TX BIOS:  Mrs. Elvira Hobbs Law
   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.
   
   For more information about this text and this American Memory
   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
   
   Folk stuff - Rangelore
   
   Phipps, Woody
   
   Rangelore
   
   Tarrant Co., Dist. #7 [19?]
   
   Page #1
   
   FC
   
   Mrs. Elvira Hobbs Law, 57, win born on her father's stock farm in
   Franklin Co., Tenn. Her father, W.K. Hobbs, moved the family to Dallas
   Co., Tex., in 1890. In 1896, she married a cowboy, R.J. Law, who later
   became the foreman of the Ben Rusk Ranch in Red River Co., Tex. John
   Hobbs, her brother, later became a horse trainer after their arrival
   in Texas, and was employed yearly on the Upchurch Ranch, the Rusk
   Ranch, and others to train their wild horses as they needed them for
   their work. A bad business deal forced Ben Rusk into bankruptcy in
   1900, which caused Law's dismissal as foreman. Believing the range
   undependable for a future, he moved his family to Ft. Worth, where he
   later died. Elvira now lives at 917 Hemphill with her father and
   children. Her story:
   
   "Well, sir. I've always loved to handle horses, but never was around
   too many at once 'til after I married R.J. Law in Dallas co. While my
   dad ran a sort of a stock farm back in Franklin co, Tenn., where I was
   born on Aug. 29, 1880, he never run many head of horses. I don't
   recall just how many head of cows he run either, but he never did run
   over 50 head at a time. That I know.
   
   "I don't recall too much about Tenn., because we moved away from there
   in the '90's to come to Dallas co. Nothing much ever happened to me
   'til after I met and married Law, and he got to be foremen on the Ben
   Rusk Ranch on Shawnee Prairie in Red River co., Tex. While I'm not too
   sure about it, I think there was around 2,000 head of cattle on the
   ranch with the ' BR' brand. I do know it was pretty close grazing for
   them cattle on 2,000 acres, but the Rusk people had hay land leased
   close by for winter feeding.
   
     NOTE: C12 - Tex
     
   00022"Yep, Dec. 15, 1896, was the start of my ranch life. While Law
   run the ranch, I ran the big commissary on the place. I didn't only
   sell to the cowboys who boarded with me, but to other ranches around
   there too. Rusk himself was a beef contractor who got out and hustled
   business. He tried to sell four-or 500 head of three-year- steers
   every year, in addition to other small beef contracts.
   
   "My brother, John Hobbs, had the same love of horses I did, and got a
   job on the Upchurch in the Sulphur River Bottoms. The Upchurch Ranch
   ran 8,000 head of cattle on about 12,000 acres. His brand was an '8'
   on the right hip. John liked to work with horses, and got Upchurch to
   let him wrangle the horse herd. He done just that, and that was where
   John got his training to be a bronc buster. One season with that herd,
   and he never done anything else but bust horses as long as he worked
   around ranches. He used to go to the different ranches and take
   contracts for busting their hosses.
   
   "One time Knewt Dillard, who sold the Rusk Ranch to Ben Rusk in the
   first place, sold Ben 70 wild horses he'd trapped and bought in West
   Texas. That was Knewt's business, handling wild horses. He didn't
   break them a tall, but just sold them to ranchers. Well, John took a
   contract to bust all them horses. Many's the time I've seen him get
   thrown from a horse after he'd rode so long he had the nose bleed bad.
   That looked to me like the hardest way in the world to make a living,
   but John seemed to get along at it. It finally done him up in the end,
   though, because every step he takes today pains him. 00033"There were
   two horses he never did plum break. Him nor nobody else ever broke
   them plum good? They were both on the Rusk Ranch, and one of them's
   name was 'Blaze' because she'd be off like a streak of lightning once
   a man mounted her that'd never rode her to a show-down before. My!,
   how that horse would tear around is something I could never make you
   fully realize, because she'd sure pitch and buck.
   
   "The other horse was named 'Star,' because she had a white spot in her
   forehead just like a star. Star seemed to sense whether a man could
   ride her to a show-down or not, and if she felt she might be able to
   throw the man, he was in for a real ride. I never saw a greener stay
   on her. She could pitch just as bad, or worse, then Blaze, but
   wouldn't pitch if her rider could really ride.
   
