Pecos, Texas

Held a block south of Pecos Courthouse, July 4, 1883. Started with claims of cattle outfits -- Lazy, Na and W Ranch -- that each had fastest steer ropers. Settlers in town for Fourth of July picnic were spectators. The prizes were blue ribbons cut by pocket knife from new dress of a 4-year-old girl in crowd. Best roper was Morg Livingston, of the Na. Trav Windham, Lazy Y was second. Other contestants: Fate Beard, Geo. Brookshire, John Chalk, Jeff Chism, Howard Collier, Jim Livingston, Jim Mannin, Henry Miller, Brawley Oates, Jim and Henry Slack, E. P. Stuckler. (1965)

On July 4, 1883, cowboys from local ranches competed in the first organized rodeo in Pecos, Texas, with prize money and a formal program.

Nationally famed melon, originated in this city. Residents from 1880s grew melons in gardens, noting sun and soil imparted a distinctive flavor. Madison L. Todd (March 22, 1875-Sept. 10, 1967) and wife Julia (Jan. 30, 1880-Feb. 5, 1969) came here from east Texas and New Mexico. In 1917 Todd and partner, D. T. McKee, grew eight acres of melons, selling part of crop to dining cars of Texas & Pacific Railway, where Pecos cantaloupes first became popular and in wide demand. McKee soon quit business, but Todd remained a leader for 41 years. Famed lecturer Helen Keller, Presidents Eisenhower and Johnson and many other distinguished persons have ordered and appreciated Pecos cantaloupes. Exclusive clubs in New York, Chicago, St. Louis and other cities are regular clients of Pecos growers. Genuine Pecos cantaloupes begin ripening in July and continue on the market until late October. The varieties are the same as those grown in other areas. Climate, soil and special cultivation methods account for the distinctiveness of Pecos melons. 2,000 acres are now planted annually. M. L. Todd was known in his later years as father of the industry. He and his wife and family were leaders in civic and religious enterprises. ( 1970).

George Eames Barstow, capitalist and irrigation pioneer, was born on November 19, 1849, in Providence, Rhode Island, the son of Amos Chafee and Emeline (Mumford) Eames. He was educated at the public school and at Mowry and Goff's English and Classical School in Providence. The son of a manufacturer and banker, Barstow himself began a business career at the age of seventeen. He eventually founded, financed, or organized five worsted and paper industries in Rhode Island. He became a member of the Providence school board at the age of twenty-one and served for fourteen years. He also served four years on the Providence common council and three terms in the Rhode Island House of Representatives. He married Clara Drew Symonds on October 19, 1871, and they had nine children. For a number of years Barstow was involved in irrigation projects and in the draining of swamp lands. His attention turned to the Pecos valley in Texas after the state legislature passed an act in March 1889 to encourage the development of irrigation in West Texas. The Pioneer Canal Company, with Barstow as treasurer, was chartered on July 6, 1889. On September 30, 1889, Pioneer took over the Ward County Irrigation Company. Barstow served as president of at least one of the Pioneer Canal Company's later incarnations, the Pecos Valley Land and Irrigation Company. An ad for the latter company, with a picture of Barstow as president, appeared in a 1909 issue of Cosmopolitan . In 1891 Barstow joined other land developers in a project to promote a town on the Texas and Pacific Railway in western Ward County. The townsite, laid out in 1891, was deeded by Mr. and Mrs. B. K. Brant and O. F. Brant to the Barstow Improvement Company in 1892. Disagreement surfaced early over a name for the town, but by 1895 the community had taken the name of Barstow. Barstow himself moved to Barstow in 1904 from New York City. He also reportedly participated in organizing other irrigation and drainage systems throughout the West. He was president of the National Drainage Congress in 1907–08 and of the Eleventh International Irrigation Congress in 1908–09. He also served as vice president of the Texas Conservation Commission and president of the West Texas Reclamation Association. He was a member of the Conference of Governors in 1908, a delegate to the World Court Congress in Cleveland in 1915, a life director of Euphrates College (Turkey), a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (London), a member and fellow of the Society of Applied Psychology (San Francisco), a member of the committee on conferences of the American Agricultural Association, and a member of the advisory committee of the University Forum (New York). He was also a member of the American Society of International Law, the National Institute of Social Sciences, the Southern Sociological Congress, the National Child Labor Committee, the National Civic Federation, the American Institute of Civics, the Academy of Political Science, the American Society of Judicial Settlement of International Disputes, the International Peace Forum, the League to Enforce Peace, the International World Conscience Society (Rome), the Navy League, the Rhode Island Historical Society, the Empire State Society of the Sons of the American Revolution, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, and the New York Museum of Natural History. He was also a councilor of the World's Purity Congress. In addition, Barstow wrote pamphlets on such varied subjects as immigration, cooperatives, Sino-Japanese relations, and Americanism. He was a Republican and attended the Congregational church in Providence and the Methodist church in Barstow. He died in Barstow on April 30, 1924, and was buried in the Barstow Cemetery.

