The panhandle plains were Texas’s last frontier, barren lands populated by hostile Comanche and outlaws attempting to outrun civilization. It was Texas Ranger and frontier scout Jim Jackson who first saw potential in the region. Jackson accompanied Col. Ranald Mackenzie into unsettled Kent County in 1875. He climbed a mountain at Polar to witness a sea of tall grass and a good stream of water. This was good news for Jackson’s friends and relatives in Coleman County. Many chose to leave the crowded range and move their cattle herds west. Those who answered the call of the wild were Elkins, Mann, Brown, Overall, Sharp, Wallace, and a host of others. They were the point riders who took the challenge of opening Kent, Garza, Crosby, Lynn, Borden, Dawson, Mitchell, Fisher, Scurry, Stonewall, and Nolan Counties to permanent settlement.

Early Settlers of the Panhandle Plains (Images of America)

Arts & Photography

Brown, Norman Wayne

Parsons, Sarah Bellian Foreword by Chuck

Photography & Video

Arcadia Publishing

The panhandle plains were Texas's last frontier, barren lands populated by hostile Comanche and outlaws attempting to outrun civilization. It was Texas Ranger and frontier scout Jim Jackson who first saw potential in the region. Jackson accompanied Col. Ranald Mackenzie into unsettled Kent County in 1875. He climbed a mountain at Polar to witness a sea of tall grass and a good stream of water. This was good news for Jackson's friends and relatives in Coleman County. Many chose to leave the crowded range and move their cattle herds west. Those who answered the call of the wild were Elkins, Mann, Brown, Overall, Sharp, Wallace, and a host of others. They were the point riders who took the challenge of opening Kent, Garza, Crosby, Lynn, Borden, Dawson, Mitchell, Fisher, Scurry, Stonewall, and Nolan Counties to permanent settlement.

Early Settlers of the Panhandle Plains

History

Bellian, Sarah

Americas

Arcadia Publishing Library Editions

The history of flight for the US Army Air Corps became increasingly important during World War I. Wichita Falls, Texas, was determined to be a fair weather flying location for training cadets to become aviators. Wichita Falls was the gracious host not only for World War I pilots training at Call Field, located near the city, but when World War II came along, the city also hosted the opening of Sheppard Field, adjacent to the municipal airport. Thousands of personnel were trained there during World War II, and later, the field was redesigned as Sheppard Air Force Base. The base has been a hub for pilot training as well as technical training for many Air Force specialties. Wichita Falls, therefore, has a rich history as a host for decades of military training. Sheppard Air Force Base, Texas, has trained hundreds of thousands of military men and women from within the United States, as well as thousands of men and women from allied countries around the globe. Sheppard Air Force Base became the largest training base in the Air Force and continues actively today with its primary mission of training military personnel.

Sheppard Air Force Base

Parsons, Chuck, Brown, Norman Wayne

A Lawless Breed: John Wesley Hardin, Texas Reconstruction, and Violence in the Wild West (A.C. Greene Series)

Biographies & Memoirs

Parsons, Chuck

Historical

University of North Texas Press

John Wesley Hardin! His name spread terror in much of Texas in the years following the Civil War as the most wanted fugitive with a $4,000 reward on his head. A Texas Ranger wrote that he killed men just to see them kick. Hardin began his killing career in the late 1860s and remained a wanted man until his capture in 1877 by Texas Rangers and Florida law officials. He certainly killed twenty men; some credited him with killing forty or more. After sixteen years in Huntsville prison he was pardoned by Governor Hogg. For a short while he avoided trouble and roamed westward, eventually establishing a home of sorts in wild and woolly El Paso as an attorney. He became embroiled in the dark side of that city and eventually lost his final gunfight to an El Paso constable, John Selman. Hardin was forty-two years old.
Besides his reputation as the deadliest man with a six-gun, he left an autobiography in which he detailed many of the troubles of his life. In A Lawless Breed, Chuck Parsons and Norman Wayne Brown have meticulously examined his claims against available records to determine how much of his life story is true, and how much was only a half truth, or a complete lie. As a killer of up to forty men, Hardin obviously had psychological issues, which the authors probe and explain in laymen’s terms. To Hardin, those three dozen or more killings were a result of being forced to defend his life, his honor, or to preserve his freedom against those who would rob or destroy him or his loved ones. Was he a combination freedom fighter/man-killer, or merely a blood-lust killer who became a national celebrity? This deeply researched biography of Hardin and his friends and family will remain the definitive study for years to come.

A Lawless Breed: John Wesley Hardin, Texas Reconstruction, and Violence in the Wild West (Volume 14) (A.C. Greene Series)

George Redman Tucker was a well-known lawman during his time but almost lost to the pages of history. Norman Wayne Brown brings to life a man whose career chasing outlaws took him from Texas, through the Indian Territory, to Wyoming and back to Texas. Man Hunter in Indian Country separates fact from fiction and tells the story of one of the last lawmen of the Old West.Tucker's career as a lawman brought him into contact with several legends of the era, including Isaac Charles Parker, better known as the "Hanging Judge." Tucker was also present during several of the best-known episodes in the history of the "Old West," including the lawlessness of the Indian Territory, the Johnson County Range War in Wyoming, and the Oklahoma Land Rush.George Redman Tucker documented his life in an unpublished manuscript that tells of his exploits in law enforcement. This manuscript was the basis of much of the information in Man Hunter in Indian Country. But the author also did extensive research to separate the facts from what could best be described as embellishment by Tucker.

Man Hunter in Indian Country: George Redman Tucker

Eakin Press

Bad Blood: The Violent Lives of John Wesley Hardin, His Brothers, and Associates

Chuck Parson and Norman Wayne Brown are noted experts on the life and times of John Wesley Hardin. They have written numerous books and magazine articles covering the topic from all angles and in such respected publications as True West, Frontier Times, and The Tombstone Epitaph.\nTheir biography, A Lawless Breed: John Wesley Hardin, Texas Reconstruction and Violence in the Wild West (Denton: UNT Press, 2013) was relevant about John Wesley Hardin and his siblings at the time. Since then, they learned where John Wesley Hardin was really born, found that Gip Hardin did not die at sea, discovered a rare letter penned by Reverend Hardin to son Joe's widow, Belle, additional evidence surrounding John Wesley Hardin's death in El Paso, 1895, and much more.\nSome of the new discovered information was reported in articles published by True West, The Tombstone Epitaph, and Journal of Wild West History Association. Some articles have not been published. It seems bad blood ran though the veins of the Hardin brothers and many who associated with them. Hopefully you will find this collection worthwhile in addition to their knowledge of why the "breed" of John Wesley Hardin seemed so lawless.

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Brown, Norman Wayne. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Brown, Norman Wayne

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Brown, Norman Wayne. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Early Settlers of the Panhandle Plains (Images of America)

Early Settlers of the Panhandle Plains

Sheppard Air Force Base

A Lawless Breed: John Wesley Hardin, Texas Reconstruction, and Violence in the Wild West (A.C. Greene Series)

A Lawless Breed: John Wesley Hardin, Texas Reconstruction, and Violence in the Wild West (Volume 14) (A.C. Greene Series)

Man Hunter in Indian Country: George Redman Tucker

Bad Blood: The Violent Lives of John Wesley Hardin, His Brothers, and Associates

Bad Blood: The Violent Lives of John Wesley Hardin, His Brothers, and Associates