   "John broke both them horses from wild horses, but there was another
   horse he broke for himself. She was a race mare he named 'Daisy,'
   because she was such a pretty thing. He won plenty money on her too,
   because she could really run.
   
   "There's another thing I don't guess many folks thought about, but
   John never rode a pitching horse with his chaps on. He said he
   couldn't stay on because he had to clamp his knees too tight, and the
   leather'd give on him. Any number of times after he'd rode a horse,
   I've seen him pull his pants legs up, and the blood'd be a-streaming
   down from his knees where he'd held on so tight, the skin'd give 'way.
   
   "My brother trained a horse for me to ride around on. He was a
   'Spanish' horse, and we named him 'Chootaw,' which we later [?] to
   just 'Choo'. That horse would ride just as pretty, and not [???] a bit
   of [??] all of a sudden, he'd start 00044pitching. He didn't do but a
   very little of that, or I wouldn't have had him. However, one time
   after our second child had come to us, he started pitching when I had
   one on the saddle in front of me, and one in behind me. He pitched us
   both off into the sand. There was a time when he started pitching with
   me by myself, and after he saw he wasn't going to pitch me off this
   time, he started running. He run to the creek, then stopped all of a
   sudden. I didn't know he intended to stop, so I never stopped but went
   on into the creek.
   
   "It seemed like the cowboys didn't like the Rusk Ranch, or were
   drifters, because they kept drifting in and then out. Among the best
   riders that ever came there were Harvey Rawlings, John Lewis, and Bob
   Roden.
   
   "Bob Roden's riding days were finished on that place. One day, his
   horse shied at a sand rattler, and started pitching. Bob was pitched
   off, but his left foot hung in the stirrup. His horse ran round and
   round a clump of cedars, and drug Bob all the way. Some nigger cow
   punchers that worked for another ranch, happened to see what was going
   on, and they roped the horse. Bob lay between death and life for a
   long time before he rallied, then he left the range a broken man.
   
   "You can't hardly realize just how dangerous a cowboy's work is 'til
   you've seen the narrow escapes they have. Besides riding broncs and
   wild horses, there's stampedes to put up with. A stampeding herd is
   something to be really reckoned with, because it runs over anything it
   can't knock down if it doesn't look too big.
   
   [????] will start a stampede. 00055A neighbor's boy just walked out to
   a herd once when a Norther was on, and just because he had his coat
   over his head, the herd ran over two barb wire fences on it's way
   toward the house. We had an unusually big log corral on the other side
   of the barn, and this corral had two big gates which swung outward. It
   just happened that these gates were open, and the leaders of the herd
   led the herd right into the corral. We watched for the walls to fall,
   but they circled after they got in, and started to milling. Well,
   that's the only way to stop a stampede, is to start the herd milling.
   Then it runs in a circle 'til it gets tired, then a cow will bawl,
   others will take it up, and the first thing you know, the whole herd
   is stopped and some of it is laying down, getting it's wind back. Yep,
   that's the way it is. Other things that causes stampedes are rains,
   lightning and thunder storms, coyottes, wolves, and any kind of a wild
   animal. After a herd has got sort of skittish, any kind of a sudden
   noise will start it off like an airplane. Just roaring along with the
   noise of a freight train at full speed.
   
   "That's about all I know the cowboy's life because I stayed so close
   to the commissary that I didn't have much time to be running around
   over the ranch. I don't know what kind of a deal, but some kind of a
   bad business deal broke Ben Rusk, and he had to let his cowboys go
   along in the 1900's. Law and I decided we'd better get in a business
   that was more dependable, so we come to Fort Worth, where he worked
   for different building contractors.
   
   He's been dead for several years now, and dad and I live [????]

************************************************************************
USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE:  These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced 
in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or
persons.  Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must
obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative
of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of
this consent. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives
to store the file permanently for free access.

http://www.usgwarchives.net/

Thanks to the Library of Congress
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/wpaintro/txcat.html
***********************************************************************