Shooting the bull about Cowpens

By LARRY M. JONES
 
For those of you who don’t remember much about your American history, Cowpens was a decisive battle in the American Revolution fought in January 1781 in South Carolina. This epic victory by the Continental Army was the turning point in the Southern Campaign, and was fought north of the town of Cowpens, an area known for extensive grazing of livestock.

While a few facts about the Revolutionary War are nice to know, I’d like to talk about Texas cowpens. Texas is a state renown for really extensive livestock grazing, producing almost twice as many beef cattle as the next competitor, Nebraska. With this many cattle, not to mention all the horses, goats, sheep and others, it takes a lot of pens to keep all these critters corralled.

The first cowpen I heard about on the “pore farm” was the log corral in which my great grandfather kept his horses, mules and cattle. Grandpa Jones told me many times of how his father had fired upon a band of marauding Comanches as they tried to take down the poles of his corral to steal his horses and mules. The rail fence was adequate to hold the livestock, and the Indians fled when he fired.

When I was a youngster, I recall that we had what was probably the sorriest excuse for a cow lot imaginable. Yet, it was a perfect match for our adjacent “corn crib.” Both structures were constructed out of whatever scrap materials were available. The pen had about four or five strands of rusty barbed wire strung between four trees forming an irregular quadrilateral shaped pen. In addition, it had a few pieces of old sheet metal and a couple of old rusty car doors woven into the structure. It was good enough to generally hold the milk cow and her calf, and little more.

While taking vocational agriculture in high school, we boys were given the opportunity for receiving “hands-on” instruction in working cattle and hogs for farmers and ranchers throughout the community. In doing so, we witnessed quite an assortment of cowpens, varying greatly in design and construction.

READ ENTIRE COLUMN