Tall Tales: The stories of Jones and Sam Glenn
Tall tales, Greek mythologies, and even a finely crafted ghost story can tell you a lot about a place in time and the people who wrote the stories. When I was a kid, I enjoyed the tall tales featuring the giant, Paul Bunyan and his blue ox. Later I was charmed by the tales of Casey Jones at the bat and railway man John Henry.
Only a few years ago I learned that Kerrville has its own set of tall tales. After discovering the tales in one book, and then finding the legends repeated in other publications, I became curious about the men who were featured in the tales – most of them involved one of two men, both with the last name of Glenn.
 |
| Samuel Donnelly Glenn |
As the woman scurried into the shelter, the cowboy picked up his fork and reached for a biscuit. At that instant the storm hit, and “in less than a second” the house was gone. Everything in the house had blown away, except for the cowhand, sitting in his chair, reaching out for a biscuit (which had also blown away).
The cowboy rose shakily from his chair, when a head popped out of the cellar. The cowboy asked which way was north and the head said, “It used to be over there, but Lord only knows where it is now.”
One account, in “Lore and Legend of the Texas Hill Country” by William Campion, made Jones Glenn the star of the legend, while Merill Doyle in “Reminiscences of My Youth and Other Catastrophes” says the star of the tale of the tornado was Jones’ younger brother, Sam Glenn.
 |
| William Jones Glenn This is the best photo I could find of him |
Recently, I stumbled across the first-hand account of surviving a tornado by Sam Glenn in “Kerr County Texas, 1856-1976” by Clara Watkins. As Sam tells it, the event happened after a really rough cattle drive in New Mexico, in which the men had ran out of water to drink.
“We had filled a barrel of water, but a bar of soap fell into the barrel and now we had soap suds,” he recalled. “The lead cattle went on ahead and I was left with the drags, taking two or three days to cross the plains under a burning July sun. I suffered some, and began to look for help, although I did not give up hope. We would have reached water sooner, but the cattle got lost the third day.”
Relief came when Sam noticed riders coming from the west, one of them was carrying water. He rode the 30 miles to camp and decided to take the train home to Kerrville. Between Emporia and Parsons, Kansas, is where Sam encountered his “first cyclone.”
“I stopped in a little town and went over to the hotel for supper, and when the lady of the house seemed very pale and nervous, I asked her if she was sick. She told me that she was afraid a cyclone was coming and that a nearby town had been blown away a few days before. I tried to pacify her, telling her that I was a cowboy and was in all sorts of storms all the time and for her not to worry. As I was hungry, I ate longer than the rest of the boarders, and as I reached for a piece of bread, ‘bang!’ I went round and round and so did the house!”
Sam said that when the storm set the house down and turned it on its side, he crawled out, covered in splinters. He looked around to see what happened to the town and that there “was not a soul in sight.”
“Pretty soon,” he said, “People began to come out of their storm caves. During the excitement I asked which way was north and one man said, ‘It used to be over there, but the Lord only knows where it is now.’ So I took the train for San Antonio.” I can’t help but reflect on the string of bad luck Sam was having on that trip.
William “Jones” Glenn was born in San Saba Texas in 1844. His younger brother, Samuel Donnelly Glenn was born in 1854 in Llano County. They were two of eight children born to William Taylor and Nancy Boston Glenn. The family moved several times while the children were growing up. In 1859, they were living at the headwaters of the Pedernales River in Gillespie County in a log cabin.
When three of the oldest sons, including Jones, left to serve in the Civil War, the family lost their line of defense against attacks from Kiowa and Comanche Indians. There was a military presence in the area to defend civilians from the attacks, but when General H.R. Bee, the commanding officer in San Antonio, ordered the settlers of Gillespie County to band together and protect themselves from attack, the Glenn Family decided to move to Kerrville in 1862.
