop as well as a refuge for buffalo hunters and drovers since it sat smack in the middle of the cattle trails.

Do you have a favorite jail scene from a book or movie? Mine is the John Wayne movie El Dorado with James Caan and Robert Mitchum. Three-fourths of that movie took place in the calaboose.

Hey, there, from north Texas!  I’m thrilled to be blogging with you today and hope you enjoy it as much as I plan to! 

Although I’m a recent transplant to Texas from Alabama, I’m no stranger to this great state.  We’ve lived in Texas several times over the years, three times in El Paso, once in San Angelo, Austin, Frisco and now the northeast.  My husband’s family settled in southeastern Texas shortly before the Civil War and one of his great-uncles, among a company of volunteers from Georgia, was shot down after surrendering at Goliad. 

Too much detail?  My husband often tells me, “Quit researching and get to writing!”  Not that it stops me.  That’s what I love most about writing historical romance—the research.  And in Texas, where “Everything is Bigger!”, there’s plenty of history to be discovered.  I love to visit the sites of the actual events I write about.  Big events, especially the tragic ones, leave unmistakable energy at the site.  While writing Time’s Captive, I visited the Palo Duro Canyon.  I’d read that on the day General Mackenzie fired on the Comanche’s camp, he ordered his troops to round up the Comanche’s horses, then shoot and burn them.  Fourteen-hundred horses burned that afternoon while the Comanche women keened and wailed.  The men were too busy fighting at the time, but they mourned the loss soon enough.  Without their horses, the Comanche—often called the Lords of the Plains—were lost, destroyed. 

The day I visited, I stumbled around, looking for the place where the horses were burned, wandering through a thick copse of scraggly trees.  The ground beneath my feet had an odd feel, like sand, only coarser.  Finally, I came to an historical marker, where I learned that I’d been wandering around on the actual site of the burning.  Such a rush of emotion swept over me as I read that I almost fell to my knees, residual emotion from the site’s energy.  It was as if the Comanche’s sorrow hit me all at once, and the view of the sparse vegetation so paralleled the Comanche’s’ lives that I understood more than a book could ever have told me.  At day’s end, I found it hard to leave.

Not all my discoveries are tragic.  For instance, Lockhart, the actual town near which I set the fictitious town of Cedar Springs in Destiny’s Captive, holds a watermelon festival each year, complete with seed-spitting contests, eat-offs, cook-offs, you name it.  As a result, watermelons had to figure among the activities in the book.  (I’d wanted to include a “festival,” but the hero and heroine had other plans for this plot.)  Lockhart originally boasted a large complement of German immigrants and the town is famous for its long-lived barbeque establishment:  Kreuz’ (pronounced Kr?tzes).  (Absolutely incredible barbecue in a simple setting, true to its German roots.)  I considered having the hero and heroine meet over barbecue, but Kreitz’s hadn’t been established yet. 

I visited Lockhart years ago, before I ever dreamed of setting Jeremiah’s story there.  And, though I’ve lived in Austin (which so far ranks as our Top Pick), and been to the Texas Capital and most of the tourist sites around, I still needed to do more detailed research for the book.  For that I turned, as I generally do, to the Internet, where I discovered a real-life heroine:  Mrs. Angelina Eberly.  (Another discovery was that Angelina’s a pretty common name in Texas, past and present.)  This gutsy lady, an innkeeper, hated Sam Houston.  Who can blame her?  In the chaos that ensued after the fall of the Alamo, Houston ordered the town of San Felipe burned to keep it out of General Santa Anna’s hands, including the hotel Angelina and her deceased husband had founded, and upon which she relied for her living.  That didn’t deter Angelina.  She remarried, bought another hotel in Austin, which had been newly proclaimed the capital by Texas’ second governor, Mirabeau B. Lamar, and she started over. 

