Old Lea County, N.M.

Tag: pioneers

  • The Causey Brothers

    The Causey brothers were formerly buffalo hunters. The big lumbering buffalo were hunted in the southwest to the point where they declined from a peak of over 100 million animals to near extinction in only a few decades during the late 1800s.

    Likely the best known Causey brother went by George Causey, though his given name was Thomas Leander Causey. He was born in 1849 in Madison County, Illinois and died in Roosevelt County, New Mexico in 1903. How he came by the nickname of George is unknown. He was a single man most of his life. He married in 1903 but died by his own hand only a few weeks after he married.

    George was the first born of ten children to George Washington Causey and Mary Adeline Crowder Causey. The others were Mark, John Van Cleave, Eliza Jane, Mary Adeline, Charles Grant and Nellie Grant (twins), Robert Lincoln, George Washington, Jr. and Rose Evelyn. All but one or maybe two of the children were born in Illinois. George W. (the father) had been born in Tennessee and in the 1870 census, his occupation was listed as farmer and was still shown as being a farmer in the 1900 census before his death in 1907 at around 80 years of age. He died in Guthrie, Logan County, Oklahoma. Mary Adeline had predeceased him, also in Oklahoma, in 1895.

    Thomas Leander “George” Causey does not appear have served in the Civil War, although he may indeed have done so. Near the end of the war, however, he is said to have worked as a freighter hauling supplies to Army forts and trading posts in Kansas. This profession became less profitable as the railroad system expanded and goods could be transported reliably via rail.

    At some point, George began to hunt and trade in animal hides, following the buffalo herds south and west from Kansas to Oklahoma and later to Texas and New Mexico. George is reputed to be a prolific buffalo hunter, and by esimates of others is said to have killed over 40,000 of these animals, living off money he earned from selling both hides and meat.

    By around 1877, George and at least two brothers, Robert and John, had come to Yellow House Canyon, apparently near the current town of Littlefield, Texas. The brothers, George, John and Bob, came to the area in the late 1870s. They are first believed to have settled with a couple of other partners on the western side of Yellow House Draw.

    Yellow House Draw was a natural old watercourse, or stream bed, in the Llano Estacado that ran for about 150 miles originating around 20 miles south of Melrose, Roosevelt County, New Mexico all the way to near the current town of Lubbock, Lubbock County, Texas. There it ties into a fork of the Brazos River. There, still hunting for the remnants of the buffalo herds, the Causeys built an adobe house at a water hole there before exploring a bit further south into the Four Lakes area, in the northern part of what is now Lea County. They eventually settled on the southern end of the county near Monument Spring, still hunting the last of the buffalo which had been hunted until around 1880 in this area.

    By the early 1880s, the brothers had tried to make the transition to capturing and selling wild mustangs. They began by capturing 100 mustangs along with about 50 stray beef cattle after the brothers moved to what became Lea County. An early task was to look for water, which they found in the northern part of the current county. George bought an Eclipse direct stroke windmill. Their ranch is referred to as being the first ranch in Lea County. After operating there for some time, that ranch was sold and George relocated some five miles south of Lovington. He had to supply water from Monument Spring and built a rock house. Causey ran his horse and cattle operation for a number of years from that location. He also contracted to drill water wells and set windmills for other settlers.

    Around 1900, the exact date is unknown, Causey was riding a horse in a mustang roundup. The mount got spooked and fell after possibly stepping into a badger hole and breaking its leg, after which it rolled over Causey. Ranch hands came upon him two days later, sent for a wagon and brought him back to the headquarters at Four Lakes and then taking Causey on to Roswell for further medical treatment. Causey was then transported to Missouri for further treatment but never regained full health, reportedly suffering from a continuing spinal injury causing him extended pain and discomfort. Causey sold his ranch to the owners of the Hat Ranch. He and his brothers continued to operate a mustang operation on the open range in Chaves County. His employees also continued the water well drilling operation.

