Download or read book The XIT Ranch of Texas and the Early Days of the Llano Estacado written by J. Evetts Haley and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2013-06-14 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Among the famous ranch brands of Texas are the T Anchor, JA, Diamond Tail, 777, Bar C, and XIT. And the greatest of these was XIT—The XIT Ranch of Texas. It was not the first ranch in West Texas, but after its formation in the eighteen-eighties it became the largest single operation in the cow country of the Old West and covered more than three million acres, all fenced. The state of Texas patented this huge rectangle of land, at the time considered by many to be part of "the great American desert," to the Capitol Freehold Land and Investment Company of Chicago, in exchange for funds to erect the state capitol building in Austin. This "desert" became a legend in the cattle business, and it remains today a memory to thousands who recall the era when mustangs and longhorns grazed beneath the brand of the XIT. The development and operation of this pastoral enterprise and its relation to the history of Texas is the subject of this great and widely discussed book by J. Evetts Haley, now made available to readers every· where. It is the story of a wild prairie, roamed by Indians, buffalo, mustangs, and antelope, that became a country of railroads, oil fields, prosperous farms, and carefully bred herds of cattle. The XIT Ranch of Texas is the epic account of a ranching operation about which many know a little but only a few very much. It is the one volume that, more than any other, portrays the early-day cattle business of the West.

Download or read book Hidden History of the Llano Estacado written by Paul H. Carlson and David J. Murrah and published by Arcadia Publishing. This book was released on 2017 with total page 1 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Llano Estacado, or "Staked Plain," of Texas and eastern New Mexico spreads two hundred miles across what early visitors called "an ocean of land." No other place on Earth is quite like it. Humans first inhabited the area more than twelve thousand years ago. Subsequently, settlers came to convert the grassland to ranches and then to sprawling farms. Every new generation performed its duty at this cultural crossroads, from the trade routes established by the comancheros to the fateful meeting between Buddy Holly and Elvis Presley at Lubbock's Cotton Club. Noted West Texas historians Paul H. Carlson and David J. Murrah compiled and edited fifty-six brief stories presenting the Llano Estacado's heritage at its liveliest and most unfamiliar.

Download or read book Historic Tales of the Llano Estacado written by Edited by Paul H. Carlson and David J. Murrah and published by Arcadia Publishing. This book was released on 2020 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The distinctive high mesa straddling West Texas and Eastern New Mexico creates a vista that is equal parts sprawling lore and big blue sky. From Lubbock, the area's informal capital, to the farthest reaches of the staked plains known as the Llano Estacado, the land and its inhabitants trace a tradition of tenacity through numberless cycles of dust storms and drought. In 1887, a bison hunter observed antelope, sand crane and coyote alike crowding together to drink from the same wet-weather lake. A similarly odd assortment of characters shared and shaped the region's heritage, although neighborliness has occasionally been strained by incidents like the 1903 Fence Cutting War. David Murrah and Paul Carlson have collected some three dozen vignettes that stretch across the uncharted terrain of the tableland's past.

Download or read book Death on the Lonely Llano Estacado written by Bill Neal and published by University of North Texas Press. This book was released on 2017-07-15 with total page 235 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the winter of 1901, James W. Jarrott led a band of twenty-five homesteader families toward the Llano Estacado in far West Texas, newly opened for settlement by a populist Texas legislature. But frontier cattlemen who had been pasturing their herds on the unfenced prairie land were enraged by the encroachment of these “nesters.” In August 1902 a famous hired assassin, Jim Miller, ambushed and murdered J. W. Jarrott. Who hired Miller? This crime has never been solved, until now. Award-winning author Bill Neal investigates this cold case and successfully pieces together all the threads of circumstantial evidence to fit the noose snugly around the neck of Jim Miller’s employer. What emerges from these pages is the strength of intriguing characters in an engrossing narrative: Jim Jarrott, the diminutive advocate who fearlessly champions the cause of the little guy. The ruthless and slippery assassin, Deacon Jim Miller. And finally Jarrott’s young widow Mollie, who perseveres and prospers against great odds and tells the settlers to “Stay put!”

