Texas History Notebook

Ben Kilpatrick and the Fort Worth Five

(Image credit: Smithsonian Institute)

This famous photograph, sometimes called the “Fort Worth Five,” was taken in 1900 an the Schwartz Studio in old downtown Fort Worth. Pictured are the following: left to right, front row: Harry A. Longabaugh (aka the Sundance Kid), Ben Kilpatrick (aka the Tall Texan), Robert Leroy Parker (aka Butch Cassidy); standing: Will Carver and Harvey Logan (aka Kid Curry). The photo is said to have helped authorities later to identify each of them and within twelve years, they would all be dead. Carver was killed in a shootout in Sonora, Texas the following year. Logan was killed in a shootout with a posse in Parachute, Colorado in 1904. He may have taken his own life rather than submit to being captured. Longabaugh and Parker are believed to have been killed in a shootout in Bolivia in 1908. Kilpatrick died in 1912.

The Immortal Ten

On January 22, 1927, the Associated Press headline read “Basketball Team of Baylor Victim of Grade Crossing Tragedy Near Round Rock.” The first reports indicated that of the twenty-one passengers comprised of players, coaches and guests, that there were as many as fourteen fatalities. The exact number was ten: James Clyde “Abe” Kelly, William Winchester, W. E. Murray, Merle Dudley, Sam Dillow, Jack Castellaw, L. R. “Ivey” Foster, Bob Hailey, R. L. Hannah and James Walker.

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H. S. Lebman

If you were to do an internet search any day for “Lebman saddles for sale,” you would probably find a number of saddles that are available to be used as working saddles, held as collector’s items or as family keepsakes. They were made in a San Antonio saddle shop a few blocks from the San Antonio River on Flores Street. The former location is now a restaurant, but for many years, it was a busy store for leather goods.

Gov. Edmund J. Davis

Edmund Jackson Davis was born in St. Augustine, Florida in 1827 to William G. and Mary Ann Channer Davis. His family moved to Galveston, Texas in 1848 and he began to study studied law. After being admitted to the Texas bar, Davis moved to Laredo where he served as a deputy customs collector until he was elected district attorney in Brownsville in 1853. He later served as a district judge in Brownsville. Davis married the former Anne Britton in 1858 and served as a state judge until the beginning of the Civil War.

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Fess Parker, Jr.

Fess Elisha Parker, Jr. was born on August 16, 1924 in Fort Worth, Texas to Fess Parker, Sr. and Mackie Allen Parker. His father had been born in California, but his mother was born in Texas. His paternal grandparents Otis L. and Cora Lightfoot Parker had been a farming family in Comanche County, Texas and both are buried there. Fess grew up in San Angelo and was a multi sport athlete there. He graduated from San Angelo High School in 1939 and did a hitch in the United States Navy before coming back to Texas and enrolling at Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene in 1943.

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