Kenedy Ranch Museum of South Texas

Mifflin Kenedy and Richard King first made money as steamboat captains on the Rio Grande. After an amicable split in 1868 Kenedy built his own ranch. He chose the Laurel Leaf brand in 1867, and by the end of 1868 had fenced 30 miles across the peninsula of the Laureles Grant, enclosing 131,000 acres. The museum calls it the first fenced range of any size west of the Mississippi. In 1882 he sold Los Laureles to a Scottish syndicate for $1,100,000 and bought the La Parra Grant, then in Cameron County, the start of a Kenedy Ranch of some 400,000 acres.

The family ran it as the Kenedy Pasture Company, with Mifflin as president and treasurer and his sons Thomas, James and John as officers. His granddaughter Sarita Kenedy East died in 1961, and much of the estate passed to a charitable foundation that still manages ranchland across most of Kenedy County. Sarita, the county seat, is a company town.

The museum is about 20 miles south of Kingsville. It opened in 2003 in the ranch's former business office, a brick building of 1927 whose upper floor still holds ranch offices. Instead of family keepsakes it uses traditional Mexican murals, painted by Daniel Lechón in his Houston studio, with an audio guide and bronze statues. The address is 200 East La Parra Avenue; call ahead or check kenedy.org for current hours.