Download or read book El Llano Estacado written by John Miller Morris and published by Texas State Historical Assn. This book was released on 2013-09-12 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: El Llano Estacado, a major new work of Western History, reveals the historical heart of one of the world's unique regions--the enormous mesaland of the Southern High Plains in Texas and New Mexico. From the Canadian River in the north to the Edwards Plateau in the south, from the Pecos River in the west to the fantastic canyonlands of the Red, Pease, Brazos, and Colorado Rivers in the east, the 50,000 square miles of "the Llano" are chronicled over three centuries with an eye to the history and compelling mystery of this special land. Armchair detectives will especially relish the comprehensive discussion of the lost--now possibly rediscovered--Coronado expedition route across the plains. This story of the legendary Llano Estacado from 1536 to 1860 informs our understanding of discovery and geography in the Southwest. El Llano Estacado is more than a good read; it is also a native son's meditation on the role of imagination and myth in how we perceive this unique environment. From the dawn of historic contact with the Southern High Plains, a remarkable series of Spanish, French, Mexican, and Anglo-American explorers and adventurers attempted to make sense of its curious environment. "Lo Llano," the first part of this saga, is a detective story on the Lost Coronado Trail. The key to this ancient Southwest mystery--where did the Spanish go in Texas in 1541?--is understanding what they saw and how they remembered it in their writings. Part Two, "The Llano Frontier," studies the three centuries of Spanish exploration and imagination following Coronado. "The Illimitable Prairie," part three of the study, analyzes the romantic discovery of the Llano in the Anglo imagination. In the final part, "The Great Zahara," the author rides the trail of the classic Anglo explorers of the Llano: James W. Abert, Randolph Marcy, John Pope, and others. The visual representations of the Llano are also revealed through numerous illustrations of rare maps and lithographs. El Llano Estacado is a grand history and geography told in an imaginative, interdisciplinary style befitting a high land. The mysteries and mirages of this great Southwestern landscape are the stuff of adventurers' quests and now readers' dreams.

Download or read book Charles Goodnight written by William T. Hagan and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 2012-10-19 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Charles Goodnight was a pioneer of the early range cattle industry—an opinionated and profane but energetic and well-liked rancher. Goodnight’s story is now re-examined by William T. Hagan in this brief, authoritative account that considers the role of ranching in general—and Goodnight in particular—in the development of the Texas Panhandle. The first major reassessment of his life in seventy years, Charles Goodnight: Father of the Texas Panhandle traces its subject’s life from hardscrabble farmer to cattle baron, giving close attention to lesser-known aspects of his last thirty years. Goodnight came up in the days when much of Texas was free range and open to occupancy by any cattleman brave enough to stake a claim. Hagan shows how Goodnight learned the cattle business and became one of the most famous ranchers of the Southwest. Hagan also presents a clearer picture than ever before of Goodnight’s business arrangements and investments, including the financial setbacks of his later life. As entertaining as it is informative, Hagan’s account takes readers back to the Palo Duro Canyon and the Staked Plains to share insights into the cattleman’s life—riding the range, fighting grass fires, driving cattle to the nearest railhead—the very stuff of cowboy legend and lore. This fascinating biography enriches our understanding of a Texas icon.

Download or read book Cowboy Life on the Llano Estacado written by Vivian H. Whitlock and published by . This book was released on 2011 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1887, Vivian H. Whitlock went with his brother and widowed mother to live with his uncle, George Causey, a buffalo hunter turned rancher, at his ranch on the Llano Estacado (Staked Plains) in New Mexico. Here Whitlock describes--vividly, realistically, and with humor--what life was like on those vast, desolate plains at the turn of the century.

Download or read book Llano Estacado written by Steve Bogener and published by Voice in the American West. This book was released on 2011 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Essays and photography on the nature and culture of the Llano Estacado. Demonstrates multiple visions of the region and serves as a much-needed corrective to characterizations of the Llano Estacado as featureless, flat, and uninteresting"--Provided by publisher.