Unfortunately, Houston hated Lamar and called Austin “the most unfortunate site on earth for a government.”  He tried to subvert Lamar’s intentions by sending a company of Texas Rangers to steal the state’s archives and return them to Washington-on-the-Brazos.  Angelina stumbled on the men leaving in loaded wagons, realized what they were about and fired the town cannon, which was kept loaded in case of Indian attack.  It’s believed she lit it with her cigar!  Luckily, she missed the men and their load of archives, but blew a hole in the General Land Office building three blocks away and succeeded in alerting the town.  In the ensuing “Archives War,” the archives were safely returned to the capital intact, and Mrs. Angelina Eberly was recognized as a true Texas heroine.  Ironically, during his entire second term as governor, Sam Houston rented a room in Angelina’s inn.  In 2004 a statue commemorating Angelina’s bravery was placed at the same corner where the town cannon sat. 

Did I mention residual energy?  Maybe I’m overly sensitive, but when I visited the stacks at the Center For American History at the University of Texas in Austin, I got to handle that energy in the form of original documents from the participants in the Red River War (the major conflict in Time’s Captive.)  (You can tell a lot about a man by his penmanship, or total lack thereof.)  What a thrill!  Just take a roll of coins for the copy machine, loose paper (a ream should be enough), five pencils (which they’ll provide if you forget), and be prepared to be amazed.  It’s a thrill to hold the hand-written reports of the people who were there and enjoy a first-hand look at events.

What it all boils down to is this:  on-line research is great.  The Internet is a wonderful resource and we’re all lucky to have it.  After all, I came across Angelina Eberly’s story while researching the Governor’s Mansion in Austin.  However, writing’s such a solitary existence that I highly recommend hands-on research if you can manage it.  History’s waiting for you.  Get out there and see it, feel it, touch it—SENSE IT!

Just be prepared for a few zingers!

Most of you undoubtedly know that, over time, the capital of  Texas has moved about from place to place.  But did you know one of the earliest capitals was situated about thirty miles east of the Sabine River in northwest Louisiana?  It’s true.  From 1729 to 1770 the first official capital of the Spanish province of Tejas was Los Adaes.  In fact, fourteen territorial governors ruled over Tejas from this location during that period.  Over the five decades it served as an active settlement, Los Adaes anchored what was quite literally the end of the road for the Spanish territory.  It was the easternmost point on the trail titled El Camino Real de los Tejas (the Royal Road of the Tejas Indians).  This road, more of a glorified trail really, linked Los Adaes in the east with Mexico City, the seat of Spanish royal authority in New Spain.

Both a fort and a mission, the Spanish built this outpost to bring Christianity to the Caddo Indians and to keep the French out of New Spain.  Ultimately, it didn’t really succeed in either endeavor.

All during those forty years, the border separating Louisiana and Texas was vigorously debated with both France and Spain continually claiming sections of each other’s territory as their own.  The French established Fort St. Jean-Baptiste at Natchitoches, Louisiana in 1714.  (This is the basis of Natchitoches’ claim to be the oldest permanent settlement in the entire Louisiana Purchase).    Eight years later, the Spanish constructed Los Adaes thirteen miles away to protect their claim to the land and to keep the aggressively expanding French from encroaching further.   

Officially named the Presidio Nuestra Senora del Pilar Los Adaes (Fort of Our Lady of Pilar at the Adaes), the structure was a hexagonal fortress measuring 115 feet on each side.  Each of three alternating corners were fortified and defended by two cannons.  The whole structure was surrounded by a moat.  Nearby the mission of San Miguel de Cuellar de Los Adaes was erected.

Almost immediately, Spain designated Los Adaes the capital of the province of Texas.  The governor’s official residence was built there and it remained the administrative seat of government for the entire province for the next 44 years.  The remote provincial capital eventually grew to become the home for over 400 Spanish citizens.  Among these were families, soldiers, priests, French traders, converted Indians, escaped slaves and an assortment of other settlers of the frontier.

Yes, Los Adaes was built to counter the French incursion into Spanish territory, but as it happens, if it had not been for their proximity to the French supply center, Los Adaes might not have survived.  This presidio was no plush capital city.  Life at Los Adaes was harsh and unforgiving.  Frontier posts were expected to be self-sufficient so the soldiers stationed there also worked as farmers and ranchers.  But the land was poor and crop failures were a common happenstance.  The nearest Spanish supply post, Saltillo, was 800 miles away and the humid, rainy climate meant supplies brought in were often spoiled by the time they reached their destination.   Without the ability to trade with the French at the Natchitoches settlement, those at Los Adaes would most likely have starved.

