Site of the Trading Post

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Way out in Ochiltree County, on a stretch of ground that's seen more history than it gets credit for, something took root in 1874. A man named C.

E. Jones set up a trading post, right there on what folks called the Jones and Plummer Trail. Now that trail was no short Sunday drive.

It ran all the way from Dodge City, Kansas, down to Mobeetie. You want to talk about a road with some miles on it, that's your road. And right in the middle of that long dusty corridor, Jones planted himself and opened for business.

The trade was simple and it was real. Food and cloth went one direction, hides came back the other, and the whole thing moved on the strength of a handshake and necessity. Indians were among those bringing hides to that post, and Jones was there to meet them.

Then, as the land began to change and ranching pushed into those wide open spaces, the clientele shifted. Ranchmen started showing up needing general supplies, and those supplies were hauled down from Dodge City along that same trail. Same post, same ground, different season of life for the place.

One spot on one trail doing the quiet, essential work of keeping people provisioned and connected across a hard country. The State of Texas saw fit to remember it, erecting a marker in 1936, and honestly, that little trading post earned every word on it.

What the marker says

Established by C. E. Jones in 1874 on the Jones and Plummer Trail which extended from Dodge City, Kansas, to Mobeetie. Here food and cloth were traded to Indians for hides and later ranchmen purchased general supplies hauled from Dodge City. Erected by the State of Texas 1936