    Albuquerque Journal – May 30, 1903

    Causey was married to a nurse of German ancestry named Johanna Fewson on April 8, 1903 and established a ranch between Kenna and Roswell. About six weeks later on May 18, 1903, Causey is believed to have taken his own life. Witnesses heard a gun shot, ran to the room and found Causey fatally wounded. Speculation was that he was despondent over his inability to recover from injuries sustained in the riding accident. When he died, Causey was 54 years old. Funeral services were held in Roswell at the First Christian Church after which Causey was buried in Southside (now called South Park) Cemetery there. His brothers Bob and John moved away and lived until the mid 1930s. Bob is buried in Arizona and John is buried in California.

    Sources: Elvis E. Fleming’s articles in the Roswell Daily Record on George Causey. Fleming gives much credit to Gil Hinshaw’s book “Lea: New Mexico’s Last Frontier” and to Vivian H. Whitlock’s book “Cowboy Life on the Llano Estacado.” Sources also include genealogy records of the Causey family and various other newspaper articles.

  • J. T. Easley and Lorena Lee Anderson

    When this couple married in Post, Texas in the 1920s, the wedding united two families who were early settlers in the area that became Lea County. John Thomas Easley was one of eight children born to Robert Henry Easley (1864 -1928) and Rosa Belle Jones Easley (1873 – 1962). The other children included Minnie, Levie, Charlie, Blanche, Ruth, Jack and R. H., Jr. Robert Henry and Rosa lived in several locations, mostly within the current boundaries of Lea County, including Monument, Plainview, Hagerman and a few miles north of Lovington before returning to Post, Garza County, Texas where they would remain for a number of years. Robert Henry died in Littlefield in 1928 and Rosa survived him almost thirty five years before she passed away in Post.

    John Thomas was born in 1899 in Oklahoma where the family was living at the time. He grew up mostly in Post and also lived in Lovington. He and Lorena married in Post in 1921.

    Lorena was the second child born to James Smith Anderson (1873 – 1930) and Minnie Myrtle Stringer Anderson (1881 – 1967). The other children were W. A. (Bill), Preston Pond, Roy Lewis. James and Minnie also came to the area in 1906, settling on a place about four miles east of Lovington. Their property included two dry lakes at the time. The lakes eventually filled up during an extended rainy period. These later became known as Easley’s Lakes to county residents. James died in 1930 and Minnie Myrtle survived him another thirty-seven years. After James died, J. T. and Lorena moved to the county to operate the Anderson ranch and lived there for the rest of their lives.

    The couple was active in the community and the county. J. T. served on several boards and area groups including serving as County Commissioner in the 1960s and as President of the county fair board during the time when the McClure Arena was conceived and built.

    Sources include various genealogy resources, newspaper archives and Lea County Genealogical Society’s “Then and Now – Lea County Families, Volume 1” published by Waldworth Publishing Company, 1979.

  • The Cowden Family

    Four brothers, W. H. “Bill” Cowden, George Cowden, John M. Cowden and Buck Cowden came to the area in the mid 1880s and settled with their wives and children near what became the town of Jal. The men drove their combined cattle while the women drove wagons. Water sources were found by digging wells. Their ranch was called the Mule Shoe Ranch and had its headquarters at what became the Jal town site.

    Their father was William Hamby Cowden (1826-1903). According to federal census records, in 1850, he was twenty-five years old, living in Alabama. By 1860, he was thirty-five years old, living in Palo Pinto, Texas. That same year, he married Caroline Martha Liddon (1832-1879). During the Civil War, he served in Company A of the Frontier Battalion under Captain William C. Clayton. Though it was considered part of the Confederate Army, it essentially served as a local militia, protecting settlers primarily from the native tribes. To the best of our knowledge, it never left the state of Texas. Cowden enlisted in September 1865 for an initial period of six months and during the time of his service, he rose to the rank of sergeant.

