TX BIOS:  R. L. Anderson
   Selected and converted.American Memory, Library of Congress.
   
   Washington, 1994.
   
   Preceding element provides place and date of transcription only.
   
   This transcription intended to be 99.95% accurate.
   
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   collection, refer to accompanying matter.
   
   U.S. Work Projects Administration, Federal Writers' Project (Folklore
   Project, Life Histories, 1936-39); Manuscript Division, Library of
   Congress.Copyright status not determined.
   
   00011
   
   Folkstuff Range lore 2735 Words
   
   EDITORIAL FIELD COPY
   
   by
   
   Mrs. Florence Angermiller
   
   Page 1
   
   232
   
   Pioneer Reminiscences and
   
   Cowboy Tales of Early Days UVALDE COUNTY, DISTRICT #10
   
   R. L. ANDERSON
   
   Uvalde Texas
   
   R. L. Anderson declares that he does not believe in trying to get
   [???] he would not have his picture taken expressly for a news paper
   [??]. Neither would he approve of a lot of junk written about his
   cowboy [??] he went up the trial, for it looked like a person was
   trying to [??] for what was only an ordinary thing in [??] days. "Just
   like [?] Old Trail-Driver Association,'" he added. "It looks a little
   silly [?]." But then, he is only 74 years old.
   
   However [??] up on the subject of the early days when the methods of
   handling [?] were no different, he became a genial, laughing, old son
   [??] and though he vowed that he didn't "know much to tell," I found
   that [??] and the following account is in his own words:
   
   "I don't know when my people first came to Texas. I think they
   discovered it [?] anyway, they were living in [Eatagorde?] County
   during the Mexican [?]. [?] would get word down there that the
   Mexicans were [?] and all the [?] would go east til things would [??]
   again. After the [?] parents lived on St Joseph's Island, then at
   Gonzales.
   
   "I left [?] so early I was never around my people much. I guess I was
   [?] for [?] years old when I first left home. I left horseback with
   old [??]. I went with him to take a herd of cattle up in north Texas
   [?] locate a ranch. They finally stopped up there in Runnels
   00022County. I [?] that job for fifteen dollars a month and rode an
   old, wild mule. [?] Man Parimore had this mule along and as I was
   light he wanted me [??] him. It would take two or three men to hold
   him for me to get on. And then he would run two or three miles before
   he played out. I had [?] horse and saddle of my own and a regular
   outfit of leggins and [??] on. That mule would always run till he gave
   out then I would have [?] worry with his dragging along. I spurred him
   so much it made a [?] and old man Parimore saw that, and told me I had
   to doctor the mule. [?] mule kicked my hat off but they made me doctor
   him. There were about [?]-five hundred head of cattle on that trip.
   [?] had our wagon, horses and men along, and after we got the cattle
   located, I came back to [??] and went to school some more.
   
   "I left [?] next morning-- the spring of 1880. We took about 3,000
   head of cattle [?] Panhandle. I was with J. C. Houston on that trip.
   We had a Negro [?] along and he had a [?] fixed under the wagon for
   wood and such-[?]. A [?[ is a hide stretched under a wagon to carry
   things in. Most [?] had these rawhide [?] in those days. On long trips
   in that country where wood was so scarce, the cook always got every
   piece of wood he could find as he went along, and put it in that [?]
   so that he would have a supply when he struck camp. These [?] were
   used for other things besides wood too.
   
   "It [?] about a couple of months or a little longer to make that
   drive. The cattle were the old-time longhorns. Their horns usually
   measured [?] feet or so across. There were several herds of Houston's
   that met, [?] around old Fort Griffin. There must have been twelve or
   fourteen-thousand head in that round-up. They cut out the steers and
   took them on to [?]. Then we took the stock cattle on to the ranch
   that Houston had started on the North Pease River right between the
   Pease and 00033the Red River. That ranch was as big as the
   all-out-doors. Nobody owned any land in those days much. And we got
   there with about five-thousand head of cattle. I put in about three
   years there, and there was two years I never saw a woman's face. We
   hauled our supplies from Old Fort Griffin [?]-hundred and fifty miles
   below us. Some of the freighters had ox-[?] and some used horses for
   freighting. We would send down there [?] flour and coffee. We always
   had plenty of good beef. They used to [?] to a certain store as there
   was a mail line form Fort Griffin [?]. They could send a letter down
   for a supplies and the merchant would send them out by the freighters.
   We would get [green?] coffee in [?] hundred pound sacks. No, we never
   had anything sweet, no sugar, not even molasses. We learned not to
   carry molasses in the wagon after [?] stopper blew out of the jug once
   and got molasses all over the [?] and every thing else.
   
