GOD & TEXAS: Tee Pee City

At first glance, Tee Pee City was the perfect place to settle. Nestled at the confluence of Middle Pease River and Tee Pee Creek, the small Motley County community of picket houses and buffalo hide tents seemed appealing.

Founded in the 1870’s by several men including frontier-trader Charles Rath, Tee Pee City became a prosperous outpost for buffalo hide brokers. The town nickname stuck because the first homes and buildings were constructed with tipi poles discarded by migrating Comanches. But one night in Tee Pee City was usually enough to convince decent families to move on.

By 1877, Tee Pee City had several saloons, a gambling hall, a dance hall, and a seedy two-room hotel. Gunfights, prostitution, violence, and other forms of debauchery required many forceful interventions by the Texas Rangers. When arrests were made, the prosecuted were usually some mishmash of buffalo hunters, renegade Indians, and cowboys from the nearby Matador Ranch.

Started in 1878, the founders of Matador Ranch quickly purchased thousands of acres for over 8,000 head of cattle. But with the fast growth, inexperienced supervisors hired unsavory cowboys to manage the herds. Internal strife caused profits to dwindle, so the owners sold their ranch to a group of investors in Dundee, Scotland.

In 1891, Murdo Mackenzie, a Scottish lawyer and banker, was hired to manage the Matador Land and Cattle Company. He was known as a man of high moral character -- honesty, straight talking, and fair dealing. With the assistance of Arthur G. Ligertwood, they began to improve what Arthur called “a demoralized outfit of men.”

Among the unpopular but needed rules they enforced, were no card playing at either the Ranch or on their wagons, and to stop frequenting the saloons in Tee Pee City. But when Mackenzie saw that the cowboys sneaked into town anyway, he bought the saloons and shut them down.

The new operational plans of pasture management, water conservation, and innovative breeding techniques that Mackenzie instituted, met with immediate success. In the ten years that he directed operations, Matador Ranch expanded into Kansas, the Dakotas, and Canada. In 1892 alone, their gross sales were equal to about $4.5 million in today’s money.

President Theodore Roosevelt said, "During my term as president, Murdo Mackenzie was, on the whole, the most influential of the Western cattle growers." Mackenzie’s support of the Hepburn Act of 1906 secured fairer rates for Western shippers. President Roosevelt appointed Mackenzie to the National Conservation Commission in 1908.

In his later years, Mackenzie reminisced about his philosophy of life by saying, “In those days, a man who let it be known that he could not be budged from decency and honesty had the surest formula for keeping out of trouble.” And that remains a good word for today.

One man of integrity changed failure into success. One honest man impacted a whole industry. May we each follow the admonition of Psalm 25:21 NLT, “May integrity and honesty protect me, for I put my hope in You.”

--------------------------------------------------

For more inspirational reading please visit www.davidroseministries.com 

To purchase the book GOD and TEXAS by David G. Rose visit www.amazon.com