    William Hamby Cowden and Caroline Martha Liddon Cowden had a number of children, including Bill, George, John and Buck Cowden. Caroline, known as Carrie, passed away in Palo Pinto in 1879 at the age of 47. The following year, William Hamby Cowden married her sister, Catherine Cobb “Kittie” Liddon Moore who had recently become a widow after the death of her first husband, Robert Young Moore, back in Tennessee in 1876. Kittie and Robert had been married a number of years and had several children including Hattie Lucille Moore, who would become the wife of Ambrose Quincy Cooper of Jal, and Lillie Parham Moore, who would become the wife of John Motherwell Cowden. Though it is not as complicated as it might sound, when Kittie Liddon Moore married William Hamby Cowden, Lillie’s mother became her mother in law. William Hamby Cowden and Kittie do not seem to have lived in New Mexico, but eventually resided in Midland, where they were living when they both passed away.

    Bill, George, John and Buck all were married and lived in the Jal area at least for a while before moving away, but their property was conveyed to Walter C. Cochran and others and eventually became the core of the town of Jal. Hattie Lucille Moore Cooper mentioned in a newspaper article that Walter C. Cochran became her brother in law. Mr. Cochran married yet another sister of Lillie and Hattie Lucille named Nannie Dodson Moore.

  • Joe Cooper Recalls Youth In Jal Area

    Memories of the days when he first came to Lea County were revived by The Jal Flare‘s special edition in Joe Cooper, who lives ten miles north of Jal.

    He came here in ’10 from Pyote, Texas with his parents, Mr. and Mrs. James M. Cooper, and has lived in this area for the last twenty-eight years.

    When they first arrived, they had to haul water six or seven miles, Mr. Cooper recalled, from what is known as the west wells (now Jal). But the four boys and the father soon had a house built and a well drilled.

    “Those were rough days,” Mr. Cooper said, “but still they were the sweetest of my childhood. I couldn’t see it then, but now I can realize it.”

    When the time came to drive the look back through the years and and stock to water, it fell to Joe’s lot to climb aboard the burrow and round them up. It usually took him all day, since the horses were wild.

    Sickness of two of his brothers also threw a hardship on Joe during those early days, as there was a great deal of work to be done.

    [Jal Flare, Jal, NM. 30 Mar 1939.]

  • Walter Colquitt Cochran

    Walter Cochran was born August 14, 1952 in Georgia to Col. Winston W. Cochran and the former Mary Dickson. His family is believed to have moved to Texas when he was still an infant. He married Nannie Dodson in the 1880s.

    Walter C. Cochran came to Jal in 1883 from Palo Pinto County in North Central Texas. He moved his cattle from the JAL ranch in the spring of 1885. According to a 1939 article in the Jal Flare, his cattle were already branded with the Muleshoe brand, so he named the ranch the Muleshoe Ranch.

    He had become acquainted with the area by hearing stories of his friends the Cowdens, also of Palo Pinto. When he first came to New Mexico, he set up his cattle ranching operation further east but relocated to what became the townsite of Jal.

    Mr. Cochran lived in the area until 1893 after which he moved his ranching operation to around Midland, Texas. He was remembered as being a local favorite for his witty and droll demeanor. Considered to be very knowledgeable, he was sought out by younger ranchers for advice.

    Mr. Cochran died of natural causes on October 31, 1934 while living in Midland, Texas and is buried there in Fairview Cemetery. His wife Nannie survived him until 1940 and is also buried there.

  • The Fort Family

    One of the early families to come to the area were the Forts. Benjamin Herman Fort was born December 15, 1857 in Scott County, Arkansas to John Gabriel Fort and Dorinda Jane Bell Fort and was the youngest of their eleven children. Benjamin married the former Louisa Swilling “Lou” Bramlett in Paris, Arkansas in 1879. In the years that followed, they had at least about twelve children of their own and lived first in Arkansas before settling down in Brown County, Texas. They were living in Texas when in 1902, they decided to take the younger children and make the long trip by covered wagon to New Mexico. However, Lou did not survive the journey. She passed away about 130 miles from their destination and was buried in the small community of Fluvanna, Scurry County, Texas. Benjamin and the children continued on to the area near Lovington, which was then part of Chaves County.

