INSTITUTE OF TEXAN CULTURES
ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM
INTERVIEW WITH: BILL CORKERY, OL ' BILL , Cowboy
INTERVIEWER: Esther MacMillan
DATE: April 27, 1982
PLACE: Oral History Office, ITC.
C: 01' Bill .. . Cowboy Bill is for the birds.
M: The first thing I want to ask you is
as 01' Bill and everybody here knows you
a last name.
you're known
you must have
C: C-O-R-K-E-R-Y.
nounced.
It don't sound nothing like it's pro-
M: Somebody told me you were born in East somewhere.
C: That's right. I was born in 1912 in Flushing, Long Island.
M: Really?
C: I don 't blame you. Because people think that everybody
that is a Texan today was born here.
M: That's right!
C: Now honey, don't ever believe that. When I was a boy, I
went to school on Long Island. We had farms; they had
potatoes; and what they called Long Island ducks and all them
things.
And then we had Westbury , Long Island, where they had a
bunch of Society women that had fine horses. And as a boy,
11, 12 year old, 13, I rode them horses, worked them out for
them .
CORKERY
C: They were polo horses; they were jumping horses; they
were all kinds of horses. And of course we had draught
horses that used to pull ploughs. And of course today you
have your tractor which has nothing on that old draught
horse. Because when you sweated and walked behind him and
he sweated, there was a smell there that you can't produce
today. And folks, it wasn't pollution; it was the real
McCoy.
C: Now . the thing is this here: I had a little
schooling, yes, but experience in life is a wonderful
thing. Here I was, just a boy, 15. My mother died when
I was 15 and I was heart broken. I mean them old tears
come out of my eyes; I thought I had lost everything.
Well, at that time, I was exercising some horses for
a woman out on Long Island, and she had got a load of polo
horses in. Now of course, back in them days, polo horses
sold for a good price and only the rich could afford 'em.
Two old boys, great big old boys come up from Texas with
those horses. Here I was a kid of 15 and they watched me
riding them ole horses; kind of looked at one another,
grinned,. They'd say, "That kid is somethin'" In other
words they'd say today, "Some " .. but I can't get around
that; I aint got no teeth. (One of these days I'm
going' to ole Mexico and have them teeth made up and come
back here to San Antonio and I'll be able to talk Spanish.)
(laughter)
Now anyways, breaking back into my story again, when I
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CORKERY
c: was 15 my mother died. And I was over by that horse
pen that day and I was thinking about it. The tears were
coming down my cheeks. These two big ole Texas boys
looked me over. And they said, "Bill, what's wrong?" I
said, "My mother died . She was all I had that to me was
everything." They said, "Now listen, you're going to have
to forget. We don 't mean it in a mean sort of way. But
listen, we're goin' back to Texas in about a week. And
listen, that ole Texas is a big dad-gum country. You'll
like it there, Bill." And I came down with them ole boys.
M: You did !
C: Yeah. and, well .
M: Did you come down on the train?
3 •
C: No, we come down in a big ole truck that they had. We
stopped of at Ft. Worth there. You know I'd never been in
Ft. Worth before, and of course at that time, hell, they
had them ole stock yards and stuff; and them ole cattle men
and cowboys walking down the street, cow manure on the back
of their dad-gum boot heels . it was Texas.
But if you go up there today, all you'll see is these
boys with feathered hats on and a bunch of high peeled dudes
is what I call ' em. But I don't mean any harm. Everybody
can't dress alike. But if they get a kick out of that, it's
all right. Aint nothin' agin~m.
Well anyway, t hem ole boys said to me, "Listen Bill,
we're goin' over by one of these ranches here and if you'd
like to take a job on a ranch)we'll fix you up with this
CORKERY
c: ole boy. I'm trying to thi nk back what his name was.
I t 's been so long ago. I 'll be 70 years old in June
You figure I was born in 1912 . I've kind of
l ived a little while .
M: You were in Ft. Worth in 1927, t hen.
C: In 1927 , yes, I was in Ft. Worth, Texas. So these o l e
boys took me to a r anch there and that ole man. . he was
comical, he had a twinkle in his eye I remember his
first name, Torn . and they said, "Torn , t his is Bill here ,
just a little button . "(the expre ssion button was when
you was young. . probably didn't have good sense. That's
the way they talked. That was their way of life.)