This set the stage for Los Adaes to become the site of a unique cooperation among the Spanish, the French and the Caddoans.   Though Fort St. Jean-Baptiste and Los Adaes were located near one another and were established primarily to protect their respective nations’ interests from aggression by the other, their inhabitants got along surprisingly well.  In fact, when the French fort was attacked in 1730 by about 400 Indians who kept them under siege for 22 days, it was the soldiers from Los Adaes who eventually came to their rescue.

The French capitalized on the shortages of supplies in the Spanish camp to set up a flourishing, if illicit, trade.  The Caddo Indians traded with both sides.  Though the Spanish Crown banned this commerce, the Spanish settlers eventually took on the role of go between the Indians and the French.   No battles were ever fought at Los Adaes during the years it served as the Spanish provincial capital.  Instead a stalemate, reminiscent of a cold war, existed between the opposing forces.

In 1763 France ceded Louisiana to Spain.  Finally, in 1772, Spain transferred the capital of the Tejas province to San Antonio and most of the 500 plus settlers relocated.  By the 1780s the center of Spanish life in East Texas had shifted to Nacogdoches.  In 1800 the Louisiana territory was transferred back to the French who sold it three years later to the United States.  Interestingly, in 1806 Los Adaes was reoccupied by the Spanish for a short time but the Americans quickly drove them back.  Both the United States and Spain continued to lay claim to Los Adaes until the Adams-Onis Treaty of 1819 finally settled the matter and Los Adaes, once the capital of Texas, ended up firmly within the boundaries of the state of Louisiana.

Los Adaes is very likely the only Colonial Spanish provincial capital that is still intact from an archeological perspective.  Admittedly, other capitals such as Sante Fe, San Antonio and Saltillo are still population centers today.  But most traces of their provincial origins have been erased – either built up, dug up or obliterated in some other manner.  What parts do survive are but remnants of the original settlements.  Los Adaes, on the other hand, is an archeologist dream.  While the standing architecture, made entirely of wood, disintegrated over time, beneath the ground the patterns and substantial material evidence of the presidio remain, traces that archeologists are still exploring today.  The state of Louisiana now owns the property so this very special site will be preserved and available for study for many years to come.

Be sure to hook up with the Fillies on Twitter: http://twitter.com/Felicia_Filly

When people say I write with a true Texas voice I always thank them and wonder how I could write any other way.  I’ve got Texas in my blood and I’ve been telling stories set in Texas for twenty years.  From Beneath the Texas Sky in 1988 to The Lone Texan released October 6, 2009, my heros belong here.

My stories are born in the soil of my memories.  I remember hearing my grandmother tell about how she was born in a covered wagon.  Her mother died that night so her aunt took the newborn to Oklahoma where they homesteaded and returned her four years later to her father.  My grandmother traveled back and forth between the two farms until she married at 16. She met my grandfather at a barn raising when they were both fifteen. They spent one day together.  He returned a year later to marry her.  He’d spent the year clearing land and building a house.  She’d spent the year filling a hope chest.  They were married almost 70 years and I can see the chest they had from my desk as I wriite.

My other grandmother was born in a dugout not much bigger than a hotel room. I have her biscuit bowl in my kitchen.  She never measured when she made bread.  She just knew how much of each ingrediant to put in that bowl.

When I began the Whispering Mountain series, I knew I wanted to write a story about a family.  Being a Texan isn’t just the hat and the boots, it’s the heart as well.  Folks say Texan’s brag.  I think I’ve figured out why.  After the Civil War, most people in Texas, and those who came around then like my relatives, had nothing.  Life was hard and when they finally had a good crop or their wife made a great pie or their horse won a race, they bragged.  Not to show anyone up, but to show what they’d done and they knew their friends and neighbors would celebrate with them.

