Ranger McDonald Shoots Mexicans
#OTD on November 10, 1906 Texas Ranger Captain William McDonald and several others shot and killed at least 4 Mexican men and wounded several others.
Rangers at Salt War
#OTD on November 5, 1877 Texas Rangers under the command of John Tayes and John Jones arrived in the El Paso area to quell the San Elizario Salt Wars, leading to one of the few Ranger defeats.
First Episode of Walker, Texas Ranger Premiers
#OTD in 1993, Walker, Texas Ranger, starring Chuck Norris premiered on CBS. The show consisted of 9 seasons, with Chuck Norris as Sergeant Cordell Walker, a DFW-based Texas Ranger. The series was inspired by the 1983 film, Lone Wolf McQuade, directed by Steve Carver, also starring Chuck Norris. J. J. McQuade (Norris) portrays a former
Lee Roy Young becomes first Black Ranger
#OTD in 1988, Lee Roy Young became the first African American man to be allowed to join the Texas Rangers. Young served in the U.S. Navy for four years during the Vietnam war before attending UT Austin and graduating with a degree in sociology with an emphasis on criminology. After college, Young joined the @TxDPS
KKK Violence in Lorena
#OTD in 1921, future Texas Ranger Red Burton, a sheriff’s deputy at the time, and Waco sheriff Bob Buchanan had a run-in with the Lorena Ku Klux Klan in Lorena, Texas. While Burton and Buchanan were not opposed to the Klan’s announced march, they stated they were there to prevent violence, which they were unable
Thurgood M. Complains to Hoover About Rangers
#OTD in 1956, legendary civil rights attorney Thurgood Marshall wrote to J. Edgar Hoover, head of the @FBI, complaining of Ranger intimidation of Black citizens who had sued Dallas over school segregation. Marshall, Chief Counsel of the @NAACP, was advising Dallas families in an effort to desegregate the city’s schools, pursuant to the ruling in
Texarkana Jr College Integration Attempt
Black-and-white photo of a white man kneeling beside a small white boy on a sidewalk. The boy holds a sign reading “‘All-white’ college.’”
First episode of the Lone Ranger
#OTD in 1949, the first episode of The Lone Ranger premiered, starring Clayton Moore and Jay Silverheels. In this romanticized version of the Wild West, and what it meant to be a Texas Ranger, this ABC show teamed up a Native American named Tonto, and the Lone Ranger to defeat lawlessness. While the television series
Bob White
#OTD in 1937, Bob White, a Black farmworker, was found guilty of rape and sentenced to death based on a forced confession extracted with the help of Texas Rangers. Though little remembered, the case is one of two Supreme Court rulings against Ranger conduct. In August 1937, White was arrested in Polk County, Texas, for
Hamer Kills Lopez
#OTD sometime in October of 1921 Texas Ranger Frank Hamer killed Mexican revolutionary and outlaw Rafael “Red” Lopez. His death marked the end of a years long tale that law enforcement would only fully come to understand in the early 2000s.