    Fort Family about 1902 – Walter, Dorinda, Mae, Nannie, Lula Second Row: Herman, Johnny Front Row: Lillie, Eddie, Benjamin H. (Father), holding Bessie, Louise (Mother), holding Adriane and Claudie. Photo is believed to be in the public domain.

    Benjamin and the children settled not far from the Texas border. Some, if not all, of their property has remained in the family since that time. A number of the children of Benjamin and Lou Fort remained in the area or came to the area to live including Nannie Fort Allen, Benjamin Walter Fort, Dorinda Jane Fort Mann, John Ruben Fort, William Herman Fort, Eddie Thomas Fort and Claudie Adolphus Fort. Benjamin died in Texas in 1929 and is buried with several other family members in Antioch Cemetery in eastern Lea County.

  • William Standifer Williams and Minnie Alice Anderson Williams

    William Standifer Williams was born in the early 1860s in Chattanooga, Tennessee to Samuel Lowry Williams (1807-1898) and Katuriah Taylor Williams (1825-1893), a farming family. His father was one of the earliest Anglo residents of that area and is known as the Father of Chattanooga. William was one of the youngest of some thirteen siblings and half siblings. Some accounts give William’s year of birth as 1861 and others show it to be as late as 1864. William lived with his large family until at least 1880. The actual date of their marriage is unknown, but William married Minnie Alice Anderson of Sabine County, Texas prior to 1900. The couple resided for a number of years in Indian Territory, now Oklahoma. William is said to have traveled to what was then Chaves County, New Mexico Territory in 1898 and began to acquire land but returned to his cattle operation in the Oklahoma Territory with his wife. They were still living in Indian Territory in 1900 when their first child was born. Two more children were born there and after the third, George Howell Williams, was born, they came by wagon in 1907 to William’s property and officially homesteaded in New Mexico on property located just east of the Caprock and roughly sixteen miles west of Lovington. The location was near a water source known as Old Cedar Lake. It was water, but was once described as “gippy” by a descendant. Cedar Lake was a landmark in the area, however.

    William and Minnie operated their cattle ranch for the next thirty-eight years until William’s death in 1936. It was known as the Plains Cattle and Sheep Company and at one point amounted to at least 275 sections of land. The ranch headquarters had initially consisted of a dugout residence but most of the time, the family resided in Artesia. Williams was often referred to in the local newspapers in connection with his cattle operation. Williams acquired the nickname “Colonel” reportedly from his stately stature while astride his horse, but he is not known to have served in the military. The ranch was on the western side of Lea County when it was created out of Eddy and Chaves counties in 1917.

    William was nominated for the Lea County Cowboy Hall of Fame for a number of years and was inducted into the organization in 1992. Comments about Williams included mention that his ranch headquarters was always a welcome stop for freighters passing through the area and that Mr. Williams was known to be a mentor to younger ranchers in the area.

    Mr. Williams died in 1936. Mrs. Williams survived him until 1956. Both are interred in Woodbine Cemetery in Artesia. After Mr. Williams’ death, the ranch was divided among the couple’s children.

  • T. P. Bingham

    On last Friday evening, June 8, 1928, at 6:30 at the home of his daughter, Mrs. John Gaither, near Pearl, New Mexico, our beloved friend T.P. Bingham, closed his eyes on the pain and suffering of this world to open them in that City beyond where pain and suffering are unknown.

    He had been a constant sufferer for more than two years and almost daily expressed a desire that God would call him up higher, yet he never lost interest in his fellow man, his Church nor in the political activities of his state and nation.

    He was a noble character, always holding out a helping hand to cheer and always had a kind word for all.

    He was born in Choctaw County, Miss. January 10, 1840. He moved to Texas when he was 5 years old. He was truly a frontiersman. He joined the Texas Rangers at the age of 20, working with them to keep down Indian depredations in Western Texas and Eastern New Mexico.

    When the Civil War was declared, he received a discharge from the Ranger force and enlisted in the 19th Texas Company, serving in various capacities till the close of the war. In 1866, he married Miss Mary Jane Morgan of Milford, Ellis County, Texas. She passed away in 1886. He later was married to Mrs. Letha Ann Smith of Corsica, Texas. We have often heard him say that he had been fortunate in having married the two best women in the world.

