North Texas can lay claim to many famous men and women, but one of the most famous was also the most infamous. In a three-part series, the Red River Scrapbook looks at the life and mean times of Texas' World Champion Desperado, John Wesley Hardin.

In 1837, when Daniel Rowlett petitioned the Texas Congress to divide Red River County west of the Bois d'Arc, he suggested the name Independence.

The Lake Fannin Volunteers is having a fund-raising drive to repair the roof on the Lake Fannin lodge. Half pint jars of mustang grape jelly are being made available to the public at Owens-Parker Medical on the east side of the Bonham square. There is no fixed fee. A donation in any amount will be appreciated.

Tallgrass prairies once covered more than ten-million acres in north-central Texas, stretching from San Antonio to the Red River. Because of the region�s productive soils, most prairie lands were converted to farmland more than a century ago. Additional acreage fell to urban development with the expansion of Dallas-Fort Worth and other cities. Experts estimate only 1 to 2% percent of the original prairie is left today.

Summer was baseball, twice a week under the lights at the ballparks and every day in some lot or backyard. Toss the bat, choose up sides, banish the last pick to the wilderness of right field and play ball. Rarely were there nine to a side, so you made do.

Allie Tennant's statue of Alamo hero James Butler Bonham graces the town square. The statue was restored by Fannin County Historical Commission.

For more than one hundred years, the heart and soul of Trenton, Texas, current population about 700, was embodied by the town's two oldest businesses, The First National Bank of Trenton and The Trenton Tribune, and the three generations of the two families behind those enterprises, the Donagheys and the Holmeses. (L-R) Tom Mc Holmes and Lewis Donaghey

On July 7, 1919, Lieutenant Colonel Dwight Eisenhower was assigned to a military convoy that departed Washington, D.C. and headed for San Francisco in a test to determine how long it would take the military to respond to an incident on the West Coast. Almost 60 days later, the convoy arrived in San Francisco.

It was 1845, and Texas had been a state less than a year. Enticed by the promise of cheap land, settlers steadily poured in. Among those who hailed from the state of Georgia was a young man named Robert H. Taylor, accompanied by his in-laws, the Hardaways.

Shucks! Corn, that is. From 1918 until the early 1950s, Charles Stokes methodically and skillfully wrapped his home-ground tamale blend with corn husks before placing them in his portable tamale cart. A tasty hot tamale is a fondly remembered tradition of Fannin County lore.

The long and often bitter debate that charged the atmosphere in the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia in the early summer of 1776 as the members of the Continental Congress thrashed out the question of independency from Great Britain, was matched outside the hall, as the vote grew near, by nature's display of crashing lightning and rolling thunder that served to reinforce the import of the moment.

Lance Corporal Billy Roy Bowen�s bucket list was full to the brim . . . with a single item---to serve his country. His bucket tipped over and spilled on March 18, 1968, in Quang Nam Province, South Vietnam.

Stone has been cut and removed from the Floyd Quarry, south of Honey Grove, for the renovation of the Fannin County Courthouse.

A few years back, I took a mental time-out and strolled through the beautiful and historically seductive Willow Wild Cemetery, located in Bonham, approximately 75 northeast of Dallas on Highway 121. Every delicate and respectful step I took made me realize the infinite number of mothers who occupy the cemetery's nearly 10,000 graves. One timeworn, patina-kissed tombstone tugged me closer. It was that of Emma James.

John J. McGraw, owner of the New York Giants, had Jim Thorpe in right field. This was a year after Thorpe had won Olympic gold medals in the pentathlon and decathlon. On the mound for Chicago was Reb Russell, although he was known as "Lefty" growing up in Fannin County. Russell won 22 games for the White Sox that year and Shoeless Joe Jackson said Russell was one of the two toughest pitchers he ever batted against. The year was 1913 and the White Sox were squaring off against the New York Giants in a section of Bonham, Texas known as Russell Heights.

A Fort Worth Gazette clipping noted that once in Bonham, Jay Gould and his retinue, which reportedly included George (son) and his wife, Howard (son), Dr. John P. Munn and others, "were met at the depot by a delegation of prominent citizens." The Gould party was then "escorted by Capt. S. B. Allen, ex-president of the Fannin county bank and other prominent citizens . . . through the principal streets of the city." It further noted that Gould said that "we had a fine town and the finest courthouse in the state, and that we only needed a few more public buildings of the same kind."