That man, he said, "Wel l, Bill, I 'll pay you a dollar a
day and your keep." And I thought to myself. "Just think,
I'm going to get three meals and a dollar a day." I worked
with that man and finally went to other ranches. There was
always one nice thing about it, they'd always say, "Bill,
c orne back and see u s again when you're here. You 're always
welcome ." Today you don 't hear that welcome like it used
to be. And that's the s orrowful part. There was people
that was so friendly and so nice . it's a thing you
can't forget . I mean, a man would have a pot of beans
alongside the road and you might be walkin' alongside that
r oad , and he 'd look at you and say, "Boy, did you have any­t
hing t o eat today?" You was proud; you'd t hrow your
chest out and say, "Oh , yes, I already ate." "Don' t lie
to me; come over here and eat with me ." If that was his
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CORKERY
c: last pot of beans, he shared ' em with you. That was
Texas then. It's gettin' pitiful now.
M: Oh, there 's still good people out in the We st .
c: Oh, they is l ots of good people. But I'm older now.
Now you take , for instance, I had to laugh. . years ago
t here 's an old man, he's 82 years old and he i s comical.
He had an old horse t here and I'd ride out with him
this was later on in years. These old ranchers had pickups
and they'd ride around ; be talking ; and that old man'd say
to me, "Bill , you see them o l e pickup cowboys there? Listen ,
they aint worth a dam. " I said, "Why? " He said, "They
don 't get on a horse and get out in t hat dam' brush and see
if t hey have any wormy calves ; any cows that need doctoring;
what i n the hel l is it comin' to?"
c: That ole man , he never did eat much; he just eat a little
bit o f beans and beef. But the thing is in them days you
had fresh killed beef. Now the stuff you get at the store
these days tastes like eatin' a p iece of old card board or
somethin '. That was real beef. And that was grass f ed; it
didn't have any of this dad gum push-' em-up-quick and get ' em
out and s ell ' em.
M: Let me interrupt here . . when you went to ranching,
to cowboying, from Ft . Worth the first time , did you work
with horse s mostly all your life?
C: I worked wit h horses .
:; .
CORKERY
M: That was kind of your thing, wasn't it?
c: I liked horses. I lived on the ranches goin' through.
I hit the ole Four Sixes, that's up around Guthrie,
Texas, and the ole Waggoner Ranch, Old Pitchfork . I
stayed there a while with different ones. Texas was so
big; and I was still young. I said to myself, n I'd sure
like to see all of this."
M: So you just kept moving on, eh?
C: But you know, I never did get to see all of it. Because
Texas is mighty big.
M: I don't think any of us ever has.
C: I don't think anybody has. We've got some thin , like 254
counties. I had an ole grandfather, he had an expression,
"I don't give a continental."
M: My grandmother used to say that.
C: He l earned it from his grandpa. And handed it down.
M: That's an old-time expression.
C: That's Yankee talk, in a way. It is comical, you get
around, get to knowin' people. If you know the real Texas
. and me, I say I knew the real Texas in them days.
M: You did. In the early part of this century.
C: That's right. Say in the 20's and up into the 40's.
M: That far?
C: I enjoyed life to the fullest.
M: Did you?
C: With me, I was always a boy; I was full of fun. I liked
to make people laugh . When you can do that that's somethin'
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CORKERY
c: the good Lord hisself give you.
M: Tell me a little about life on those ranches in those
early days.
c: Well, honey, let's figure this way: Everybody goes by,
the book; the television they're showin' nowadays; all
these thing goin' on; like they have some kind of a show
called "Hazard County" if they don't bust up a whole lot of
cars, it aint a good show. Now in the old days, rodeo, you
got busted up instead of a car. The horse usually come out
on top.
M: Did you get into rodeo?
C: I rode a little bit, honey. Nothin' to brag about.
Won a few prizes. But wasn't trying to make a career out
of it because I liked horses and to be with a bunch of colts.
And educating them colts was my life.
I worked cattle, yes. I went out in that brush, I
worked for one outfit that was all brush country. And that
ole brush was as thick . . oh, Lord God. Now before I
came on that ranch, I went over to El Paso Texas. Went down
into ole Juarez, Mexico, and I bought a pair of leggings. I
say leggins; of course a lot of people use the word leggings.
Some people call them chaps, and the ole Spanish term is
chappereros. Now I bought them. . they cost me $6.50 a
pair. And one of them was heavy. When you got off a horse
your knee bent with them leggins. If you wanted to have any
comfort at all, you unhooked 'em and hung 'em on the
7.
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CORKERY
c: saddle hor n. Stretch your l egs a li ttl e bit. Now you
see these ole boys on television, why they can do a dance in
a pair of chaps because the dad gum things are so thin the
first shot of brush you hit would tear ' em all up like
shredded wheat. Yes, ma'm.