    In 1918, he was again called to give up a dear companion, and since then he has made his home with his children.

    No one is perhaps better known or more loved in Lea County than he, by both old and young. He was indeed “a friend to every one.”

    He came to New Mexico 25 years ago and has always been a staunch worker for the good of his state, county and town and always very optimistic as to their future. He served as Justice of the Peace for a number of years at Monument and also at Lovington. He also served as Probate Judge of Lea County for four years. He has been a member of the Baptist Church nearly 65 years, a consistent, devoted Christian, living the “golden rule”.

    He leaves 5 children to reverence his memory. They were all with him at the time of his death. They are Mrs. Nanny L. Cathey, Jayton, Texas; T.S. Bingham, Lovington; Mrs. John Gaither, Pearl; Bailey Bingham, Aspermont, Texas; and Mrs. B. Hardin, Carlsbad.

    There are 21 grandchildren and 8 great grandchildren, all of whom revere the name of grandfather.
    The funeral services were at the Baptist Church in Lovington of which he was a consistent member and was conducted by Rev. W.G. McArthur, Supt. of the Orphans Home at Portales, assisted by Rev. Parker and Beauchamp. This service was very beautiful and impressive, Rev. McArthur being his old-time friend who paid many loving tributes to his memory. One of the most beautiful things said was that Judge Bingham had had more influence in his spiritual development than any other man.
    The music consisted of some of the favorite songs of the deceased, among them being, “Rock of Ages”, “Shall We Gather by the River”, “When the Roll is Called up Yonder”, and “By the Touch of His Hand on Mine”.

    A short service was held at the Lovington Cemetery, after which all that was mortal of “Grandpa” Bingham was tenderly laid to rest by the side of his dear wife, whom most remember with love. This dear old “Soldier of the Cross” has passed earth’s shadow into a glorious life beyond, where no partings are, neither pain, nor sorrow and where he lovingly beckons us to follow.

    [Lovington Leader, Lovington, NM. 15 Jun 1928. Submitted by David L. Minton, Lea County Historian.]

    1916 – Left to right: Dad Steele, T. P. Bingham, George McGonigal – Preparing to attend Confederate Veterans Reunion in Washington, D. C. – Image from Findagrave.com

  • Pioneer Woman Tells of First Days of Jal

    Mrs. A. Q. Cooper First Saw Site of Jal in Eighties

    Mrs. Cooper first visited Jal at the age of eleven. She came from Palo Pinto. She later went to Chattanooga, Tennessee to attend school. After marrying Mr. A. Q. Cooper in Midland, Texas she moved to Jal in 1896 to make her home.

    Mrs. Cooper is a sister-in-law to Mr. W. C. Cochran, founder of Jal. It was on his Bar-Two Mule Shoe ranch that the townsite of Jal was founded.

    From the Memories of a Real Old Timer

    My first visit to these parts dates back to the eighties. In fact, I believe it was the year of 1889. My sister and her husband, John M. Cowden and his two older brothers, Billie and George, who were also my step brothers, had come out several years previous and brought their small bunch of cattle and established a temporary camp at the northwest edge of the White Sands. They turned the cattle loose as there was plenty for them to eat on the hard flats and they could get an abundance of water by merely trampling around on the sand and waiting for the water to rise.

    They remained there only a short time while they were looking for a better place. They finally settled on the present site of upper Jal and there established their first homes. These homes were dugouts, covered with tents. It was about this time that they bought the J. A. L. brand from L. A. Lynch. From that time on that part of the draw has been known as the Jal Draw.

    At this time there were still a few buffalo in the country and on one occasion when the three women and a visiting woman were at the ranch alone with us children, we spied five buffalo coming over the hill. The visiting woman took down the old buffalo gun and shot. The gun went off accidentally and hit one of them. She took aim and fired again. Two buffalo fell. There we were with two dead buffalo and just four lone women. Then as luck would have it, the boys came in unexpectedly that night in time to skin and hang the buffalo. This was my only experience in eating buffalo meat. Another amusing, but at the time tragic, incident of the time occurred when two of the milk cows licking salt from a tub near one of the tents hooked one another and one of them fell through the tent on a bed in the dugout on which lay a sleeping baby. With much bucking and plunging, which almost wrecked the domicile and with some help from us the cow finally got out.

