Site of Wagon Yard

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'm going to let it breathe a little. Way out here in Randall County, there was a place that served as a ranchman's true headquarters in town. Not a hotel with brass fixtures.

Not a restaurant with linen napkins. A wagon yard. And it did its work from about 1890 to 1921.

Thirty-some years of hard, honest, unglamorous business. When a ranchman rode into town, this is where he landed. He'd pull his wagon in, unhitch his animals, and that was that.

Home. For the night, anyway. He could sleep in his bedroll right there in the wagon, or, if he was feeling a little fancy, he could take a room above the office.

Now, supper wasn't brought to him on a tray. He cooked it himself, over a campfire, right there in the yard. You want to picture the scene, picture that.

Firelight, open sky, the smell of horses and woodsmoke. The rates were straightforward. Ten cents a horse for the night.

Fifty cents for the man. Feed was sold if you needed it. Coal was sold too.

But water, water was free. That detail has a way of sticking with you. In a place where every service had its price nailed down to the penny, somebody decided water was just water.

And this yard was more than a place to park and sleep. Hands were hired here. Horses were doctored here.

It was a working node in the whole operation of ranching life, a place where deals got made and help got found. By 1921, it was gone. But for those thirty-some years, that yard was the kind of place that kept the whole enterprise moving, one dime, one half-dollar, one free bucket of water at a time.

What the marker says

Ranchman's headquarters in town; slept in bedroll in his wagon or in room above the office. Cooked over campfire in yard. Overnight charges: .10 cents a horse; .50 cents a man. Feed and coal were sold, water was free. Hands were hired, horses doctored here. Yard existed about 1890 to 1921. (1966)