M: You wore these . I suppose they were made of horsehide?
C: No, honey, they was made out of ole bull hide. You lift
'em up they dam near weighed 50 pounds.
M: But they protected your l egs .
C: Yes, ma 'm. And in the evenin', when you come in
an ole boy had an ole brush there we used to brush off all
them dam' stickers and stuff. Now they don't tell you that
in the stores nowadays; hell, some of them ole ranchers were
comical it would get too hot to sleep in that ole bunk
house. The boys would say to one another, "Listen, that aint
nuthin' but a dad gum flea bag anyway." In other words, it
was cockroaches, fleas and bed bugs. They aint goin' to tell
you that in books.
One ole boy, it was comical. . I seen him going like
this here he was picking lice off his chest, laying ' em
down , you know. He'd take 'em off his back and he'd kill ' em.
And I said, "Jake, how come them ones you pick off your bosom
there, you don't kill, you let go and the ones on your back,
you kill?" He said, "Bill, I love bosom friends but I hate
back biters." (laughter) That 's all part of life.
M: When it got too hot in the bunkhouse, did you sleep outside?
C: We slept outside on our ole tarps.
CORKERY
M: What's that?
C: We'll it's a bed roll.
Years ago they called 'em a hot roll.
M: But you called yours a tarp?
C: Well, I called mine a tarp because it buckled on the
side. We put this piece through the hole and just flip
it over and it would lock. I'd have to have it here to
show you how it was done.
M: t-a-r-p-s.
C: Some people call 'em tarpolians (tarpaulin). Now
today a tarp would be something you would throw over a hay
stack to keep i t dry . Some ole boys, the ole timers, they
still call 'em hot rolls.
M: Was there anything else inside but the tarp?
C: Yes, we had blankets and stuff, when the weather was
cold . But of course with hot weather that way, you wanted
to get down to the bare necessities to keep cool .
M: And there was a lot of hot weather, wasn't there?
C: Oh, there was a lot of hot weather.
M: Were you in West Texas all the time? Pretty much stayed
there?
C: Oh, I moved around, all around. There's been so many
places I went and did , it's pretty hard at times to remem-ber.
You know how they show you in the comics. . a
little light pops up? Well , here it is: that's with me;
I'll be thinking and all of a sudden, it will hit. That's
why I'm talkin' to you now and tryin' to remember back the
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CORKERY
C: way I was.
M: When you moved from one ranch to another, were the
fellows were working, the cowboys, were they all young like
you or was it a mixed bag?
C: Well, ma'm there was what they call reps ... what was
called representative of the ranch. In other words, they
were the home guard . they called 'em reps . That means
they worked there all the time .
or bad . They always had a j ob.
whether times were good
M: r-e-p-s?
C: Yeah. or reputation, you could say it that way.
I used to know t he word rep 'til somebody told me later on
-- I didn't have too much schooling. They'd say, "Oh, he's
a rep ; Bill, y'all don't know what a rep means," he said,
"that's what you called a home guard. He's there all the
time. II
It's was comical how some o f them ole boys would explain
things. One morning they had some horses they were breakin'
there was this ole timer with handle bar mustache on
him. . i t's comical to look at t ha t ole man. He was
chewin' tobacca; and he'd be chew in , and that ole mustache
was like a pair of long horns . . it stuck out . and
when he ' d chew them ole things would bob up and down. He
looked like an ole lead steer on a trail drive. Well, we
was over by the horse pen, me and that ole man, we's
standing there ; an old boy got pitched off a bronc; his
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CORKERY
c: legs were all spraddled out and his arms stuck a way
out. That ole man looked at me and said, "Bill, that kid
there looks like a migratin' frog ." That was his way of
talkin' .
Now I haven't heard that expression since but I re­membered
it because he was an old timer. And I like ole
timer. And I like ole time trail drivers. They'll tell
you somethin' they won't tell you in history books today.
Them ole timers, back to 19 I think it was 36 , I
came in here to San Antonio just for the fun of it, killin'
time and they had a trail driver's get together. Back then
they had a I think they started, them trail drivers,
s tarted with their organization in about 1915.
A lot of ole timers were still left. A comical part
t hey had a dance right in the ole Gunter Hotel in
San Antonio, here. Them ole timers were up in their 80's;
some in their 90 's; and you could see their eyes was
squinched from that ole sun. And little ole crow feet
alongside. Kind of a long , lean look about their face.