After the Civil War ended in 1865, Jones re-joined the family in Kerrville, where he met and married Rhoda Arminta Lowrance in December of that year. Jones started out as a cow hand, rounding up stray cattle and herding them to market in Kansas and was known locally as a skilled trail rider. By 1872, both Samuel and Jones were driving cattle for ranchmen in Kerr County. In every account where the Glenn Brothers were mentioned, their incredible height was mentioned. No exact height was given for Jones in any of the accounts, but Sam was reported to stand six feet, six inches tall.
One of the tales told about Sam was that he had enlisted in the Texas Rangers as a young man. As a captain surveyed the troops, he told his sergeant to “tell that new man to get off that stump.” The sergeant replied, “Sir, he’s not on a stump, he’s standing in a hole.”
A story told about Jones was that Captain Charles Schreiner hung a new sign outside of his store one morning and it was lower than a previous sign. Jones Glenn, who was in the habit of taking a walk along Water Street and in front of the store each morning, repeatedly hit his head on the new sign. One morning Jones encountered Captain Schreiner and said that the Captain had better remove the sign or Jones would take care of it himself, which caused the Captain to chuckle.
The next day, Captain Schreiner heard a commotion outside of his store and when he went to investigate the source of the noise, he saw his new sign torn down, lying in ruin on the sidewalk and Jones Glenn walking calmly away.
While I don’t know if this story is based in fact, in studying both Jones and Sam Glen, I discover two men how had action-packed lives. Their accounts read like a novel based in the Wild West. Both men were experienced trail riders and both had established reputations for fighting Comanche raiders and outlaws. When Sam was asked if he had “ever killed an Indian” he responded with a yes, that “I ran him to death, by keeping in the lead.” He added that there must have been a second Comanche chasing him, because when he visited Fort Griffin, he encountered a native that greeted him by calling him “Leaping Deer.”
The brothers served locally as Minute Men, an organization of 12-15 volunteer frontiersmen under the leadership of Captain Schreiner who responded various emergency situations in Kerr County. Both Sam and Jones were known for their participating in the “Flat Rock Fight.” In 1876, Sam Glenn and a man named Alex Crawford, were riding on Second Creek (now known as Silver Creek, near the VA Hospital) when they saw a band of five men taking horses belonging to Kerr County Deputy John Henson.
Sam Glenn and Crawford hurried to town to notify Captain Schreiner and the Minute Men were assembled to capture the horse thieves. Captain Schreiner also sent word to some Texas Rangers in the area to assist in the apprehension. As fate would have it, the Rangers were at a house where one of the thieves had stopped to have the lady of the house bake some bread for the men in his camp. When the message from Captain Schreiner arrived, the thief overheard the messenger talking about the horse raiding and he “quickly forgot all about the bread and headed back to camp.”
The horse thieves were camped in the area now known as Flat Rock Park and that is where the Minute Men caught up to the bad guys. A gunfight ensued. One of the thieves died by a gunshot wound and, according to Sam Glenn, only one of the Minute Men was injured when he hit his head on a tree while trying to escape bullets.
After the rest of the bandits were rounded up and taken into town it was discovered that the men had held up a stage at Leon Springs and had taken the four stage horses. They had also robbed the Max Ane Store in Leon Springs and had left the owner of the store tied to a chair. A lot of the goods the bandits had with them when they were arrested was identified as loot that came from Max Ane’s store, including red bandanas the men had worn around their necks during the fight with the Minute Men.
Samuel Glenn married Martha Jane Crawford in 1875. She was the sister of Alex Crawford mentioned above.
 |
| Samuel & Martha Glenn |
Sam and his wife lived in Kerrville the rest of their lives and had five children. Sam (d. 1939) and Martha (d. 1943) are both buried in Mountain View Cemetery on Sidney Baker Street.
Jones Glenn and his wife, Rhoda, left Kerrville sometime between 1915-1920 and settled in Midland. They had one daughter. Both Jones (d. 1925) and Rhoda (d. 1949) are buried
in Midland.
Comments
Post a Comment