Barstow is at the intersection of U.S. Highway 80 and Farm Road 516, on the Missouri Pacific Railroad, five miles east of Pecos in southwestern Ward County. The town was named for George E. Barstow , a Rhode Island land promoter who established it. The Texas and Pacific Railway reached Barstow in 1881. Ten years later the townsite was laid out and a post office established. Barstow became the county seat when Ward County was organized in 1892. That same year George E. Barstow formed the Barstow Improvement Company to promote the sale of land irrigated by the Pecos River. He constructed irrigation canals and a dam and brought trainloads of prospective settlers to the town in land promotions. A red sandstone courthouse was constructed in 1893. By 1900 Barstow had a population of 1,103. In 1914 the community had three churches, a bank, a hotel, an opera house, and a weekly newspaper, the West Texas Journal . Two years later a power plant was built to generate electricity. The farms around Barstow grew grapes, peaches, pears, and melons. In 1904 the Barstow Irrigation Company won a silver medal for grapes at the World's Fair. The same year an earthen dam on the rain-swollen Pecos River burst, and the resulting floodwaters raised soil salinity levels, thus ruining many of the farms. In 1907 and 1910 serious droughts plagued Barstow farmers. Vineyards and orchards began to decline in 1911, and by 1918 farming ceased. The population fell from 1,219 in 1910 to an estimated 490 in 1925. Barstow had 468 residents in 1930. In June 1938, after the discovery of oil in Winkler County and eastern Ward County, Monahans replaced Barstow as the county seat of Ward County. Barstow had a population of 683 in 1955. Four businesses and an estimated 637 residents remained in 1982. The population in 1990 was 535; by 2000 it dropped to 406.

On May 11, 1914, León Cárdenas Martínez, Jr., was executed for the murder of Emma Brown in Pecos, Texas, despite a Texas law preventing the execution of minors. The case was associated with one of the most prolonged efforts to save a Tejano , and for more than three years such organizations as the Mexican Protective Association of San Antonio and the Partido Liberal Mexicano as well as the Mexican government provided aid to the Martínez family in appealing the boy's sentence. Martínez's sentence and hanging ultimately acted as a catalyst for mutual aid societies ( sociedades mutualistas ) to address the issue of lynching and unusual punishment of Mexican people across the Southwest. On July 23, 1911, León Cárdenas Martínez was arrested in Saragosa in Reeves County by two officers from the Reeves County sheriff's office, who were investigating the murder of Emma Brown, a White school teacher. According to an account given by his father, León Cárdenas Martínez, Sr, immediately after his son's arrest, Martínez Jr. was taken to the location of Emma Brown's murder and forced at gunpoint to confess or be lynched by local ranchers. Additionally, on the night of the arrest, Reeves County Sheriff Pink A. Harbert and a number of other men forced Martínez Sr., the proprietor of a local butcher shop, to leave his shop and also vacate his home with his family and leave town by way of the desert. Over the next five days Martínez Jr. was kept in prisons in Pecos and Midland. The transfers were in part meant to thwart potential threats of lynching by Pecos citizens. On July 28, 1911, his trial took place. Although the only evidence that he was guilty was the forced confession, the jury was composed of jurors who had already formed an opinion of the defendant's guilt, and the prosecution intimidated witnesses who testified on Martínez's behalf. During the trial, Martinez's defense attorneys focused on proving that their client was a minor, which would prevent him from receiving the death penalty. His father stated that his son was fifteen years old at the time of the crime. Both of his parents testified to his age, but their testimony and their efforts to provide birth and baptism certificates were ignored in favor of other witnesses, who guessed that the age of the defendant was about eighteen or nineteen. Ultimately, Martínez was found guilty and sentenced to death. Several efforts were made to appeal the sentence, beginning with the Mexican Protective Association of San Antonio, which raised money for this purpose. The Partido Liberal Mexicano, which counted Martínez's father as a member, also offered aid. The Sociedad Obreros of Laredo sent a petition to Governor Oscar Colquitt and asked that the death sentence be commuted to a life sentence. The petition also had the attachment of a document showing that the defendant was born on June 10, 1895, and therefore too young for the death penalty. The Mexican government, on Martínez's behalf, hired lawyers to file a writ of habeas corpus with the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals to review the sentence. According to the November 3, 1911, issue of the San Antonio Express , Robert P. Coon of San Antonio, J. F. Cunningham of Abilene, and George Bates of El Paso represented the defendant. This appeal temporarily postponed the hanging, but the Court of Criminal Appeals upheld the lower court's ruling. The defense lawyers appealed to the United States Supreme Court, but when the case finally came before the high court it was dismissed because Martínez's lawyers failed to follow through on some technical requirements. This did not stop efforts to gain a pardon, and in April 1914, Mexican Americans in Waco formed the Comité de Defensa to publicize the case. They were followed quickly in their efforts to raise publicity by La Prensa in San Antonio and El Guardia del Bravo in Laredo. This increased publicity resulted in hundreds of clemency petitions, but Texas Governor Oscar Colquitt ignored these requests