   "I [?] one in those line camps most of the time. We lived in a dugout.
   I [?] supposed to be by myself but the other fellow was boss and he
   [??] out and be gone several days at a time. I was about sixteen and
   [?] course, I had to stay. The only way I had of entertaining myself
   [??] night -- I had me a skunk pole made out of wild China. There were
   [?] skunks there than any place I ever saw in my life, and I would [?]
   there at night and thrash skunks. One night the boss was there [?] got
   after a skunk and he run in the dugout. Mathis began ['hollering,'?]
   trying to get him out but the old skunk just kept coming [??] in. And
   of all the commotion nd yelling , it took place then. He [finally?]
   got his gun and killed him and we had skunk all spring. We generally
   [?] beef hanging up out side and that seemed to be what drew them.
   
   "When [??] a notion to go back to see my mother there were three
   00044of us. [?] Parke, Milton Fly, and my self started for Gonzales
   horseback. [?] one horse apiece and mine played out in about twelve
   mile of Gonzales. He was an old range-horse ad wouldn't eat a bit of
   grain. Lots of them won't eat grain until they are taught. I left my
   horse at [?] and someone brought him down to me, but I didn't ride him
   back. [?] my first train back. I went to Albany , about ten or twelve
   miles [?] Fort Griffin, and we took a [?] from there.
   
   "There [?] two Houston brothers: J. D. who branded the NN and the
   Houston [?] who was partner with Lemons and branded T41.
   
   "I [??] till February '83, when they sold the ranch out to the [??]
   Company. The last winter I was there, they left us there to [?] charge
   of it till they got the money for it. They sold out for [?] and got it
   in cash. I forget how much they paid when the deal was closed. Then
   they had to wait about a week for the balance of it.
   
   "I came back down to Gonzales then and we started back up the trail
   again in [?] with a heard of steers. We gathered those steers down
   there and drove them to [Lamnesas?]. We had along about a hundred head
   of horses. The herd we [?] with was to go to Kansas. But they had
   bought two more herds of over [?]-thousand head, and we waited there
   til they came up. Then they [took?] our herd of steers and went on to
   Kansas from [Lemnesas?] which was the old Dodge city Trail. And we
   took their herd and went on to the [?]. We cross over into the Pecos
   River [?] County and established a ranch there [?] the NA ranch. That
   was north of Fort tockton toward Pecos City. [?] was all open range
   there also.
   
   "I was [??] old vaquero making about thirty dollars then. There were
   four of [?] boys and we bought cattle when we first went out there. We
   worked [??] ranch but w had our own brand. We moved part of our
   00055cattle down to the Henry Packenham ranch to the rough part of the
   Pecos River country. We stayed there with Henry Packenham about a
   year. He had a ceder-picket house covered with grass, and we flew in
   there and helped him put up another room. He had a room about twelve
   or thirteen feet high and he had an old beef hide stretched up in the
   top of the room for sort of a ceiling. He told me how the hide came
   there. He said he had an old steer that got to leading his cattle off
   and he said one day he found him with a bunch of his cattle way up on
   one of those high peaks. So he just killed the steer and skinned him,
   and drove the cattle on back. I used to cow hunt with Packenham. He
   later bought a big ranch down on Independence Draw. He was a [DEL:
   might :DEL] mighty good man. There was nothing unusual about his
   appearance; about average height and rather dark complected. He had
   lived alone much of the time and I have seen him sit for hours and
   never say a word.
   