Not the cattle man today with a big ole fat face , chompin'
on a seegar, and sayin', "We ll boys, you're all right." and
then go to a hotel and eat the finest food stuff.
The ole boy that worked the ranches, that's the ole boy
earned his dollar a day and keep. Honey, if you ask me
anything, he really earned every penny.
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CORKERY
c: Now there was some time you'd have to dig post holes ;
set posts in; stretch wire. You know everybody thinks,
hell, all you did was ride around . There was so many
things. Maybe you'd have to fix a dad gum ole windmill.
There was many an ole boy . . . the windmills sometime
were pretty high . and when it come time to climb up
there and grease that windmill, they'd say, "I've got to
grease that windmill in about a week." And you could see
by look in , at him, they wasn't goin ' to go up there. They
quit and went off.
M: Really?
C: They wasn't goin' to climb up there . Only fools'd
climb up there. Now today, of course, they have windmill
men that have all their fittings and stuff to fix them
windmills. And they're strictly what you call windmill
men.
I nave an ole friend down at Pearsall; that ole rascal
is a dam good ole cowboy and he can gather cattle in the
brush still today. I l aughed because he said , "Bill , them
ole heliocopters (sic) fly over that brush. Them ole cows
are gettin' kinda wise to 'em. They dig out and get further
in that brush. Them ole cows look at one another, say,
" 'Isn't that nice the boss sent that air conditioner over
here to keep us cool.' " (laughter)
You know, it's comical . I get to tal kin ' that way.
Every year here we have a Texas Folklife Festival. There's
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CORKERY
c: all different kinds of people that make that up and
they ' re all good folks. It tickles me to watch them ole
"Scot", I admire them men; they got big ole arms on 'em.
They look like a blacksmith; you of tern see blacksmiths
with big arms. And they ' ll take a great big ole pole.
dad gum near as big as a light pole, and toss that thing.
I think they call it 'tossin' the caber'. It kinda tickles
me. They're just a bunch . them ole blue eyes they
have is just like lookin' at water that's nice and clear.
It's a feelin' , they shake your hand, they really mean it .
C: They wring that ole hand t il your knuckles pop. That ' s
real people. Now some of these people shake hands with you,
it's like pickin' up a dead fish. That's a fact. You know,
it aint like it used to be.
M: In other words, your breed is fast disappearing.
C: My breed is dyin'.
M: Did you ever go up on a trail. . up the trail with
cattle?
C: Oh, no ma'm. But here ' s a comical part: just recently,
it kinda tickled me, some ole place up in North Texas, I
read this in the newspaper ... can't remember all about it.
No, I didn't read it in the newspaper. . I saw the dad
gum thing on television . that's what tickles me. These
ole cattlemen ,to ship their cattle in trucks, why the
price was so high they just couldn't afford it. So they
gathered the cattle and drove ' em down the road. Now,
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CORKERY
C: if only I could think of the names of the towns and it
tickled me because here them ole boys after all these years,
were repeating years ago. Because things are gettin' so
high . you take like today. . you know an ole bicy-cle,
you see many little ole boys ridin' bicycles . I
get a kick out of 'em, but for them boys that ride that
bicycle down the road, they takin' an awful chance. I
don't think people today ralize how fast they're goin ' in
automobiles.
'Course back in the ole days, we had the Model T Fords;
maybe four, five of us would have our saddles in the back .
. we had our saddle s and bridles. You see, you had to have
your own saddle and bridle years ago.
M: You did?
C: Yeah. Some ole boys would buy a ole beat up saddle for
about five or ten dollars . . and Lord God, if you wanted
to be easy on your horse you'd put a good blanket on there
so we wouldn't get no saddle sores on him.
C: And a man that really knowed horses is not goin' to
tear 'em up and jerk 'em around and have 'em bleedin' at
the mouth. I have seen some people that are mean like that,
handlin' horses like a bunch of fools. And you'd like to
knock the tar out of 'em but, but you look and say, "He's so
CORKERY
C: ignorant it's pitiful. If I beat him, he'd only do it
again. It
M: Were people more thoughtful and sensitive in your day?
With their horses?
C: People were thoughtful because for instance, if a man
was raisin' some good quarter horses. . he wanted them
horses so that any ranch hand could clumb up on those
horses and ride off and be perfectly safe. He wouldn't
have a horse that was goin' to pitch on him and he was a
horse, if he had to cut cows, he could go right in there
. you could drop the reins; he knowed what he was doin'
hisse lf.
