Preserving Law and Order
In the 1890's, Rangers preserved law and order in Big Bend mining towns, tracked down train robbers and even were called on to prevent an illegal prize fight from taking place on Texas soil. The promoters of the storied Fitzsimmons-Maher bout finally had to settle for staging the boxing match on an island in the Rio Grande.
In 1894-95, the Rangers scouted 173,381 miles; made 676 arrests; returned 2,856 head of stolen livestock to the owners, assisted civil authorities 162 times and guarded jails on 13 occasions.
In 1900, the Frontier Battalion faded along with the frontier; but by July of 1901, the Legislature passed a new law concerning the Ranger service. The force, to be organized by the governor, was created "for the purpose of protecting the frontier against marauding or thieving parties, and for the suppression of lawlessness and crime throughout the state." Ranger captains picked their own men, who had to furnish their own horses and could dress as they choose. They did not even have a standard badge.
The law authorized for Ranger companies of a maximum of 20 men each. The career of Company B. Capt. W. J. McDonald, and a book written about him, added much to the Ranger legend, including two of its most famous sayings.
Bandit Raids
Panic spread in 1915 when authorities in McAllen, Texas, arrest Basilio Ramos, Jr. Ramos was carrying a copy of the Plan of San Diego, a revolutionary manifesto supposedly written and signed at the South Texas town of San Diego. It called for the formation of a "Liberating Army of Races and Peoples," of Mexican Americans, African Americans, and Japanese, to "free" the states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, and Colorado from United States. Versions of the plan call for the murder of all white citizens over 16 years of age. The goal was an independent republic, which might later seek annexation to Mexico.
Raids from both side the the border quickly escalated into guerilla warfare. Francisco (Pancho) Villa's raid on Columbus, New Mexico, in March 1916, causes more panic and the United States responds by sending a large military force under Gen. John J. Pershing in pursuit of Villa.
Texas responded, as it had so many times in its history, by raising Ranger companies. At the time the Texas Ranger Force was very small, and incapable of maintaining law and order along the border. The Texas Legislature by authorizing mass inductions and the "overnight" creation of new Ranger companies.
Hispanic, as well as Anglo, Texans served in these units. The Ranger force grew to its largest level, but the lack of training and controls were evident. Some of the new companies upheld the law while others functioned as vigilante groups incensed by raids from Mexico.
These Rangers were were given orders and wide powers to keep the hostilities in Mexico from washing across the river into Texas. Gov. O.B. Colquitt wrote Ranger Capt. John R. Hughes: " I instruct you and your men to keep them (Mexican raiders) off of Texas territory if possible, and if they invade the State let them understand they do so at the risk of their lives."
The vigilante nature, and poor command structure on the new Ranger units led to incidents unacceptable to "regular" Rangers. Serious crimes were committed that led to the 1919 Canales Investigation. After one retaliatory Ranger raid into Mexico, an entire company was dismissed. In one battle in 1917, as many as 20 Mexicans may have been killed by Rangers who crossed into Mexico.
The 35th legislature also created a "Loyalty Ranger Force" under the "Hobby Loyalty Act" to serve as a secret service for the State. Loyalty Rangers were to brief the Adjutant General on Mexican revolutionary activities outside of San Antonio and in the border counties in Mexico and Texas.
In response to Pershing's US troops on Mexican soil, President Carranza demanded the withdrawal of US forces, which was summarily rejected. As a result, Mexican raiding intensified and an attack against Laredo was considered with a combined force of "San Diego raiders" and regular Mexican Army soldiers. A state of war was narrowly averted when US and Mexican officials agreed to a peaceful settlement.
The fragile peace was threatened again in 1917 when a World War I telegram sent to Mexico by the German Secretary of State Zimmerman became public ". . . we propose an alliance on the following basis with Mexico: That we shall make war together and together make peace. We shall give general financial support, and it is understood that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona. The details are left to you for settlement...." Nothing materialized, but it served to further alarm the public.
Mexican raids into Texas in 1915-16 caused an estimated 21 American deaths; an estimated 300 Mexicans or Tejanos may have been killed in South Texas by the actions of Rangers, vigilantes and citizens. Some sources place the death toll as high as 300 and 3,000.
