Mrs. Cordia Sloan Duke

Her diary became the nucleus of 6000 Miles of Fence: Life on the XIT Ranch of Texas, written with the historian Joe B. Frantz and published by the University of Texas Press in 1961. The press describes her keeping a notebook and pencil in her apron pocket, and the book arranges the old hands' recollections by aspects of ranch work, in their own language. Her husband, Robert L. (Bob) Duke, became the last cowboy to work for the Farwell estate, kept on to oversee range it leased to the Shelton-Trigg partnership.

What the plaque says

(Jan. 10, 1887 - July 23, 1966) Chronicler of a unique era in the history of the Southwest. Born in Belton, Mo. At 17, taught school in Indian Territory (Okla.) In 1907, she married Robert L. Duke, a ranch hand who had risen to division manager of the XIT Ranch (then world's largest). In addition to ther own family, she "looked after" the 150 cowboys who worked the 3,000,000-acre spread. Kept a diary of everyday events in ranch life around her and successfully encouraged 81 others to do likewise. Thus was preserved an authentic account of a passing phase of American life -- the cowboy and his work. (1969)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• XIT Museum — 0.4 mi
  Dalhart's museum of the three-million-acre ranch Texas traded for its capitol, in a 1929 Chrysler dealership that once housed a USO club for Black soldiers.
• Rita Blanca National Grassland — 29 mi
  Scattered tracts of shortgrass on old XIT range, failed Dust Bowl farms the government bought back and regrassed, with two picnic sites in the open country near Texline.

More markers nearby

• Heartland of Old XIT Ranch — steps away
• Dalhart Army Air Field — 0.6 mi
• Dallam County — 2.2 mi
• Hartley County — 13 mi