Someone asked me where I find my heroes and I have to say, ‘I’m surrounded by them.’  Six years ago when I moved into Women’s Fiction and began writing stories taking place in today’s Texas I still felt very much at home.  With TWISTED CREEK (2008) I blended character traits of people I’d known and loved.  In REWRITING MONDAY,  I stepped into a small town modeled after the one where I spent my summers growing up.

When I began THE LONE TEXAN, I faced the challenge of writing about a younger hero than usual.  I don’t know when I’ve had so much fun.  Drum grew up in an outlaw camp with no parenting.  He’s as wild as Texas was in 1850, but when he sees what a real family is like, he knows what he has to do.  In the first Whispering Mountain story, TEXAS RAIN(2006,) he’s 15 and thinks himself in love with Sage McMurray.  In THE LONE TEXAN he’s 20 and knows she’s the woman he wants.  Only problem, besides keeping her alive, is convincing her to marry him.

Hope you read Drum and Sage’s story that is out this month and step into my Texas with me for the adventure.  If you have a minute take a look at my video.  By the way, Matt at Readerhood, who did all the videos of my books, is a sixth generation Texan and my son.  He works out of a home office where he also corrals the first seventh generation who just turned one.

So, how do you know if Texas is in your blood?
1.  If you can look out at miles and miles of open plains and marvel at how beautiful it is.
2.  If you don’t notice the wind until it slams your car door closed for you.
3.  If you can still smell the gunpower at the Alamo and cry when you walk in even though the men died over 170 years ago.
4.  If, when you’re overseas and someone asks where you’re from, you say Texas.
5.  If you know what a yankee dime is.
6.  If you know what a cow patty is.

Are there any Texans out there who want to add a few to the list?  I’d love to hear from them and everyone who loves western romance. I’m giving away a copy of THE LONE TEXAN to one lucky commentor.

And for those of you who are not from Texas, you’re welcome to ride the range with me through the books anytime. I’d love to have you join me. Also, I’m on Twitter. You can follow me there.

Jodi Thomas

www.JodiThomas.com

http://twitter.com/jodithomas 

I’ve blogged before about the various settlers in Texas: the Anglos, the Native tribes and the Tejanos, Texans of Mexican or Spanish descent. Today I want to share a scene from my book Her Abundant Joy, which will be released early in 2010. The Tejano Wedding from Her Abundant Joy, third book in my Texas Star of Destiny series, Three Generations, Three Historic Texas Events, 1821-1847.

  Excerpt

“The women led Sugar (the bride) out of the house toward the white canopy where the ceremony would be held. Mariel hung back toward the rear of the procession. The priest from a nearby mission church had come and would give his blessing to the couple in this unorthodox open-air ceremony. Since there were still few Anglo churches in Texas, the families felt fortunate to have a man of God present.

To Mariel’s surprise, the two fathers would actually be the ones performing the wedding. Mrs. Quinn had said that this sort of “family” wedding was common on the frontier. Often so far from any town or any church, a wedding consisted of a man and woman declaring that they were husband and wife and writing of their union in a family Bible.

Such a contrast to the formality of marriages and church records in Germany. …

Everyone waited under the canopy, leaving an aisle open for the bride’s procession. Leading it was Erin as flower girl and young Carlos Falconer as the page at her side. Then came the damas or bridesmaids and the chamblanes or other groomsmen all in their wedding finery. At the front of the canopy waited a beaming Emilio with Scully Falconer as padrino and Carson as best man—both in black suits–at his side. …

Finally Sugar on her father’s arm reached Emilio (the groom) who wore a more Spanish-looking suit of brown. The madrino put something in Emilio’s hand that clinked.

In the back of the gathering standing beside Mariel was the man called Ash with his wife Reva who were as close as family to the Quinns.

Ash leaned close to Mariel and murmured, “Emilio will give Sugar those thirteen gold reals later in the ceremony. The coins symbolize that he is trusting her with all his worldly goods.” Mariel nodded and smiled.

The priest began speaking in Latin, often making the sign of the cross and obviously praying for the couple. Then he stepped away, joining the wedding guests. The madrina placed one chain of flowers around both the bride’s and the groom’s necks.

