Route of Jones & Plummer Trail

The Handbook of Texas traces the trail through this corner of Texas. From Beaver, Oklahoma, it ran due south about thirty miles to where Booker now stands, then passed Brubaker Lake and angled southwest toward Gillalow Lake and the partners' store on Wolf Creek, roughly 160 miles from Dodge City. Freight volumes were large: Charles Rath alone shipped 150,000 pounds a week to Mobeetie in 1878. Mail contractors used the road after 1879, and in 1886 P. G. Reynolds made it a major stagecoach route between Dodge City and Mobeetie.

What the plaque says

Established about 1874, when used by the freighting firm of Ed Jones and Joe Plummer to haul tons of buffalo hides from their general store in Lipscomb County to Dodge City, Kansas. Also, in its early days, this trail carried crucial supplies to Generals Nelson Miles and Philip Sheridan during their famous 1874 Indian campaign. Materials for building Fort Elliott, at Mobeetie, also came over the trail. The fort then became southern terminus for the route; Dodge City, northern. In its later years (until 1885), it became a cattle trail. (1968)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Museum of the Plains — 15 mi
  Perryton's four-acre museum of the wheat country at the top of Texas, with an 1899 depot, five historic buildings and a life-size Hank the Cowdog, whose author grew up here.

More markers nearby

• Booker — steps away
• Gray Community Church — 15 mi
• Ochiltree County — 15 mi
• George Morgan Perry — 16 mi