Tag: texas

Alfonso Harris

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Alfonso Laurell Harris was born March 26, 1926 at old Parkland Hospital a few miles from his home.  He was a good student and entered Booker T. Washington High School at age 11, allowing him to graduate when he was just 15.  He he later moved to the Northwest and began working as an aircraft engine inspector in Ogden, Utah.  On July 14, 1944 he enlisted in the US Army, shortly after his 18th birthday at nearby Fort Douglas, Utah.  As it did for hundreds of thousands of others, the terms of his enlistment read “Enlistment for the duration of the War or other emergency, plus six months, subject to the discretion of the President or otherwise according to law.”

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Matador Ranch

The Matador Ranch is unique in that for the first 70 years of its existence it was owned either by a number of people or a syndicate, rather than having been owned by one family or a partnership.  The Matador Cattle Company was founded 1879 by five individuals: Col. Alfred Markham Britton, Henry Harrison Campbell, Spottswood W. Lomax, John W. Nichols, and a brother in law of Britton known only by the name of Cata. The ranch’s name was coined by Lomax, who is said to have had a keen interest in Spanish literature.

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Henry Karnes, Karnes City and Karnes County

Henry Wax Karnes was a soldier in the Texas Revolution and later was a Texas Ranger.  He was born in Tennessee in 1812 and grew up in Arkansas. He first came to Texas on a visit in 1828 and later returned for good in 1835 when he enlisted in the army under Captain John York.  One of the first battles he is known to have participated in was the Battle of Concepción (on the grounds of Mission Concepción) and later in the Siege of Bexar.  He was also associated with Erastus “Deaf” Smith and is thought to be the first to deliver the news to Sam Houston of the fall of the Alamo mission to Santa Anna.

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(Mission Concepción)

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Quanah Parker

Quanah Parker is thought to have been born around 1850, although his exact date of birth is unrecorded, and he died in 1911. He was the son of Chief Peta Nocona and Cynthia Ann Parker, who was taken captive by the Comanche during the Fort Parker Massacre in 1836 when she was 9 years old. Cynthia lived most of her adult life with the tribe and at the time of her recapture in 1860 had become virtually assimilated into the culture and the tribe. The circumstances of the battle which resulted in her recapture are debated, with Texas Ranger Sul Ross having claimed to have killed Peta Nocona while others claimed that Nocona was not at the battle. However, it is agreed that Cynthia was recaptured at the battle and that Quanah escaped and was captured later, at another location.

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