Choose from multiple print sizes, border colors, and canvas materials. 510,527.00 Electra II married twice, the second time for keeps to John Biggs, a Texan who worked for International Paper Company, in New York, in 1943. The ranch was established in 1849 and spans six Texas counties and almost 800 square miles. declared a misdeal and had them draw again. Inside the Decades-long Effort to Commemorate a Notorious Waco Lynching. Though there are more than two thousand miles of road inside the ranch, there are hardly any road signs or navigational landmarks. The W.T. He was the first quarter horse ever to be insured for $100,000. Very few test wells havepenetrated the remaining 400,000 acres. This is a robust and versatile multi-faceted operation like none other available on the market today. But for how much longer? These live creeks and their tributaries provide a desirable source of livestock water throughout the property. They are already being augmented by Kroenke Ranches' world-class commercial Angus herd. For the past 15 years, champions at both the National Reining Association and the National Cutting Horse Association Futurity have had Waggoner bloodlines in their pedigree. Buster received income from his share of the estate, but he had no role in the ranch management and was happy to leave the ranching to E. Paul. To Buckys surprise, the Biggs family responded by filing suit, asking the court to liquidate the estate. Ill draw a line and you take first pick, he offered. He sits across the table from me in his starched jeans and freshly shined boots, ramrod straight, his hat resting in his lap, his gray hair slicked down. Nobodys sure. [9] One of the lakes on the ranch provides water for the City of Wichita Falls. Consequently, climate data can vary over such a large area of the state. Waggoner divided the Waggoner Ranch into four subsections: one for himself (White Face); and three smaller 8,500 acre sub-ranches for his children: Zacaweista, Four Corners, and Santa Ros. Potential buyers include a group of Japanese investors, Ross Perot Jr., Boone Pickens, even the Mormon churchor so go the rumors. The Waggoner Ranch Store is located in the Waggoner Estate building in Vernon Texas. Recently, new ownership has brought substantial investment in both equipment and design. Sep 1989 - Present33 years 6 months. Cowboys of the Waggoner Ranch. Whats Up With All the Kangaroos on the Loose in Texas? Hawley has a cell phone handy, and the ranch radio under the dash crackles with voices from isolated posts miles away. hoped that his kids would learn to ranch and develop a sense of responsibility. I guess you could say its traumatic, but in two or three days the calves will forget they ever had mamas, Weldon Hawley says in response to my city-boy question. [9] In 1902, W.T. Land Broker and Land Appraisalfirm established in 1920. W.T. In his entire life, he never drew a paycheck from anyone but the Waggoners. If you fill out the first name, last name, or agree to terms fields, you will NOT be added to the newsletter list. The Waggoner is one of the 20 largest cattle ranches in the U.S. and is known worldwide for its quarter horses. Photographs of his wife and children occupied a bookshelf beside four footballs labeled Coach Bucky Whartongifts from former University of Texas coach David McWilliams, whod invited Wharton to join him on the sidelines at several UT games. Back in town, I am introduced to 79-year-old G. L. Proctor, the old cowboy who Weldon Hawley has modeled himself after. The other wants to sell the ranch and divide the assets. Didnt any of them have to work or suffer to get it. Horses like Waggoners Rainy Day, Midnight, One Eyed Waggoner, Yellow Wolf, Yellow Jacket, Pretty Boy, Pretty Buck, Snipper W, Pep Up, Jesse James and of course Poco Bueno still appear in the pedigrees of many great horses today. They buried him standing up, Hughes informs me. [6][12], When Guy Waggoner died in 1950, his sons sold their share of the estate to members of the family. One of the striking sights as you leave the ranch is the sudden appearance of enormous green fields of cotton, wheat, and alfalfa. Gene is, by all accounts, gregarious and outgoing, a typical good ol boy who enjoys playing dominoes at the country club. The Waggoner (Three D) Ranch had its beginnings in the early 1850s when Daniel Waggoner, his son W. T. (Tom), and a fifteen-year-old Black slave trailed 242 cattle and six horses into Wise County. By the 1880s, the Waggoners Victorian mansion, El Castile, was the most prominent structure in Decatur. Bickering and backstabbing have been a way of life in the family. Cowboys ambling from the bunkhouse to the cookhouse for their five-thirty breakfast see her loping across pastures, dodging bulls and pump jacks. $ 58.00. West Texans Are Learning What It Means to Live in Bear Country, H-E-Bs True Texas BBQ Restaurant Is Slipping, Jimmy Carters Peanut-and-Egg Taco Made Quite the Impression on San