Lake Fannin Saved is a book in 150 pages compiled by Gregory Hall now available from Amazon in "full color" for $29. A "black & white" version is available for $8.

His name was just too much for the Texans under his command, so they called him "Prince Polecat," a nickname that delighted the general. In a Confederate army officered by men of all manner of backgrounds, Camille Armand Jules Marie, Prince de Polignac was still one of a kind.

North Texas can lay claim to many famous men and women, but one of the most famous was also the most infamous. In a three-part series, the Red River Scrapbook looks at the life and mean times of Texas' World Champion Desperado, John Wesley Hardin.

John Wesley Hardin's violent career finds new opportunities for mayhem as he takes part in the Taylor-Sutton Feud in DeWitt County and then is tracked down and captured by the Texas Rangers. It's "Texas, by God!"

After sixteen years in prison, John Wesley Hardin gets a second chance, but is soon back to the dangerous ways that will end his life in an El Paso saloon while shooting dice with "...Four Sixes to Beat."

For most of the country, the Civil War ended with the surrender of Confederate forces across the South in the spring of 1865, but in Northeast Texas, these events only presaged the beginning of an informal struggle between rival factions that paid out in blood and death for another half dozen years. Starting today, the Red River Scrapbook takes two-part look at the infamous Lee-Peacock Feud. photo by David Womack

The wounding of Bob Lee and the assassination of Dr. W.H. Pierce in late winter of 1867 ending nothing as Lee and Lewis Peacock and their supporters played revenge for revenge and the Lee-Peacock Feud continued. photo by David Womack

Here is the text of Robert Lee's letter to The Bonham News. It has been edited and punctuated somewhat for clarity.

John Wesley Hardin's violent career finds new opportunities for mayhem as he takes part in the Taylor-Sutton Feud in DeWitt County and then is tracked down and captured by the Texas Rangers. It's "Texas, by God!"

After sixteen years in prison, John Wesley Hardin gets a second chance, but is soon back to the dangerous ways that will end his life in an El Paso saloon while shooting dice with "...Four Sixes to Beat."

The long and often bitter debate that charged the atmosphere in the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia in the early summer of 1776 as the members of the Continental Congress thrashed out the question of independency from Great Britain, was matched outside the hall, as the vote grew near, by nature's display of crashing lightning and rolling thunder that served to reinforce the import of the moment.

For most of the country, the Civil War ended with the surrender of Confederate forces across the South in the spring of 1865, but in Northeast Texas, these events only presaged the beginning of an informal struggle between rival factions that paid out in blood and death for another half dozen years. Starting today, the Red River Scrapbook takes two-part look at the infamous Lee-Peacock Feud. photo by David Womack

The wounding of Bob Lee and the assassination of Dr. W.H. Pierce in late winter of 1867 ending nothing as Lee and Lewis Peacock and their supporters played revenge for revenge and the Lee-Peacock Feud continued.

We invite you to join North Texas e-News in a new project - a scrapbook of the Red River Valley and of the people, places, and events that have made a mark on this part of Texas and Oklahoma for two hundred years and more. At e-News we often have thought that an import function of a small town newspaper is to act as a repository of the everyday things that tie one day to the next, one year to the next, one generation to those who have come before and will come after.

It was one thing for the Congress to declare independence from Great Britain; it was another thing to achieve it. As the word of the decisions reached in Philadelphia spread throughout the colonies, those in favor of the move, if they were not under the baleful eye of King George's soldiers, generally celebrated with gusto, but it would take six years of war and before the idea became a reality for many.

In times past, no American politician worth his salt would let Independence Day past with out rising to extol the virtues of the founding fathers, the grand old flags, and the sacrifice of the men and women who made the American Dream an American Reality for millions. These days, the speeches are more likely to be bitter, angry, and mean spirited, so here are some words from earlier times when pride and love of country were not such a negative things as it sometimes is now.

During the war for independence, the new American government and the armed forces of the army and navy utilized numerous flags of different designs. Although several of these flags incorporated designs of stripes and stars, none put all the elements together in the form we recognize today, until the Continental Congress passed the first laws concerning the national banner on June 14, 1777.