Ash leaned over again. “This is el lazo, which symbolizes the love that has joined these two. They will wear it throughout the ceremony and then Sugar will wear it the rest of the day.”

…Mr. Quinn read out the marriage vows from a small black Book of Common Prayer and the bride and groom exchanged rings. Then Mr. Quinn said, “Emilio, you may kiss your bride.”

Spontaneous applause broke out. Mariel thought it very strange. No one had applauded at her wedding, least of all her. This seemed appropriate here. She joined in. Then after the formal kiss, she watched Emilio give Sugar the thirteen gold coins which Sugar placed in a box that she handed to her brother. Then the newly married couple turned to face the guests.

Mr. Quinn said, “These two have become one for life. Please greet Mr. and Mrs. Emilio Ramirez.” He repeated this in Spanish and there were shouts of joy and more applauding.

 Well, I hope that this gives you some idea of a Tejano wedding in 1846. I found the symbolism—el lazo, the 13 golden coins–especially touching. I have added an image of the traditional wedding cookies that would have been also served. What caught your interest?

Do you have the theme song to Rawhide running through your head yet?

Who can forget Clint Eastwood and the show that launched his career?

But, that’s not my topic. Just wanted to get you fired up. Cattle drives are on my mind, that period in American history when cowboys drove large herds from Texas to points north. Though most people know that trail drives lasted from 1867 to 1881, few are aware that cattle were driven to markets in Kansas and Missouri as early as the 1840’s over the Shawnee Trail.

The Shawnee Trail began in San Antonio, Texas. It ran northward through Austin, Waco, and Dallas and crossed the Red River near Preston, Texas at a place called Rock Bluff. The trail divided north of the Red River with part of it veering sharply eastward through Arkansas while the other branch ran due north. The final destination led to rail heads in Baxter Springs and Westport in Kansas and Kansas City, Sedalia, and St. Louis in Missouri. The route passed by a Shawnee village in north Texas and went near the Shawnee Hills in Indian Territory. Many settlers traveled this road in their migration west. At times it was referred to as the Texas Road. But in the 1850’s farmers in Missouri became angry when the herds of Longhorns infected their cattle with a tick-borne disease called Texas fever. The farmers began turning back the drovers and left them with few choices. They could either take them elsewhere or back home to Texas. In 1859 and 1860 violence erupted when drovers encountered stiff resistance and tried to push through the blockades anyway. Then, the outbreak of the Civil War in 1861 stopped traffic on the Shawnee Trail north of Indian Territory.

Once the war was over, Jesse Chisholm blazed the Chisholm Trail and herds were taken up from Texas to the Kansas cow towns of Dodge City, Caldwell, Wichita, Newton, Ellsworth, and Abilene. More than half the cattle driven north followed the Chisholm Trail. It was by far the best known and probably the longest at 1,000 miles.

The Goodnight-Loving Trail was developed by Texans Charles Goodnight and Oliver Loving. Larry McMurtry brought their lives to the big screen in Lonesome Dove. The Goodnight-Loving Trail started in central Texas, headed due west across the Pecos River into New Mexico and Colorado before reaching a destination in Cheyenne, Wyoming.

The Texas/Western Trail started in San Antonio and headed due north through Texas and Indian Territory in Oklahoma to Dodge City, Kansas. Eventually it continued north to Ogallala, Nebraska. There it split into the Texas Trail with one branch continuing to Dakota Territory and other extending west to Cheyenne before turning north again past Fort Laramie through the Powder River Basin and on to Montana Territory.

A lesser-known route was the Chisum Trail that was established by John Chisum. It began in central Texas and traveled west into New Mexico ending at Fort Sumner.

A herd could easily travel 15 miles a day. Any farther than that and the Longhorn would lose their weight. A normal trip lasted three to four months.

The average size of a herd was around 3,000. And with the going price per head at $40 that was quite a hefty profit. Even after paying the fifteen to thirty cowboys it took to drive the Longhorns to the rail head a cattleman came out way ahead. By the way, an ordinary cowboy only earned about $40 to $50 a month on the cattle drive. Sometimes they received a bonus though at the end of the trail if the drover felt they’d earned it.

