Country Lifestyles
The man behind the reins – Brice Jackson
By Judy Wade
From the Pioneer Reunion to the Pendleton Roundup, Brice Jackson and his buggy and team of horses are well known. “I have driven United States Senators and Representatives, corporate executives, Hall of Fame inductees, RFD-TV hosts, mayors, sheriffs and dozens of Pioneer Reunion presidents. I have also had the honor of driving cancer survivors on Tough Enough to Wear Pink performances at many rodeos, and I have carried three good friends to their final resting places,” Jackson shared.
Jackson’s story began in 1850 when his great-great-great grandfather came to East Texas. In the 1880s his great-great grandfather settled in the south Clay County-north Jack County area. “In the ‘40s and ‘50s my grandmother Irene (Rene) Jackson, who rode horses until she was in her 80s, bought several small places in Clay and Archer Counties. I grew up three miles east of Scotland and attended school at Archer City in grades one through three,” Jackson said.
It was there he met a man who was to have a great influence on his life. “I was named Phillip Brice after Phil Strawhorn, a retired Cavalry man and bachelor who lived in a one-room shack west of Shannon. He was a horse and mule trader who always had a team. I spent time with him in the summers when I was in grades one, two and three,” Jackson related.
The pair would drive a hitch of mules or horses to his grandparents’ house or the Shannon General Store where they would buy some bologna, Longhorn cheese and a sleeve of crackers and head to West Fork to fish. “We drove the team and wagon in the Archer City Rodeo parade every year, and sometimes we went to Windthorst and gave kids a ride in the wagon for a dime each,” Jackson continued.
“We moved, ending up in New London where I have lived for 51 years, and I didn’t see Strawhorn again for many years. He was my first influence as a young kid,” he continued.
Fast forward 30-something years, after high school, college, going to work, getting married and raising a family.
“In the late 1980s, my wife Patti and I went to the Cheyenne Frontier Days Rodeo for the first time. The rodeo may be ‘The Daddy of Them All,’ but the collection of wagons and buggies is also ‘The Daddy of Them All.’ For over 100 years, 60 or more wagons and buggies have participated in four huge parades and 10 days of rodeo performances at Cheyenne, with many of the teams invited from all over the nation to pull their wagons. I was enthralled by them, and every year I went I paid more attention,” Jackson related.
To read more pick up a copy of the July 2017 NTFR issue. To subscribe call 940-872-5922.
By Nicholas Waters
As winter plods along – come Spring and gopher mounds – homeowners and farmers find themselves playing a familiar song – fiddling while Rome is burning.
Let’s make a mountain out of a molehill. Those mounds on your lawn and pasture could be moles, but they’re more than likely gophers; Plains Pocket Gophers to be pragmatic – Geomys bursarius to be scientific.
These rodents dig and chew, and the damage they can do goes beyond the mounds we mow over. Iowa State University cited a study in Nebraska showing a 35 percent loss in irrigated alfalfa fields due to the presence of pocket gophers; the number jumped to 46 percent in decreased production of non-irrigated alfalfa fields.
The internet is replete with academic research from coast-to-coast on how to curtail gopher populations, or at least control them. Kansas State University – then called Kansas State Agricultural College – also published a book [Bulletin 152] in February 1908 focused exclusively on the pocket gopher.
To read more, pick up a copy of the April issue of NTFR magazine. To subscribe by mail, call 940-872-5922.
By Annette Bridges
Everyone needs a room with a view that makes their heart happy. My honest favorite panorama would be either the mountains or the ocean. I have yet to convince my hubby to make permanent moves to either, although he does enjoy the visits as much as I do.
The location of our house on our ranch does not provide the expansive field of vision of our land that I would enjoy. So, I have created a room decorated and furnished in a way that gives me smiles, giggles, and a wonderful peace-filled feeling when I am hanging out in it. I am in that place right now writing this column. I am in a lounging position with my computer in my lap on the chaise that was once my sweet mama’s. I had it reupholstered this year to give it a fresh look.
To read more, pick up a copy of the April issue of NTFR magazine. To subscribe by mail, call 940-872-5922.
Local celebrity dancers of the greater Gainesville area brought the house down recently at the second annual “Dancing With Our Stars” contest in Lindsay. The event raised more than $200,000 as the sponsored dance teams did their best to take home the grand prize.
The money raised will go to the “Heart of NTMC” Campaign for the purchase of a cardiac capable CT machine for the Gainesville hospital. Rodolfo “Rudy” Martinez and Sherry Sherriden took home the Mirror Ball Trophy.
To read more, pick up a copy of the April issue of NTFR magazine. To subscribe by mail, call 940-872-5922.
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