Parmer County

The Ringtailed Panther of the plaque had a stormy road to Texas independence. Martin Parmer, a Virginia-born Missouri legislator, joined the Fredonian Rebellion in 1826 and presided over the court-martial that convicted Samuel Norris, the alcalde of Nacogdoches. When the rebellion collapsed he fled to Louisiana, and Mexican authorities expelled him when he tried to return in 1831. Pardoned in 1835, he sat in the Consultation and signed the Declaration at Washington-on-the-Brazos. He married four times, and his first wife's ten children spelled their name Palmer. He died in 1850.

What the plaque says

Parmer County Created August 21, 1876, from Bexar County. Named for Martin Parmer ("The Ringtailed Panther"), signer of Texas Declaration of Independence. Organized May 7, 1907. The XIT Ranch, extending across nine counties, initially owned most of Parmer. The Capitol Syndicate, which built Texas' Capitol, received in payment 3,050,000 acres of land and established the XIT in 1885. By 1890, population of the county was only 70. But, with syndicate land sales, buyers came on the new railroad in 1904. Brisk settlement began, with many small farms. Farwell is the county seat. (1965)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Blackwater Draw — 18 mi
  The site between Clovis and Portales that gave the Clovis culture its name, found by a nineteen-year-old in 1929 and dug for decades inside a working gravel pit.

More markers nearby

• Near Route of the Coronado Expedition — steps away
• Clovis — 2.3 mi
• Ida O. Jackson — 11 mi
• Norman Petty Recording Studios Clovis — 12 mi