    To the best of my memory at that time there were only three or four other ranches in this vicinity. Namely, the Half Circle Two’s, owned by Fred and Dock Cowden, cousins of the aforementioned Cowden brothers. This ranch was located near Custer Mountain west of the present town site of Jal. (text missing) the present town site of Jal, (text missing) at that time being the Bar Two Mule Shoe ranch, owned and established by W. C. Cochran, who later became my brother-in-law. Other ranchers north were W. C. Divers and Bill Holloway. All of these ranchmen except Holloway came to this country from Palo Pinto.

    This is a brief outline of the history of this country and its settlers preceding the time when I came here with my husband, A. Q. Cooper and two small children, to make my home at the Bar Two Mule Shoe (what is now the town called Jal) about the year of 1896. This does not purport to be authentic as to dates as I made no record of such.

    The following incidents are of no importance to the history of this country, but may be interesting for you to know.

    Many people have wondered about the origination of the name Son-of-a-Gun which has long been applied to a cowboy stew. I know of the origin of this name for I hear my brother tell the story and he was present at the time. My brother was working for the Hat Wagon once and the cook prepared a dish which they all called Cowboy Stew. Some visiting cattle buyers asked the name and when the cook told them, one of them said, “I don’t know any better name for it, but it’s a son-of-a-gun of a good dish.” Thus was the name originated.

    One of my most impressive memories is of remarks made by the three women who pioneered this land. Mesdames Billy, George and John M. Cowden, when they admitted that their beautiful homes built in Midland, Texas years later held no thrill for them like the little one room plank houses which replaced the dugouts on the old Jal Draw.

    No stretch of the imagination could have pictured to me the Jal of today from my old home site under the hackberry trees which was then the headquarters of the Mule Shoe Ranch. (Editorial note: The headquarters spoken of above were on the site of what is now Hubbs and Justice.)

    [Jal Flare, Jal, NM. 20 Aug 1938.]

  • The Hobbs Family

    James Isaac Hobbs was born January 2, 1852 in Tishomingo, Mississippi. By the time he was 19, he was working as a laborer on a farm in Prentiss, Mississippi. Eight years later in 1878, he married the former Frances Paralee “Fannie” Mooring in Point, Rains County, Texas, born in Tennessee on March 27, 1857. By 1880, the couple had been blessed with two children, a girl named Ada and a boy named John, and were still living in Rains County, Texas. James Isaac was working as a farmer. By 1900, the couple was living in Brown County, Texas. James Isaac was still working as a farmer and the last of their seven children, twins Winnie and Minnie, were born in 1896. By 1910, they had settled in what was then Eddy County and were residing in a community called Roberts, believed to be the future location of Hobbs.

    A daughter, Minnie, tells the tale of how they came to settle in southeastern New Mexico. They were originally headed to the Davis Mountains in Texas, but on the way, they met a person returning from that area who was very negative about it and the Hobbs’ prospects, should they elect to continue. As a result, they headed in a northwesterly direction and came instead to southeastern New Mexico, still then a territory. As time passed, they were joined by other settlers and the town grew up. When they applied for a post office, Minnie says that they penciled in the name “Taft” but when the name was approved, someone had changed it to “Hobbs” instead. (1) By 1920, the couple was living in the community of Nadine. Lea County had been created out of portions of Chaves and Eddy counties. James Isaac passed away three years later. Fannie survived him another nineteen years.

    At least three of the children of James Isaac and Fannie remained in the area. James Berry, called the founder of Hobbs, Winnie who married Sam Dalmont and Minnie who married Ernest Herman “Dad” Byers.

    (1) Lea County Genealogical Society, Then and Now, Lea County Families, Volume 1, Walsworth Publishing Company, 1979.