Cottonwood Mott Line Camp

Duane's take

The way the marker tells it, here's the story of the Cottonwood Mott Line Camp, and it's one worth pullin' over for. Out here in Motley County, there's a stand of cottonwood trees (a mott, as folks in this part of Texas call it) surrounding a natural spring. That combination of shade and water in country like this?

That's not nothing. That's everything. And as early as 1878, cowboys knew it.

They set up a line camp right here, using it as a base to work the land: herding cattle, mending fences, doing the hard daily business of ranch life. Somebody built a log cabin here too. Employees of the Jingle Bob Ranch put it up, and that cabin became the kind of place where, well, not every disagreement got settled with words.

The marker is plain about it: that cabin was the site of at least two gunfights. At least two. You can let your imagination work on what that means.

Now, the Jingle Bob's time on this land didn't stretch on forever. In 1882, the ranchland was sold, and here's where the story takes an unexpected turn. The buyer was the Matador Land and Cattle Company, Limited.

A Scotland-based syndicate. Scottish money, Texas cattle, Motley County dirt. The Matador ran things here for a good long while, until 1951, when the company sold out.

After that, the land was divided into smaller ranches, and the era of the great outfits on this particular piece of ground quietly came to a close. A spring, a mott of trees, a log cabin, at least two gunfights, and the long reach of Scottish capital into the Texas Panhandle plains. Some places carry more history than they look like they should.

This is one of them.

What the marker says

(Private Property) The Cottonwood Mott, named for the stand, or mott, of trees which surrounded a natural spring here, was the site of a line camp as early as 1878. Cowboys used the camp as a base from which to work, herding cattle and mending fences on the ranch. A log cabin was built here by employees of the Jingle Bob Ranch, and was the site of at least two gunfights. The ranchland was sold in 1882 to the Matador Land & Cattle Company, LDT., a Scotland-based syndicate. The company sold out in 1951, and the land was divided into smaller ranches. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986