TX BIOS:  J. R. Walkup  Wichita CO. TX
   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
   
   Erwin, WM.V., PW., Wichita Falls, Texas
   
   Words 425 [6?]
   
   Page 1
   
   EXPERIENCES OF J. R. WALKUP (FOLKLORE).
   
   J. R. Walkup of 1510 Thirteenth Street, Wichita Falls, Texas, came to
   this section of the country in [1875?] and went to work as a cowboy on
   the MO ranch, which was operated [by?] Reynolds & Matthews. Mr. Walkup
   recalls two occurrences that were [epic?] in the lives of the MO ranch
   cowpunchers.
   
   During the spring roundup of 1882 a number of the MO riders made camp
   for the night about ten miles from the ranch headquarters. They built
   a brush [corral?] in which to pen the [most?] of their cowponies
   during the night. Although the Comanche Indians were supposed to be
   restricted to [their?] reservation across Red River in Oklahoma, bands
   of them sometimes sneaked off the reservation on horse-stealing
   expeditions. Some of the MO cowboys, therefore, took precaution to
   secure their animals against theft by any marauding redskins who might
   chance upon the camp. The boys tied their ponies with stake-ropes to
   the horns of the saddles which they used for pillows.
   
   The following morning all the horses were gone, and the cow-boys were
   afoot ten miles from the ranch. Moccasin tracks in and around the camp
   showed that Indians had stolen the ponies, not only those in the
   improvised corral, but also those whose owners had tied them to their
   saddles. Footprints showed that the Indians had walked among the men
   as they slept, [even?] stepping over them, without waking a man.
   
   The other incident which remains vividly in the memory of the former
   cow waddy was a trip up the cattle trail with a herd of six
   00022thousand longhorns to be delivered in Montana. The trip required
   four mouths' time, three months and one week being spent on the road
   and three weeks' stop in Wyoming gathering the herd after it had
   scattered in a stampede. A herd drive had been made through rough
   country in Wyoming to reach a creek so that the herd could be watered,
   but the creek was dry, and the drive continued. Two great black [?]
   clouds appeared at different places on the horizon, and at last came
   together in front of the vast herd, and a terrific wind and rain
   storm, accompained by hail, ensued. The hailstones were so large that
   the trail drivers in order to escape serious injury had to dismount
   and unsaddle their horses and place the saddles over their heads,
   while the six thousand longhorns surged away before the storm and
   scattered over the country. Two horses and twenty head of cattle were
   killed by the hailstones, and forty head were lost.

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