Download or read book Texas and Southwestern Lore written by James Frank Dobie and published by . This book was released on 1927 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This Volume Number 6 contains folklore of the Texas-Mexican Vaquero; Tales and Rhymes of a Texas Household; Lore of the Llano Estacado; Names in the Old Cheyenne and Arapahoe Territory; Nicknames in Texas Oil Fields; The Devil's Grotto; Myths of the Tejas Indians; Ballads and songs of the Frontier Folk; several essays on cowboys songs, etc.

Download or read book We Fed Them Cactus written by Fabiola Cabeza de Baca Gilbert and published by UNM Press. This book was released on 1994 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Documents the daily activities of Hispanic pioneers--buffalo hunting, horse breaking, sheep herding, preparing and preserving food, sewing, tending the sick, and educating children are included in this rich recuerdo, as well as stories of Comancheros, Tejanos, Americanos, and outlaws.

Download or read book The Buffalo Soldier Tragedy of 1877 written by Paul Howard Carlson and published by Texas A&M University Press. This book was released on 2003 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The year 1877 was a drought year in West Texas. That summer, some forty buffalo soldiers struck out into the Llano Estacado, pursuing a band of raiding Comanches. Several days later they were missing and presumed dead from thirst. Although most of the soldiers straggled back into camp, four died, and others faced court-martial for desertion. Here, Carlson provides insight into the interaction of soldiers, hunters, settlers, and Indians on the Staked Plains.

Download or read book Cibolero written by Kermit Lopez and published by iUniverse. This book was released on 2007-08-03 with total page 184 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For years, Antonio Baca lived the wandering and restless life of a Cibolero, or buffalo hunter, following the great herds that roamed the endless Llano Estacado-the high plains of a region that would one day be New Mexico. After marrying and settling down, Baca has finally found a modicum of peace in the home he built for his growing family. But Baca witnesses the transformation of Nuevo Mexico from an isolated colonial outpost of the Spanish empire to a province of the newly independent nation of Mexico and, finally, to a land conquered by the avaricious Americanos. Following the United States's seizure of New Mexico, Antonio and his countrymen find themselves treated as foreigners and second-class citizens in their own land. When his daughter, Elena, is kidnapped by a band of invading Texas Rangers after the American Civil War, Baca desperately tracks them across the llano of New Mexico and into Texas using his skills as a Cibolero. Terrified for his daughter's safety, he plunges into the world of the gringos, and discovers just how much the Americanos have changed his homeland. But as the days pass without any sign of Elena, Baca fears for her life-and his own.

Download or read book Deep Time and the Texas High Plains written by Paul H. Carlson and published by Grover E. Murray Studies in th. This book was released on 2005 with total page 168 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Surveys the history and geologic past of the Texas High Plains and upper Brazos River region by focusing on human activity and adaptation and on shifting environmental conditions and animal resources on the Llano Estacado and in Yellow House Draw, the site of the current Lubbock Lake Landmark"--Provided by publisher.

Download or read book Truth Worth Telling written by Scott Pelley and published by Harlequin. This book was released on 2019-05-21 with total page 529 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This inspiring memoir of life on the frontlines of history is a “riveting blend of investigative reporting, color commentary, and personal reminiscence” (Publishers Weekly, starred review). A 60 Minutes correspondent and former anchor of the CBS Evening News, Scott Pelley writes as a witness to events that changed our world. In moving, detailed prose, he stands with firefighters at the collapsing World Trade Center on 9/11, advances with American troops in combat in Afghanistan and Iraq, and reveals private moments with presidents (and would-be presidents) he’s known for decades. Pelley also offers a resounding defense of free speech and a free press as the rights that guarantee all others. Above all, Truth Worth Telling offers a collection of inspiring tales that reminds us of the importance of sticking to our values in uncertain times. For readers who believe that values matter, and that truth is worth telling, Pelley writes, “I have written this book for you.”

