DUANE
Duane's take
Here's how the official marker tells it, and here's how I'm gonna pass it along to you. Picture the summer of 1852 — and not a comfortable summer, mind you, but a Texas panhandle summer, which is its own particular category of punishment. Into that heat rides Capt.
R.B. Marcy, leading a survey expedition tasked with documentating the Red River — its channel, its related streams, every bend and tributary worth knowing about. Now, Marcy didn't ride alone.
Among his team was Capt. G.B. McLellan of the Corps of Engineers, a name worth rememberin'.
This was serious federal work, and they meant to do it right. The team entered the Texas panhandle on June 10, 1852. Weeks later, on July 7, they arrived in what is now Collingsworth County — pressing eastward through the southern part of the county, methodical as you please, identifying the sources and the route of the Red River itself.
Think about what that means — tracing a great river back to where it begins, mapping what most folks had only heard rumors about. When their work in the region was done, the team left Texas north of Dodson and made their way back to Fort Arbuckle, over in present-day Oklahoma. Now here's where it gets interesting.
That survey they sweated through, all those miles and measurements — it didn't just sit in a drawer. Their work later proved important in settling a boundary dispute between Texas and Oklahoma. All those careful notes, all that summer heat — turned out the land itself had been waitin' on somebody to write it down proper.
What the marker says
In 1852, Capt. R.B. Marcy led a survey expedition along the Red River to document the river's channel and related streams. The team, which included Capt. G.B. McLellan of the Corps of Engineers, entered the Texas panhandle June 10, 1852 and arrived in what is now Collingsworth County on July 7. Traveling eastward through the southern part of the county, the team identified the sources and route of the Red River. The team left Texas north of Dodson and returned to Fort Arbuckle in present Oklahoma. Their survey later proved important in settling a boundary dispute between Texas and Oklahoma. (2006)