Antonians. W.T. Today, the ranch boasts 7 stallions and over 90 broodmares containing bloodlines of Poco Bueno, High Brow Cat, Peppy San Badger, Top Sail Cody, Smart Chic Olena, and Wimpys Little Step. Dan Waggoner, who was born in Tennessee in 1828, moved to Texas with his family in the mid-1840s. | This well-renowned offering includes the 510,527 contiguous acres, together with all permanent improvements, approximately 41.67% of the mineral estate, all water rights, and all wind generation royalty rights. The land was used primarily to raise crops, beef cattleand horsesas well as for oil production. Buckys home sits on one side of the square. Approximately 30,000 acres are in cultivation. American Made Cap has manufactured for all types of customers, from professional baseball teams to local ranches, including the world-famous Waggoner Ranch just down the road. This is what shes good at, raising cattle. Hawley is 52 and has been at the ranch since 1972, working his way up from cowpuncher to straw boss to headquarters boss and finally to ranch manager. The facility is equipped to do embryo transfers and has both indoor and outdoor arenas, two barns, and over 30 stalls. He was a nineteen-year-old Army sergeant at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, when he learned that the lawsuits had been resolved and that he was heir to 50 percent of the W. T. Waggoner estate. When my wife got sick with cancer, Gene and Buck got the company plane to fly her to M. D. Anderson. The majority of the ranch is in native pasture, supporting a mixed variety of palatable native grasses. Its a weird deal. Perhaps they are afraid of ghosts. has created a haven for deer, turkey, quail, dove, waterfowl and feral hogs. She hosted parties of celebrities, movie stars, and barons of capitalism, including the daughter of J. P. Morgan. Poco Bueno sired 36 AQHA Champions, and many of his offspring have excelled in all the different disciplines of modern day horse events. It comprises 520,000 acres in six counties, and is the home for 12,000 mother cows. $720,000,000 Hunting big game in Africa and hosting extravagant parties at the ranch occupied most of Busters time. Though he wouldnt talk about the lawsuit, he spoke freely about his bewildering transformation from New Mexico schoolboy to co-owner of one of the countrys most famous ranches. [5], The ranch is located west of Wichita Falls, Texas, south of Vernon, near the Red River. So what does it all mean? W.T. She was strikingly pretty, with a long, sensitive face and dark, sparkling eyes. Our ranching operation includes, cattle, horses and the farm. And You Thought Feral Hogs Were Bad. (It still is, except for the magnificent Wise County courthouse.) Be alert all the time and ready to go, he says in a strong, sure voice. The substantial structural improvements, thousands of miles of fences and roads, hundreds of earthen pond dam sites, rolling stock, waterlines, natural gas and oilfield lines, oil field equipment, the Waggoner office building, the included livestock (horses and cattle) and the entire operation are offered as a turn-key sale on an as-is, where-is basis. What the hell could he do with oil! He began buying land in western Wise County in 1870. So it was the King Ranch whose legend was set down for posterity by the distinguished Texas author Tom Lea, while the Waggoners escapades were left to be recorded by the English author John Bainbridgea few passages in his 1960 book called The Super-Americans, about the excesses of Texass oil millionaires. Vernon Regional Airport has a 5,100 foot long runway. Marketing is done through private treaty and production sales. The ranch is fenced and crossfenced, with an estimated several thousand miles of ranch roads and ranch fencing. (Tom) Waggoner was heard to say, There I was with more t, han 5,000 big, wild steers, 50 sore-backed horses, $12 and 16 years of my life.. My dockets not that crowded, he said. All canvas prints are professionally printed, assembled, and shipped within 3 - 4 business days and delivered ready-to-hang on your wall. Over the years, a substantial amount of brush work has been done, and the mesquite canopy ranges from nearly extinct to moderate over portions of the ranch. Mid America is your local truck topper and trailer dealer in St Louis MO for all your new and used truck toppers in st louis as well as dump trailers and utility flatbed trailers in St Louis MO. We met in the boardroom at the Waggoner building, Roberson told me. Numerous large, functional and well designed sets of shipping and working pens are scattered throughout the ranch. The color of this ground is the color of the ranch, Bucky told me as we bumped over the maze of rutted roads, he driving his Toyota Land Cruiser and talking nonstop and I jumping out to open gates. Shareholders of the ranch reside at these two divisions. As Parker biographer Bill Neeley has noted, ethics and morality played no part of this business