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Chapter 12. Young Lady Ranchers in Charge, 1917
- Texas A&M University Press
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Chapter 12 Young Lady Ranchers in Charge, Hawkins children were still very young, still living with their grandparents and attending Mrs. Holmes’s classes, their father, Frank Hawkins, had begun to be troubled with symptoms indicating a kidney ailment called Bright’s disease. His father-in-law Dr. Rugeley had suggested that he seek treatment in Austin with a Dr. Wooton. Dr. Rugeley accompanied him there, and the two of them stayed at the Millet Mansion in downtown Austin. On February , , while in Austin, Frank Hawkins died suddenly, and his remains were brought by train to the small neighboring town of Van Vleck, where he was buried beside his wife at the old Rugeley cemetery. He was fifty-four years old, and his children were still very young. Harry, the eldest, was only thirteen and Sister, the youngest, was five. They would continue to live with their Rugeley grandparents in Bay City. As Frank’s will provided, a trust for his minor children was soon put into effect. Henry Rugeley and James H. Brodie were both named as trustees , but Henry Rugeley, as the local resident, was the more active of the two. He began operating the Hawkins Ranch for his nephew and nieces in and continued to do so for fifteen years. He was scrupulously businesslike , as the records of his bookkeeper Frank A. Bates attest. A statement of cash receipts and disbursements for May reveals the ranch operations of that period. The report indicates that a sale of cattle on May , , brought $, and that the number of calves branded in the spring was . A notation also shows that the Brahma breed was then being recognized for its value in improving native herds. Frank Hawkins’s will provided that the trust should continue until the youngest of the children had reached her majority in . At that time young lady ranchers in charge 89 the trust benefiting all five children would terminate, and the properties would come to them free of trust. For a reason we do not know, Frank Hawkins had willed to Harry Hawkins alone that part of the Hawkins Ranch called the Sheppard Mott, the northernmost pasture of about , acres. (“Mott” indicates a clump of plainly visible trees in the middle of a prairie. “Sheppard,” often misspelled Shepherd, is the name of the early settler Abram Sheppard, from whom J. B. Hawkins bought land.) This Sheppard Mott land was to be held in trust until Harry reached twenty-one. All the rest of the Hawkins Ranch (, acres at the time of the will) Frank Hawkins left to all five of his children, Harry included. Harry turned twenty-one in , eight years before his youngest sister reached her twenty-first birthday. Henry Rugeley stated in a court record of that Harry’s trust was ended and his property was transferred to him in , near the date of his twenty- first birthday, August , . Harry was born with a disability, perhaps cerebral palsy, that made him lame and diminished his capacity to take complete charge of his own business affairs. Given this fact, Harry’s taking delivery of his inheritance free of trust did not mean that he assumed the active management of his land and cattle. Henry Rugeley kept his books in good order to reflect Harry’s ownership, and Harry signed papers presented to him from time to time. But Henry Rugeley would have felt it a duty to continue managing Harry’s part of his father’s land and cattle just as he was doing with the rest of the Hawkins Ranch still held in trust for all five of the children. There was little perceptible difference in Henry Rugeley’s active management of property whether it was held in trust or free of trust. The young Hawkins siblings, now living all together in their new house in Bay City, were thoroughly familiar with the terms of their father’s will and talked among themselves of its implications. They knew very well that when Sister turned twenty-one they had a legal right to their property free of trust, but they did not know exactly how to assert that right. They knew, however, that if they did not say they intended to manage the ranch themselves, matters would continue as they had for fifteen years. They discussed with one another how they would manage the ranch and thought they could do it successfully. They worried that the day of Sister’s majority...