Traces the history and present-day operation of twelve prominent Texas ranches.

Lawrence Clayton and J. U. Salvant impart the traditions and spirit of each ranch, including the Four Sixes, Green, Iron Mountain, King, Lambshead, Matador, Pitchfork, Swenson, Waggoner, XIT, Y.O., and Yturria. Clayton writes of the timeless round of tasks that ranchers and cowboys perform today as their forebears did and also describes changes in ranching that have taken place over the years.

Praise for KINGS OF TEXAS "Kings of Texas is a fresh and very welcome history of the great King Ranch. It's concise but thorough, crisply written, meticulous, and very readable. It should find a wide audience." -Larry McMurtry, author of Sin Killer and the Pulitzer Prize--winning Lonesome Dove "This book is about the King Ranch, but it is about much more than that. A compelling chronicle of war, peace, love, betrayal, birth, and death in the region where the Texas-Mexico border blurs in the haze of the Wild Horse Desert, it is also an intriguing detective story with links to the present-and a first-rate read." -H.W. Brands, author of The Age of Gold and the bestselling Pulitzer Prize finalist The First American

A unique volume of information and colorful anecdotes about historic ranches, located throughout the American West. In all, almost sixty ranches are profiled, covering twelve states. From the King Ranch in Texas, to the Hash Knife in Arizona, Bill O'Neal tells the history, color and lore of these legendary ranches. O'Neal is a noted Western historian who has written seventeen books and more than 400 articles and book reviews. He has always been captivated by the mystique of the vanished ranching frontier and now he has brought that mystique and lore to life.

In this tribute to a pioneer conservationist, Duane M. Leach celebrates the life of an exceptional ranch manager on a legendary Texas ranch, a visionary for wildlife and modern ranch management, and an extraordinarily dedicated and generous man. Caesar Kleberg went to work on the King Ranch in 1900. For almost thirty years he oversaw the operations of the sprawling Norias division, a vast acreage in South Texas where he came to appreciate the importance of rangeland not only for cattle but also for wildlife. Creating a wildlife management and conservation initiative far ahead of its time, Kleberg established strict hunting rules and a program of enlightened habitat restoration. Because of his efforts and foresight, by his death in 1946 there were more white-tailed deer, wild turkey, bobwhite quail, javelinas, and mourning dove on the King Ranch than in the rest of the state. Kleberg’s legacy lives on at the Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute in Kingsville, where a research program he helped found has gained recognition far beyond the pastures of Norias.

A defining study of the Four Sixes Ranch with photographs.