   "When we first started up the NA ranch we only had a little old 'dobe
   shack but we built a four-room lumber house in about a year after we
   got there. We drove our beeves to Kansas in the spring. Beeves never
   sold by the pound then, just by the head. I now one heard we drove, we
   got fifteen-fifty a head for them - they were aged longhorns, some of
   them twelve years old. They would average around nine-hundred and
   fifty pounds, I suppose. But if they had been fat, some of them would
   have weighed twelve or thirteen-hundred pounds. I stayed on that ranch
   until 1895, but I had sold out to my partners down at Packenham's and
   bought an interest in the Houston ranch about 1890. In about 1893, I
   took a herd of beeves up the trail to Kansas. The herds were getting
   smaller then for the country was getting all fenced up and it was lots
   of trouble to get those big herds through. Our ranch was about
   twenty-five miles of Fort Stockton and after I took the cattle on the
   trail and came back, 00066we came in north of Fort Stockton on the
   Santa [?] Creek. When we got to town, they were going to have a picnic
   down at the Sam Bayler ranch, so I decided to go. I met Miss Mary
   Crosby on that trip. We were married in 1894. We lived in Fort [DEL:
   stocton :DEL] Stockton a little while and then I went up the trail the
   following year again. I went to Amarillo with a herd and sold them to
   a fellow named General Maud. He was an Englishman and had a big ranch
   in that country. He was the same General Maud who went back to England
   when the World War broke out and helped [Allemby?] capture Palestine.
   He and his folks out there on that ranch were typically English. They
   had a big outfit there and spent lots of money on that ranch. Of all
   the trips up the trail, that rip was the hardest one. There had come a
   storm just before we started and all the windmills had been blown down
   and it was difficult to find water anywhere. After I watered the herd
   at the Pecos River and started out across the plains, there was a
   fellow followed me and told me about the scarcity of water and said
   unless we turned and went by his ranch, we wouldn't get water at all.
   After we turned off, we never could get started back the other way. We
   cut across the corner of New Mexico to the LFD ranch and got water
   there. This outfit heard about us being in there with a herd and as
   they were old friends of mine, they sent one of their men to come
   pilot us through the country. They killed a calf for us and treated us
   pretty fine while we were there.
   
   "We struck the Capital Syndicate Ranch then and it was fenced up worse
   than any I ever saw and they wouldn't let us through there at all. We
   turned south to Lubbock and got supplies there. There was a store,
   blacksmith shop and maybe a half-dozen houses. The merchant didn't
   have any bacon for me and had to send to another town for it. We were
   glad to stay there for awhile because there was water. I had been
   riding two or three horses down every day hunting water for the herd,
   so while the 00077merchant sent for the bacon we needed, we stayed
   close in and waited. Even then, a fellow tried to run me off as we had
   the cattle on his ranch close to the town. I told him I would sure
   stay there and fight him for a day or two. As he was an old cowpuncher
   he saw the condition and said he didn't blame me.
   
   "We had about eight or ten hands in the outfit and one wagon and those
   old steers stampeded every night on that trip. And about the worst
   stampede I ever had was right on that trip. They sure did run.
   
   "Maud wouldn't take the cattle unless I would agree to take the herd
   up to the ranch. Now we hadn't had any rain on us from the time we
   left the Pecos till we got up there and the night we started to Maud's
   ranch, the cattle began running. They run all night long. It was in
   the 'shinnery' and that is an awful bad place to bed cattle as there
   is so much to scare 'em. But we stayed with 'em and I don't think that
   we lost but about four head. The next day, I was out about a couple of
   miles from the wagon with a herd. There was an awful good cowman with
   me on that trip and we held things together pretty well. The cattle
   were in about [?] or bunches but we got them all back together again.
   I never pulled off my boots once till after we delivered those cattle
   and branded 'em out.
   
   "Coming back from Kansas one time, we were bringing the horses and
   wagon back and were coming overland. We had one boy with us in the
   outfit goin up the territory and he was always talking about the
   Indians trying to stampede the cattle and what he would do with one.
   About the last night we were going to stay in the territory we were
   camped one night and of course we kept the horses under herd. I had a
   Mexican outfit along and one of the mexicans was going to go wake this
   fellow up to stand guard. Well, I let the fellow go out there and I
   took the Mexican and went out around the herd and as it was pretty
   dark, we laid 00088down on our horses and went riding around the herd
   of horses so this fellow would see us. He was standing by his horse
   fixing his saddle and when he saw us, he began looking suspicious and
   stepped up on his horse. We yelled and made a run for him. He didn't
   know what to do so he ran right toward us. When he passed us, we
   turned and took after him and run him right into the wagon. The
   Mexican at the wagon thought it was Indians, of course, and they
   really scattered. I finally caught his horse by the bridle before he
   recognized me. Then he saw who it was, he knew why I had done it but I
   told him I just took after him to see what on earth was the matter
   with him.
   