Here are some surprising statistics:

In 1867, 35,000 head of cattle went up the trails.

By 1869, that figure increased to 350,000.

The peak year was 1871 when cowpunchers moved 600,000 head. Wow!

The last major year was 1881 when 250,000 longhorns were moved out of Texas so that was quite a decrease and was attributed to significant expansion of the railroad.

Cattle had a road brand burned into their hip for the trip so cowboys could tell which herd was whose, since many herds followed the same trails at the same time. At the end of the drive, cattle owners rebranded cattle with a permanent brand if they weren’t to be slaughtered.

Can you imagine spending 6 months of a year away from home and on the road? That’s what the drovers and cowpunchers spent on an average cattle drive-three months there and approximately three back home. Their families probably missed them terribly. And just think about all the things a man got left out of. I’m a homebody down to my bones and wouldn’t want to go through this experience. It’d be too tough. What about you? Are you adventuresome?

I love a good historical, and any story with an unlikely hero is bound to find its way onto my keeper shelf. When I discovered Gone With the Wind, I found both, as well as a love for Civil War era tales. Imagine my surprise when I found out one of the most surprising tales of the era took place almost within walking distance of where I was born in Jefferson County, Texas.

Picture it: Five thousand Union sailors in a flotilla of seventeen vessels against 44 Confederate artillerymen at the command of an Irish saloon owner. Sounds like the making of a sound defeat or a Hollywood action movie, doesn’t it?

In truth, it is the story of a band of soldiers called the Davis Guards, or Company F of the First Texas Heavy Artillery Regiment stationed at tiny Fort Griffin on the mouth of the Sabine River. Their stunning victory is one that Confederate President Jefferson Davis called “one of the most significant military victories in world history.”

Richard “Dick” Dowling started life in County Galway, Ireland. After immigrating to New Orleans then losing his family to yellow fever, Dowling settled in Houston in the mid-1850s, where he established a chain of saloons. The most successful of these, the Bank of Bacchus, was situated on Courthouse Square in downtown Houston and was, according to several sources, the first business in the city to boast gas lighting.

At the outset of the war, Dowling enlisted and eventually found himself assigned to the remote outpost of Fort Griffin (near the city of Sabine Pass, Texas). To pass the time – which moved quite slowly in the mosquito-ridden lowlands – Dowling drilled his men on artillery exercises. These lazy-day activities came in handy on September 8, 1863 when a flotilla of seventeen Union vessels appeared on the horizon. While the four-dozen men scrambled to their well-rehearsed positions, the brown waters where the Sabine River poured into the Gulf of Mexico filled with enemy ships. The first two crafts were quickly disabled by the Davis Guard sharpshooters, blocking the channel and effectively keeping the other fifteen ships out of the river.

At the end of the battle, 350 prisoners had been taken and the enemy had retreated leaving significant amount of supplies, weapons and ammunition behind. Lt. Dowling and his men were heroes, hailed by President Davis and commemorated with medals melted down from Mexican silver.

Interesting fact: two streets in downtown Houston are named for Dowling. The first is obviously Dowling Street. The second is Tuam, named for the city of his birth. And ironically, the Yankees couldn’t best him but the yellow fever that took his family back in New Orleans did. Dowling died in 1867 of the disease, just a few scant years after his stunning victory. Not the ending I would have written, but still quite a story!

So, what sort of history can you find within walking distance of your birthplace?

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Leave a comment to get your name in the drawing for a copy of The Confidential Life of Eugenia Cooper.

 Kathleen’s Website

I was doing some research the other day… 

Hmmm – it seems that most of my posts open this way.  I hope you all don’t mind that I use my research efforts as fodder for this blog.  Anyway, to continue, I wanted to insert an ‘armadillo incident’ in my current work in progress, which is set in northeast Texas in 1894.  Today armadillos can be found throughout much of the state (the exception being the Trans-Pecos region).   But what kind of range did they have in 1894?.  So I started digging around for information, and along the way I discovered some interesting facts about the strange looking critters and their migration into the US. 

