Fort Worth Stockyards Hog and Sheep Markets

The Pig Club program the plaque mentions has a named organizer. The Handbook of Texas says the stockyards company sent its public-relations agent, Charles C. French, to rural areas of Texas and the South from 1909 to 1914 to start pig clubs among rural young people. His work came before the Smith-Lever Act of 1914 set up the federal Extension Service and helped spread 4-H clubs. The Fort Worth company wanted more hogs for its market, and the clubs gave farm families a reason to raise them, with prizes and a market waiting.

What the plaque says

Fort Worth Stockyards Hog and Sheep Markets Early attempts by the Fort Worth Union Stock Yards Corporation, established in 1887, to persuade Texans to produce more hogs proved unsuccessful. In 1903 the Fort Worth Stockyards constructed new hog and sheep pens and launched a promotional campaign, which included cash and livestock prizes and a youth Pig Club program, to persuade ranchers to raise more hogs. The number of hogs processed at the stockyards increased from 150,527 in 1903 to 1,062,021 in 1917. The number of sheep processed at the stockyards ranged from about 100,000 to 400,00 per year from 1903 through the 1920s . By 1936 Texas had become the largest producing state for both cattle and sheep. For one week in the spring of 1937 Fort Worth received more sheep than any other principal U.S. market. During World War II cattle, sheep, and hog numbers at the Fort Worth Stockyards increased dramatically. Hog totals topped 1 million in both 1943 and 1944 and from 1943 through 1946 more than 2 million sheep were processed annually at Fort Worth's Stockyards. The Sheep and Hog Markets were a significant factor in Fort Worth's development into one of the nation's largest livestock centers during the 1940s and 1950s. Sesquicentennial of Texas Statehood 1845-1995.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fort Worth Stockyards — steps away
  The brick-street cattle market where Armour and Swift built packing plants in 1902, now a National Register district with a Coliseum, a museum and a longhorn drive twice a day.
• Tarrant County Courthouse — 2.3 mi
  A pink-granite courthouse of 1895 on the bluff where the Army set up Fort Worth in 1849, in a county named for the man who led the 1841 attack on the Native villages of Village Creek.
• Kimbell Art Museum — 3.0 mi
  Louis Kahn's cycloid-vaulted museum of 1972, built from Kay Kimbell's bequest and joined in 2013 by Renzo Piano's pavilion for the exhibitions the Kahn galleries could not hold.
• National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame — 3.4 mi
  A hall of fame begun in Hereford in 1975 to honor rodeo women, widened in 1977 to Western heritage, and housed in Fort Worth's Cultural District since 2002.

More markers nearby

• Fort Worth Stockyards Horse and Mule Barns — steps away
• Fort Worth Stock Yards Company — steps away
• Niles City — steps away
• Armour and Company — steps away