Download or read book Empire of the Summer Moon written by S. C. Gwynne and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2010-05-25 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: *Finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Critics Circle Award* *A New York Times Notable Book* *Winner of the Texas Book Award and the Oklahoma Book Award* This New York Times bestseller and stunning historical account of the forty-year battle between Comanche Indians and white settlers for control of the American West “is nothing short of a revelation…will leave dust and blood on your jeans” (The New York Times Book Review). Empire of the Summer Moon spans two astonishing stories. The first traces the rise and fall of the Comanches, the most powerful Indian tribe in American history. The second entails one of the most remarkable narratives ever to come out of the Old West: the epic saga of the pioneer woman Cynthia Ann Parker and her mixed-blood son Quanah, who became the last and greatest chief of the Comanches. Although readers may be more familiar with the tribal names Apache and Sioux, it was in fact the legendary fighting ability of the Comanches that determined when the American West opened up. Comanche boys became adept bareback riders by age six; full Comanche braves were considered the best horsemen who ever rode. They were so masterful at war and so skillful with their arrows and lances that they stopped the northern drive of colonial Spain from Mexico and halted the French expansion westward from Louisiana. White settlers arriving in Texas from the eastern United States were surprised to find the frontier being rolled backward by Comanches incensed by the invasion of their tribal lands. The war with the Comanches lasted four decades, in effect holding up the development of the new American nation. Gwynne’s exhilarating account delivers a sweeping narrative that encompasses Spanish colonialism, the Civil War, the destruction of the buffalo herds, and the arrival of the railroads, and the amazing story of Cynthia Ann Parker and her son Quanah—a historical feast for anyone interested in how the United States came into being. Hailed by critics, S. C. Gwynne’s account of these events is meticulously researched, intellectually provocative, and, above all, thrillingly told. Empire of the Summer Moon announces him as a major new writer of American history.

Download or read book The Ghost of the Llano Estacado written by Karl May and published by . This book was released on 2014-12-15 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this sequel to Karl May's The Son of Bear Hunter the heroes of the great adventures in the Yellowstone National Park are heading for a meeting on the hunting ground of the Apache tribe. Shortleg Frank and Bob are coming from the East, Old Shatterhand from the North, Winnetou, Bear Hunter and his son from the South. Their pathways meet at the Llano Estacado. At the same time experienced Westerners, such as the two Snuffles, Juggle Fred, and Bloody Fox are also in the area. Bit by bit these heroes learn that the bandits of the Llano Estacado are planning to attack a caravan of immigrants, and want to kill and rob them. The spies of the bandits are unmasked, and punished. After a tornado the heroes, with a Comanche band, give a good lesson to the "human vultures" of the Llano Estacado. By the end of the book the reader will find out who is behind the mask of the Avenging Ghost of the Llano Estacado, who kills bandits, and protects the travellers. This unabridged English translation retains the exciting adventures, and the strong moral conviction of May's original book, while modernising the style, and editing parts that were erroneous or may evoke bad associations. With this editing the core of May's world, the action, the dreaming of heroic deeds, and the struggle for a kind of justice have become more emphasised, and more accessible to the modern reader.

Download or read book The Papers of Will Rogers The early years November 1879 April 1904 written by Will Rogers and published by University of Oklahoma Press. This book was released on 1995-11-30 with total page 652 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Horses, friends, ragtime music, and steer roping-those were the interests of the youthful Will Rogers as he came of age in the Indian Territory and traveled to the Southern Hemisphere in this first of six definitive volumes of The Papers of Will Rogers. By separating fact from legend and unveiling new knowledge via extensive archival research, this documentary history represents a unique contribution to Rogers scholarship and to studies of the Cherokee Nation West. Using many previously unpublished letters and photographs-together with introductions, notes, and biographies of his friends and relatives-volume one illuminates Rogers’s complex relationship with his father, his Cherokee heritage, his early education, first encounters with his future wife, Betty Blake, his voyage to Argentina, and his fledging years in Wild West shows and circuses in South Africa, New Zealand, and Australia. Coorespondence, performance reviews, and rare newspaper documents spotlight the singular experiences that shaped the young Rogers within the context of his family, his ethnic background, and historical events. No other book describes so provocatively and authentically the genesis of America’s most beloved and influential humorist.