Crockett, John McClannahan

Duane's take

The official marker tells it this way, and I'm just here to make sure you don't drive past it without knowing the story. John McClannahan Crockett, born December 26, 1816, down in South Carolina, was the kind of man who seemed to show up right when a place needed somebody to show up. He married Katherine Polk, Kate, in 1837, and by 1848 the two of them had pointed themselves toward a little pioneer settlement on the Trinity River called Dallas.

Now, Dallas in 1848 was not what you're looking at out your window today. It was raw ground, and John Crockett walked into it and opened one of the very first law offices the settlement had ever seen. But he wasn't a man who stopped at one thing.

In the 1850s (and you want to think about how much territory this covers), Crockett was serving as a state legislator, acting as mayor of Dallas, AND keeping meteorological observations for the Smithsonian Institution. All at once, more or less. The man was tracking weather patterns for one of the great scientific institutions in the country while simultaneously running a city and sitting in the legislature.

There's a word for that kind of range. Several words, actually. Then came the war.

When Texas entered the Confederacy, Crockett rose to lieutenant governor; and he held that office through the first two years of Texas's time in the Confederacy. Whatever your feelings about that chapter, the marker doesn't let you look away from it, and neither will I. After all of that, he was still building things.

A prominent Mason, Crockett helped establish The Grange in North Texas, reaching out into the farming communities, laying down roots of a different kind. He died August 4, 1887. South Carolina boy, Dallas pioneer, legislator, mayor, weather watcher, lieutenant governor, Mason, Granger.

John M. Crockett lived like a man who figured life was short and the frontier was wide, and he meant to cover as much of both as he possibly could.

What the marker says

(December 26, 1816 - August 4, 1887) South Carolina native John M. Crockett married Katherine (Kate) Polk in 1837. In 1848 they moved to Dallas where Crockett opened one of the pioneer settlement's first law offices. Crockett served as a state legislator, mayor of Dallas, and meteorological observer for the Smithsonian Institution in the 1850s, and as lt. governor of Texas during its first two years in the Confederacy. A prominent Mason, Crockett also helped establish The Grange in North Texas. Recorded - 1995