First off, I assume most of you know what an armadillo looks like (see the pictures included here if you don’t) but for those of you who have never actually encountered a real life armadillo face-to-face, here are some statistics:  The common name for the armadillo found in the United States is the Nine-banded Armadillo.  The adult animal is about the size of a terrier, its upper body is encased in a bony carapace with large shields on its shoulders and rump, with nine bands in between (thus the name).  Average size is 2.5 feet in length and about 13.5 lbs in weight.  They have 30-32 peg-like teeth and strong claws that aid in their burrowing.

What my research uncovered was that the armadillo didn’t make an appearance in the US until after 1850.  After that date, however, the armadillo incursion took place with amazing rapidity.  In fact, the magnitude of their annual range expansion is almost ten times faster than the average rate expected for mammals.

Learning this tidbit, I immediately began to wonder what changed at about the 1850 mark.  Digging deeper I discovered that there were three major roadblocks that initially held the armadillos back. 

• The first of these was the Rio Grande River.  Even though armadillos are good swimmers, the Rio Grande is a formidable waterway and very few armadillos would attempt such a crossing, and few of those who did survived the conditions on the other side.  Which leads to the second factor, which was
• Predators.  Not only would the  wolves and panthers of Northern Mexico and South Texas have kept the population at bay, but man hunted them as well since armadillos were highly prized for their meat. (Still are – hubby informs me that he has eaten armadillo and found it quite tasty).  
• And lastly there was the matter of habitat.  While armadillos can and do survive in a number of different settings and environments, their dwelling of preference is brushy or forested terrain.  Prior to 1850, south Texas experienced annual fires (both natural and man made) that left the area covered in large part by prairie grass.

All of these factors changed when American settlers began colonizing Texas in the later half of the nineteenth century. Armadillos were able to take advantage of the increase in human traffic across the Rio Grande, to find opportunities for safer travel themselves.  In fact, it’s likely that many were deliberately brought across as a potential food source.  And the presence of humans also served to decrease the population of the natural predators such as the above mentioned wolves and panthers.  And the halting of the yearly burn-offs allowed mesquite brush to gain a foothold in the open grasslands, providing a more armadillo-friendly habitat.  The subsequent development of this territory for pasture and crop use gave the armadillo population an additional leg up as it made the land an even more suitable environment for their habitation.

So that explains how they came to immigrate to this country.  But what factors played into their rapid expansion once they made it to the US?  By nature, armadillos normally don’t stray far from the area of their birth – unless the population is high.  It seems armadillos have a high reproductive rate, with females regularly producing their young in sets of identical quadruplets.   As favorable conditions allowed their numbers to increase, they began to range farther from home.  And with life spans up to twenty years, it only took a small number of the animals to establish stable populations in new territories.

Of course, man helped speed things up along the way.  Armadillos managed to stow away on railcars that were used to transport of cattle from Texas to other states.   They were also carried to other locations as curiosities and then later escaped or were released in the wild.  For example, the Florida population had its genesis in 1924 when armadillos were set loose from a small zoo during a storm, and their foothold was further strengthened when several more escaped from a traveling circus in 1936.

Another interesting fact I learned about armadillos is how they cross a body of water .  Not surprisingly, because of their heavy shell, they tend to sink.  When crossing a very narrow body of water, like a ditch or small stream, the armadillo will simply walk across the bottom underwater – in fact it can hold its breath for up to six minutes.  When faced with a wider body of water, however, the armadillo has the ability to ingest air, enough, in fact, to inflate its stomach and intestines to twice their normal size.  This increases the animal’s buoyancy, allowing it to swim across.  Once it reaches land again, it will usually take several hours for the animal to release all of this extra air from its body.  The mechanism armadillos employ to accomplish this is still something of a mystery to scientists, but it appears to be a voluntary rather than autonomic response.

Oh, and as for my story, I did discover that armadillos became common in east Texas at around the 1900 mark.  Which means, it is probably safe to assume that a few of them had reached that area by 1894.  Or at least that’s my story and I’m sticking to it…