Gene Howe Wildlife Management Area

Gene Howe came to Amarillo from Kansas in 1924, started the Amarillo Globe and within two years merged it with the Daily News as the Globe-News. Readers knew him as Old Tack, author of the column The Tactless Texan, which found homes for stray dogs and scolded celebrities. He organized the Goodfellows during the Dust Bowl and proclaimed National Mothers-in-Law Day, staging a 1938 parade that Eleanor Roosevelt watched. A lifelong sportsman, he bought the 10,000-acre Big Bull Ranch in Hemphill County in 1932 and helped organize Ducks Unlimited.

What the plaque says

The Gene Howe Wildlife Management Area contains approximately 6,000 acres of upland sandhills, pastures, natural meadows and woodlands fronting the north bank of the Canadian River. Named for Eugene A. Howe, Amarillo newspaper publisher, dedicated conservationist and member of the Texas Game and Fish Commission for more than 19 years, the area was acquired by the State in 1951. The objectives: to develop, through research and demonstration, better methods of game management which can be applied to major vegetative types found in the High Plains and Panhandle regions of Texas. Chief projects on the Area involve the white-tailed deer, wild turkey, bobwhite quail and migratory waterfowl. Lesser prairie chickens and ring-necked pheasants may be found throughout the year and winter brings a wide variety of visiting shorebirds. To improve wildlife habitat and increase the yield of natural foods for wildlife, dikes have been constructed to create marshes which are planted with waterfowl food plants; brush clearings have been made in the cottonwood thickets and bottomlands to provide suitable feeding areas and game openings; small grain is sowed for winter feeding of deer and turkey. Scientific information acquired through work done on this federal-state cooperative project is available to surrounding landowners and others who are interested. Game surpluses produced on the area are harvested periodically by hunters under a controlled public hunt program. (1963)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Gene Howe Wildlife Management Area — steps away
  Five thousand acres of sand sage and cottonwood bottomland along the Canadian River east of Canadian, bought by the state in 1950 for wildlife research and open to walkers with a permit.
• Canadian River Wagon Bridge — 4.8 mi
  The longest pin-connected bridge in Texas, 3,255 feet of Parker trusses across the Canadian River at Canadian, built for wagons in 1916 and reopened as a footpath in 2000.
• The Citadelle Art Museum — 5.2 mi
  A 1910 Baptist church saved from demolition in 1977, made into a family home filled with art, and given to Canadian in 2009 as one of the Panhandle's few art museums.
• River Valley Pioneer Museum — 5.3 mi
  The Hemphill County museum in Canadian, a Santa Fe division town of 1887 on the river breaks that held one of the first commercial rodeos in Texas and voted itself dry in 1903.

More markers nearby

• Anvil Park Ranch — 1.4 mi
• Former Site of Hogtown — 1.4 mi
• Canadian River Trails — 4.9 mi
• Robert R. Young — 4.9 mi