   "In those days when a cowboy went to town, there was absolutely no
   place for him to go unless he went to the saloon. Once, in Pecos City
   I went into a saloon and there was an outlaw, Clay Allison , in the
   saloon. I was sitting down and he came over and put his foot up in my
   lap and there was nothing for me to do, but to hold his foot. I was
   just a kid and he was an older man and he was as bad a man as there
   was in those days.
   
   "I knew John esley Hardin too. I was just a kid when he was doing all
   his meanness but he went to the pen and stayed for fifteen years and
   when he got out he came back to Gonzales and started practicing law.
   He got into another row with the sheriff and had to leave. He took up
   the ministry after that.
   
   "Sheriff Morris of Pecos City was a bad one but they killed him. Gene
   Miller was an outlaw too and killed another sheriff there by the name
   of Bud Frazier. Frazier was sheriff at Pecos City for a long time but
   he waylaid Miller and shot him through the arm but Miller got his
   pistol out and started for Frazier but Frazier ran clear away. The
   second time Frazier tried to get 'im, it turned out about the same
   way. Frazier quit the office later and went up to Toyah and one day,
   he came into town and was in a 00099poker game. Somebody went down to
   Pecos City and told Miller where Frazier was and Miller got a shot-gun
   and went up to Toyah and went to the place where Frazier was. He
   pushed open the door with his gun and shot Frazier's head off. He had
   killed several men up to that time and after that he killed two or
   three more.
   
   "About 1895 we moved form Fort Stockton to Midland. I bought a home in
   town and leased the UL ranch from Mrs. Hoxey. It was about
   seventy-thousand acres. Then we began to raise white-faced cattle. We
   ranched there about ten years. Our two children, Roberts and Dunn,
   were born there.
   
   "I sold out to Nels Morris, the old packer. They gathered that
   seventy-thousand acre pasture -- everything in it -- and turned it
   over, paid for it and put the money in the bank in one day. It's all
   open country up there. When we were gathering cattle, I bought me a
   barrel of bells and when I'd catch one of those old outlaw steers, I'd
   bell him. I told the boys, 'Now, when you hear one of those bells, you
   stay with him till you get a rope on him.' You'd hear bells ringing
   all times of the day and night. Sometimes you'd see an old boy take
   out after a steer and maybe run him nearly down, but he'd stay with
   him till he caught him. Tom White, who camped with us on the Pecos and
   helped start up the old NA brand , was living in Midland and when I
   was rounding up, he came out and helped me sell it out. He said he
   helped start the brand and he was going to help sell it out. Old Nels
   Morris' ranch was joining me and he sent a man over to buy some cows
   off of me. This fellow was Morris' foreman but I didn't know it. He
   said he wanted to buy some cows to take to Kansas. I wouldn't sell
   them to him. I told him I was going to sell all those cattle to Old
   Nels Morris. Well, Norris' men came down and looked at the cattle and
   they phoned me back that they wanted the cattle and wanted them
   delivered Monday. That was Saturday. We rounded the cattle up and had
   them there Monday. That ended 001010the Houston-Anderson partnership.
   I had been with Houston since I was sixteen years old, and I was forty
   then.
   
   "After our land was sold and the cattle disposed of, we came to
   Uvalde. Old man Houston had three or four places spotted around Uvalde
   for me to look at. I looked at the Mangum, Vanham and Woodley ranches
   but they weren't what I wanted. I struck Tom Ramsey here from Oregon.
   I knew him on the Pecos and he told me not to leave so soon as there
   was lots of good country around here so he called up [Chinn?] who was
   a real estate dealer then. He showed me the old [?] end west ranch on
   the Nuecos owned by [ill?] May. It just suited me in every way and I
   bought it. I kept it twenty-one years and finally Hammer Johnson sold
   it for me to Frank Andrews for the Humble Oil Company. We moved to
   Uvalde in 1911 and have been here ever since.
   
   -30-

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