arrangement. Guy had a weakness for the ladies; he once skipped town with the lead actress from a traveling burlesque show. For more than a century the520,000-acre Waggoner Ranch has been an inseparable part of the culture and fabric of the Red River country west of Wichita Fallsand of Texas itself. When E. Paul drew Zacaweista instead, W.T. The property is divided into approximately 16 camp or division units. Bucky wanted the ranch to be divided, not liquidated. Without a trustee to keep them at arms length, they set off on a collision course. Richard King and Captain James Walworth's King Ranch brand was registered June 27, 1859 3. L. Proctor was foreman when I got here, and I made him my model., The ranch has about thirty cowboys, many of them second- and third-generation Waggoner employees. His most arresting feature is his green eyes, which are reminiscent of the luminous eyes that made his grandmother, the original Electra, such a commanding figure. . He ended up using it for cattle dip, and the well became Electras city dump., Near the entrance to Zacaweista, once the home of the first Electra, we stop at the grave of Poco Bueno. [6] Other towns nearby include Electra and Seymour. They gathered information on the value of individual pastures, with the help of foreman Jimmy Lee Smith. The history and the legend surrounding the Waggoner Ranch are as big as the ground it covers. Shortly after leaving, he got his draft notice, at the height of the Vietnam War. They say he was as mad as a nest of hornets. When Helens father died, in 1975, they moved to the ranch, where Gene gradually assumed the position of head of the family. The cowboys are already waiting on horseback just outside the loading pens, cutting up like schoolboys awaiting the bell for recess. 20% off all products! Millionaire ranchers from Argentina and the elite of East Coast society came in their private planes for weekends of polo and debauchery. I think there were twenty-five or twenty-seven attorneys involved, he recalled. [6] It is the second largest ranch in Texas (after the King Ranch),[6] enclosing 510,527 acres (207,000ha; 798sqmi; 2,070km2) of land. Dan took advantage of this great opportunity. The family made their main homes in the city and returned to the ranch for weekend getaways and holidays. By the time he was 27, Tom had full reins of the Waggoner cattle empire.. Since his retirement, in 1991, Proctor has lived in Vernon, raising a few cows and tending his yard. The entryway is glass, and there is a skylight over the vaulted ceiling above the staircase. A complete list of this inventory can be made available. We love our customers, so feel free to visit during normal business hours. Ill tell you one thing: Mrs. Biggs [Electra II] was the nicest person in the world to me, said Jimmy Lee Smith, who cowboyed at the ranch for 38 years, rising from cowpuncher to foreman and ranch manager. To make the trip, Dan gave Tom $12, a group of drovers, and 50 saddle horses, all of which had sores on their backs from heavy use. Electra died in 1925 at the age of 43, her life and much of her fortune spent on extravagance. An enormous picture window with a panoramic view of the ranch replaced the porthole-size window of 1910. Either Guys two children would become their partners or E. Paul and Buster would have to buy them out. After Biggs fell ill with cancer in the early seventies, Moore was essentially running things, and the boardwhich then consisted of Electra II and Buckyappointed him trustee after Biggs died, in 1975. Buster never liked cows; the only thing about the ranch he cared about was horses, especially his polo ponies. Historically, potable drinking water has been an issue on the Waggoner Ranch, and for that matter, on many other ranches in this area of North Texas. A unified decision has now been made by the shareholders to sell this legendary ranch. I didnt ask for the nuts and bolts, he said and walked away. She left an enduring reputation and two children from the first of her three marriages: Tom Waggoner Wharton, who died of syphilis at age 25, eight-times married but childless, and A. A number that denotes the foal's dam is placed on the left shoulder, and the ranch's famous D brand is placed under that. Since Electra IIs death, in 2001, the board has been composed of these two men who rarely speak to each other. The farmers probably didnt need intimidating. The cowboys of the Waggoner Ranch are living legends, men who embody the attributes of the lean and dusty riders who braved the wild a century ago to make room for a herd. Historically, the Waggoner Ranch has been operated as a cow/calf ranching unit, with stocker cattle used for seasonal grazing on wheat fields. E. Paul, a whiskey-drinking, poker-playing party animal, stayed married to his wife, Helen, for fifty years, but few people doubted the rumors that he kept mistresses in Mexico and South Texas. They communicate by written memos, even though their