In January of 1919 Representative José T. Canales of Brownsville demanded a legislative investigation of the conduct of the various Ranger forces during the period 1915-1917 and the reorganization of the force. The Texas Legislature investigated nineteen charges made against the Texas Ranger forces in the aftermath of the Plan of San Diego and the War.
The investigation resulted in the reduction of the Ranger force to four companies of 17 men each. A tightening of qualifications for the Texas Ranger service led to its initial professionalization.
Bootleggers and Spies
In 1918, the national prohibition law was passed. It gave the Rangers, along with federal officers, another problem to cope with on the border. Many a burro train of bootleg liquor from Mexico was intercepted, and shoot-outs between Rangers and smugglers were not infrequent.
During the first World War, the already large regular Ranger force was supplemented with another 400 Special Rangers appointed by the governor. After the war, on the heels of a Legislative inquiry into the Rangers' operation on the border, the Legislature in 1919 reduced the size of the force to four companies of 15 men, a sergeant and a captain. Additionally, the lawmakers authorized a headquarters company of six men in Austin under a senior Ranger captain.
Texas was in a state of transition, and so were the Rangers. Rangers still rode the river on horseback, but they also used cars. The automobile was taking over as the principal mode of transportation in Texas and the rest of the country. And horseless carriages needed oil, not oats. The increased national demand for petroleum fueled a new law enforcement problem for the Rangers.
In addition to their traditional duties, along with assisting in tick eradication efforts, handling labor difficulties and the enforcement of prohibition, the Rangers had to deal with lawlessness that came with the oil boom in Texas. One of the first places that happened was in a community that years before had been named in their honor.
As the Depression took hold in Texas, unscrupulous types began setting up phony holdups, hiring men to rob a bank and then killing them in the act so the reward money could be collected. This was a situation the Rangers could not solve with force. Instead, Hamer went to the press, exposing what was happening. Hamer's move paid off--the banking association's reward policy was changed.
As Senior Ranger Captain, Hamer reported to the state's adjutant general, a man appointed by the governor. A governor also could appoint Rangers, or influence a selection. As governors changed, Ranger leadership usually changed. Though history shows many good men wore the Ranger badge in the 1920s and 1930s, the system was rife with politics and ripe for abuse.
When Gov. Miriam "Ma" Ferguson took office in 1933, Adjutant General W.W. Sterling resigned his office. Forty Rangers, including Capt. Hamer, left with him.
Trailing Bonnie and Clyde
But Hamer was not away from law enforcement for long. In February 1934, Lee Simmons, superintendent of the Texas prison system, asked Hamer if he would track down the notorious criminal couple Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker. Hamer agreed and was given a commission as a Texas highway patrolman.
Since 1927, when a force had been created to patrol the expanding Texas roadways, the state in effect had two police agencies. The young Highway Patrol operated as part of the Highway Department.
Hamer trailed Bonnie and Clyde for 102 days. Finally, Hamer and other officers, including former Ranger Manny Gault, caught up with the dangerous duo in Bienville Parish, Louisiana. The officers had hoped to take the outlaws alive, but when the pair reached for their weapons, Hamer and the others opened fire. The career of Bonnie and Clyde was over.
For a time, it looked like the Texas Rangers were not going to last much longer than Bonnie and Clyde. Under Gov. Ferguson, Ranger commissions were easy to come by, and not all those handed a silver star were men whose character was worthy of the honor. Additionally, Ferguson appointed some 2,300 Special Rangers. A few of those were even ex-convicts.
The Texas Department of Public Safety
The problem did not go unrecognized. The Texas Senate, on Sept. 25, 1934, formed a committee to investigate crime and law enforcement in the state. The committee produced a report in early 1935 that was singularly critical of Texas law enforcement. However, the document also proposed a solution: the creation of a state law enforcement agency to be known as the Department of Public Safety.
Tom Hickman, a veteran Ranger, was named senior captain of the Rangers. The force was organized into five companies, each headed by a captain.
Within a year of their incorporation into the DPS, the Texas Rangers got national publicity with the opening of the Texas Centennial Exposition in 1936 at the State Fairgrounds in Dallas. The headquarters for Co. B was set up in a specially-built log building on the fairgrounds. Texas Rangers were seen in news reel footage in movie houses around the nation.
