Kimble County, TX - Obituaries: Bannowsky, W. A., 1946 Thursday, July 27, 2000 Submitted by: burtwyat@ctesc.net (Frederica Wyatt) ************************************************************************* 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 ************************************************************************* Found in the scrapbook belonging to the late Margaret Griffen Harrison, Junction, Texas (Name of paper not given) BEAR CREEK PIONEER DIES AT SAN ANTONIO W. A. Bannowsky, a pioneer of the Hill Country and a citizen of Kimble County since 1882, died in a San Antonio hospital Sunday, August 4, following several months illness. He had been under treatment in San Antonio for two weeks. Funeral services were held Monday afternoon at the Church of Christ with Elder Walter W. Leamons, officiating, assisted by Rev. Glen D. Welch, pastor of the Junction Baptist Church. Interment was made in the Junction Cemetery. The following were active pallbearers: Nolan Gilliam, George Stengel, Harold Dutton, Allen Bishop, Lee Murchison and R. H. Woody. William A. Bannowsky is survived by his widow, five sons--A. J. of Kansas City, Mo. Clarence J. of Oakland, California; Alfred, Chester and Guss of Junciton; and one daughter, Mrs. Don Reed of Lake Charles, La.; and a sister, Mrs. C. F. Burt of Junction. Ten grand- children and six great grandchildren also survive. Mr. Bannowsky, a successful Kimble County ranchman and a typical pioneer Texan, was born Nov. 10, 1858, in a hewed cedar log cabin near Oatmeal, on Cow Creek, in Burnet County where he lived until moving to Menard County with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Frederick L. Bannowsky in May 1882. After his marriage to Miss Emily Weaver on March 15, 1887, he lived in Kimble, Menard, Schleicher, Runnels and Concho Counties. In 1917 he traded for the Fred Hall Ranch in Kimble, known as the Viejo Ranch. He received 2,000 acres of divideland for which he paid $6 per acre, and also 500 acres of valley land lying along East Bear Creek, which includes 25 acres, watered by a gravity irrigation system. He enlarged his holdings until he owned 6,000 acres of ranch land. He possessed the largest apple orchard in this section of the state and grew other fruit, pecans, and vegetables, but his chief interests were his flocks of sheep, goats, cattle and horses. His most treasuered possession was his saddle pony which he rode often. He started a cedar eradication program long before the government program began and was one of the first to co-operate with the government, often using the cedar axe himself, and as a result most of his land is cleared. He had been riding horseback since he wa four years old. He and his sister, Charlotte, now Mrs. C. F. Burt of Junction, learned to ride bareback on an old Spanish mare their father had purchased and eight years later lost in the last Indian raid in Burnet County. When Mr. Bannowsky was 18 years old, his father and an older brother paid $2,000 for the horse brand "51". In two months time, with hired help, he penned and sold enough at $10 a head to repay the brand purchase price. The first lot he sold numbered 178 and went to Kansas for farm and ranch work. He raised a herd of his own horses in the early days, beginning with a young mare given him by a neighbor for penning a group of wild horses. At the time the land along the Kimble-Menard County (Coninued on page eight) Rest of article missing. ============================================================================================