offices are separated by only a few feet. The terrain varies from fairly level to gently rolling, sloping and hilly, but there are areas of rougher breaks and scenic, very eroded, red clay badland. This was a time when much of Texas was open range and unexplored. [2][3] It was originally established in 1852 near Vernon, Texas, by Daniel Waggoner under the name of Dan Waggoner & Son; his son being William Thomas Waggoner. Settling into an apartment attached to Busters former home at Zacaweista, he enrolled at Midwestern State University, in Wichita Falls, and commuted between ranch and campus, pursing a degree in business administration while learning the ins and outs of the estate. The headquarters at Zacaweista is a small, self-contained village built around a park that the cowboys call the square. In its center lies the grave of Tony Hazelwood, a legendary Waggoner cowboy and longtime foreman, who died in 1965. Seafood City (California, Hawaii, Washington, Nevada, Illinois) - Filipino American. As Smith put it, They were a beer-and-champagne twosome.. We have unique items that feature our brand. The Wichita River, the two branches of Beaver Creek, countless small streams and tributaries, and dozens of stock tanks supply the ranchs water. Add to cart. Heath Ownbey. I was there. He began buying land in western Wise County in 1870. This huge block of farmland is crossfenced into large manageable fields which are suitable for grazing thousands of head of wheat pasture cattle. In 1879, the Waggoners foiled rustlers by changing their brand from the D-71 to the now-legendary three reverse Ds. Look out there! In one last attempt to keep the range open, W.T. The W. T. Waggoner Estate is the nation's largest ranch under one fence. Three pivot sprinkler systems are used to distribute irrigation water to three large fields on the ranch. Many carry the bloodline of Poco Bueno. (Waggoner) hit oil instead. The house sits on high ground, mostly hidden by oak and pecan trees and a fieldstone wall. A portion of this acreage is seeded to very productive Coastal Bermuda. On a slight rise behind this house is a much grander two-story Spanish-style villa with a red tile roof, a swimming pool, and a formal garden. Waggoner Estate office building in downtown Vernon, and most importantly, the exclusive right and use of the iconic Waggoner Ranch name, historic brand, and related rights are expected to convey within the sale. Waggoner Ranch is a working one, with 20 cowboy camps scattered throughout the property to house the more than 120 workers. And so they were, for a hundred years and more. As the frontier pushed westward, he expanded his herd and bought more land, in Clay and Wichita counties. He was teaching at Will Rogers Elementary School, in Houston, where Helen Biggs was also a teacher. Bucky and Gene and their lawyers were there. This will still be ranchland, for thats all its fit to be, but not ranching on the grand scale that allows men to be cowboys. Depending upon weather and moisture conditions, the ranch has been operated with 11,000 14,000 mother cows, plus calves, bulls and replacements; however, due to the recent drought, and in order to protect the ranch, current stocking rates have been reduced to around 7,000 mother cows/calves, plus replacements and bulls. The wooded river and creek courses offer exceptional cover and desirable habitat for native game. There is also a rumor that the Willinghams have already bought a home in Fort Worth. For years, its two feuding clans have agreed on only one thing: They want to break up their vast eight-hundred-square-mile spread and close this chapter of Texas history. By the turn of the century, settlers were overrunning Indian reservations, and the open range was all but gone. Approximately 160,000 acres of the 560,000 acres areproven prolific oilproperties. After dinner by the creek, Dan suggested that they all ride into Frederick, Oklahoma, personally setting the pace. Two large, privately-owned lakes are located on the Waggoner Ranch. Forrest Wilder writes about politics and the outdoors. Thats where Electra Waggoner Biggs lived and where she kept her studio, Hughes tells me. At least thats what everyone outside the two families, their lawyers, and the judge believe happened. Mesquite is the major invader in this part of Texas. At Christmas, they exchange giftsby messenger. Texas became the 28th state on December 29, 1845, so the Waggoner Ranch is nearly as old as Texas itself. Buckys pride in this place was unmistakable. As the sun begins to crawl over the horizon, Hawley marvels at the endless prairie. Numerous food plots are located adjacent to these protected creek bottom areas, and these food plots serve as a magnet for wildlife. He went on and on about how heartbroken he was and how much he missed them, but he didnt write them. The Waggoner Ranch can be characterized as a potential sportsmans paradise. 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