Freestone County, Texas
News



Dallas Morning News
Nov. 29, 1952 edition
Section: Part II; Page: 8

Deer Season Will Reopen in Freestone

FAIRFIELD, Texas, Nov. 8 -- For the first time in fifty years deer will be
killed in Freestone County this fall and hunters are being offered leases by
landowners.
  Turkeys, too, are reported to be plentiful, thanks to the stocking of game
preserves by the State Game Commission, and a five-year closed season.
  According to Judge Jess G. Anderson, 89-year-old attorney of Fairfield, deer
and turkey once abounded in the sand flats and thickets of Eastern Freestone
County, especially along the Trinity River.  Anderson recalls having seen as
many as five or six deer within two miles of the courthouse.  The last deer
hunt he remembers going on was around fifty years ago, when he and a friend 
missing two perfect shots while on a stand.
  Soon after the game began disappearing from the county so rapidly that it 
was shortly all gone.  
  In 1947, a group of local sportsmen consolidated the two existing county 
game associations, and asked the State Fish and Game Commission to restock the
county, Elmer McVey, now county attorney, then State Representative, headed 
the group.
  One thousand deer and a number of turkeys were released in game preserves in
1947, and have been protected until now when leases are being offered by 
landowners for the season, which is expected to be a good one.
  Among these leasing rights are Richard and Sewell Hill, cattlemen who have 
about 14,000 acres.  There is one furnished lodge.  There are unfurnished 
cabins on some of the other leases, and the average price will run around $50
for the season.  Leases will be let on the basis of 100 to 150 acres per hunter.
  Also, hunters will be liable for the responsibility of any livestock on 
leases where it is ranging.  Some leases will not contain cattle.
  Information may be obtained from Brent Bergstrom, county game warden, 
Fairfield, or the County Game Association, headed by J. C. Sheffield of Teague.
Vice president of the association is Tom Bonner and Sewell Hill is secretary.
Both are of Fairfield.


[Forrest went with Papa when they let out deer on what is now Gene's part of the 
Lake Place (the Johnson field).  I killed my first deer at the edge of the same 
field when the season opened 5 years later.  It had a tag in the ear, so it came 
from the King Ranch.]

[JYB Sr. remembers the deer release program in Stewards Mill, he was not present 
but Billie lived there then.  Billie told dad about one deer that got his leg 
broke and they cut it off.  The deer lived for five years and dad shot it during 
the first deer season at the OYB place.]

=============================================