Modernization
World War II
During World War II, Rangers provided vigilant internal security in Texas. Ranger duties varied from showing air raid warning training films to tracking down escaped German POWs later in the war. When U.S. Army Rangers landed in France, the German press thought those commandos were Texas Rangers. This apparently caused considerable anxiety among the German people. The Reich's minister of propaganda eventually had to clarify matters.
By 1945, the authorized strength of the Texas Rangers had been increased to 45 men. Two years later, the force was increased again, to 51 men. Texas was growing in the post-war economy and so was the parent agency of the Rangers. In 1949, the Legislature authorized construction of a new headquarters building in North Austin. The same year, the DPS bought its first airplane. A Ranger became the Department's first pilot-investigator.
In their first year under the DPS, the Rangers took part in an estimated 255 cases; two decades later, in 1955, the Rangers were involved in 16,701 cases.
Keeping the Peace
The 1950s through the '70s were a turbulent time involving prison riots, Civil Rights and labor movements and desegregation.
After questionable use of Texas Rangers in some incidents, changes were made further defining their mission and restricting State and local authorities from using the Texas Rangers to aid or resist political agendas.
In 1955, inmates in the Rusk State Hospital for the Criminally Insane rioted and took hostages. The National Guard was brought in and Ranger Capt. R. A. "Bob" Crowder, to prevent violence, and the leader of the mob negotiated and the inmates surrendered.
In 1956 Governor Governor Allan Shivers, chose to passively resist federal desegregation of two schools in Texas following a district court order to implement the Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education.He dispatched a Texas Ranger to Mansfield and two to Texarkana with instructions to keep the peace, but not assist African American students in registering for school. The federal government chose not to intervene and registration was unsuccessful.
In 1957 Texas Rangers and Troopers were sent to intervene in a violent steel mill strike in East Texas. Assaults, ambushes, murder, exchanges of gunfire, and a bombing were common between union and non-union elements.
In 1966 the Texas Rangers were sent to Starr County in South Texas. Texas farmers and ranchers, the local Sheriff and Justice of the Peace called for their assistance to interfere with a United Farm Worker organizing attempt and strikes. Intimidation and illegal incarceration was common.Court actions found violations of civil rights and appeals went to the Supreme Court.
In 1974 the Texas Rangers and FBI were sent to intervene in an eleven day prison riot in Huntsville. Hostages were taken, two were killed, but the rest were saved.
Following these events, State and local governments were restricted from requesting or using Texas Rangers as strikebreakers, in civil protests or demonstrations and in prison riots. Their mission has increasingly investigative, special response aand oversight, Border security, and crisis response.
Today's Rangers
Decades later, the Texas Rangers are still investigating cattle thefts and major felony crimes. However, early Texas Rangers could not imagine the level of technical expertise and advanced training by today's rangers.
Becoming a Ranger
Texas Rangers are selected from the ranks of the Department of Public Safety. No recruiting has ever been necessary. It is not unusual for more than 100 officers to apply for only a single opening. To become a Ranger, a DPS officer must have at least eight years of commissioned law enforcement experience (including two years with the DPS) and must have at least 60 hours of college or equivalencies, Ranger appointments are made up on the basis of a competitive examination and oral interviews. Rangers are required to attend at least 40 hours of in-service training every two years, but for most Rangers, the training far exceeds that. Some Rangers receive additional training in areas such as forensic hypnosis, which has played an important role in numerous criminal cases.
Standard Equipment
In addition to their extensive training and experience, modern Rangers have the benefit of state-of-the-art weaponry and other equipment. Each Ranger is equipped with a variety of firearms, protective gear, and tools and equipment for gathering evidence at a crime scene. High-powered sniper rifles, night vision scopes, tear gas guns and gas masks are available for each Ranger company. Other specialized equipment like black lights and electronic surveillance equipment are at the disposal of the Rangers as well.
Today's Rangers travel by car, airplane or helicopter and occasionally by horse. Rangers do not have uniforms but dress as they need to. A Ranger in Dallas might wear a suit and tie while a Ranger assigned to a rural area would likely choose Western wear. During normal everyday activity, Rangers wear western boots and have their badges pinned to their shirts.
As Walter Prescott Webb wrote in his 1935 history of the Texas Rangers,
"The Rangers had to be superior to survive. Their enemies were pretty good...(the Rangers) had to be better..."
© 2018 Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum, a division of the City of Waco.