As a matter of fact, one ole boy tickled me. He said,
"Hell, this horse don't need me. He took his saddle and
bridle off and put it on the side. "Hoss, go get me that
worn out ole bag." And I laughed. And the funny part is,
that ole horse, it tickled me, that ole cow was gettin'
away from him, you know, and he just reached out with his
teeth and bit him on the flank and turned him back.
M: Really?
C: Yeah. That ole horse was comical. But that's all
part of life.
11: Did you have a preference for any kind of horse? Did
you like one kind better than another?
c: Well, you take for instance like a lot of people,
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CORKERY
C : they'll write in books today that the ole mustang
aw, they didn't want him at all. He was a horse that
wasn't worth a dam. But Lord God, honey, this country was
built on mustangs years ago. And it was built on long horn
cattle .
C: What in the hell do you think they were usin'? Thor­oughbreds
Ollt there? No. The reason why they're usin'
mustangs is when YOIl had a remuda of horses . . a big
bunch of horses. . maybe a hundred head or more, you
could take out about eight horses . each cowboy'd have
eight horses . He'd ride 'em two hours, come out of that
brush, change off, put his saddle on a fresh horse, and go
back in .
M: How long?
C: About two hours, out in the brush. Might even press
it to three if you were hard pressed trying to get a cow
out. But usually, it was about two hours.
And them ole horses, they'd come out of that brush and
they really worked. Now it's a funny thing, when you're
ridin' along beside the brush that way. an ole mustang
is comical. They kinda like a hound dog; they can smell
cattle in that brush. Them cattle hang back there in that
dam brush and they won't move, they get real quiet . And
that ole mustang'll sniff, just like a hound dog and the
first thing , he'll' tighten up and you know he didn't have
a path to go through there. He'd just pop through that
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CORKERY
c: brush. That's where the expression "brush popper " comes
from. A lot of people don't know that. They say, " What
in the hell is a brush popper?" And when a man was a
brush popper , he was a cowboy. I mean the real t hing. He
wasn't just an ole boy just ridin' in a feed lot and
throwin' 'em hay and grain. No sir.
M: You mentioned eight horses went out at a time. When you
were looking
c: We had a man called a wrangler. And that wrangler was
the man took care of the horses. At night he bedded 'em
down and keep his eye on 'em. Now that wrangler, he just
took care of them ole horses. Next day, he'd have 'em
ready for you when you were going ' to ride out. Now, you
c: might have rode out on one horse but them other horses
come along because they drive ' em along; would p ick out a
place where they \~ere goin' to make camp with them horses.
Now, sometime you'd come out there and you wanted a
cup of coffee. Well, you always had an ole coffee pot out
on the s ide there. And that ole coffee . you'd be
feelin' kinda tired, and that coffee was so strong the hair
on the back of your neck would stand up and by God, pick
you up and bring you back to life.
M: Did you put sugar in?
c: Sugar? What is sugar?
M: You didn't use sugar?
C: I have never used sugar, even today.
CORKERY
M: You didn't sweeten your coffee?
C: No. When we made coffee in the old time, we had a big
ole fat gallon coffee pot. four , five, gallon pot. And
we'd take that dad - gum ole thing and fill it four, five inches
from the top and take a can of coffee and throw it in there.
M: A whole can?
C: A half a can. About a half a pound.
Now we'd cook that up and a ole boy had a horse shoe on
the side; he'd drop it in there and i f that horse shoe
floated, that was done. If it sank, you had to add more cof­fee.
(laughter)
M: But you drank it straight, eh?
C: Drank it straight.
M: You didn't fool with any milk or cream?
C: No, that ole milk and sugar, condensed milk
Gail Borden invented that condensed milk years ago.
M: Down in Galveston .
. Ole
C: His father-in-law was o l e Shanghai Pierce. And there's a
comical thing. Down around Blessing, Texas. He wanted to
name that place Lord Help Us, Texas and the people said,
"Shanghai Pierce, you can't do that." Those people knowed
that'd be insultin' to the good Lord hisself. Shanghai was a
funny ole boy.
M: Was he? Did you know him?
18.
C: No, I didn't know Shang; Shanghai died l ong befor e my time.
CORKERY
C: His decendents are down around there , Blessing, today.
M: And he wanted to call it God Help Us?
C: Lord Help Us. Shang built the rai lroad station and
brought the railroad in. You might see a sign up there today,
says, '!Pierce 's Station. 'I
M: Really? This is at Blessing?
C: It's comical. Course, ole Shanghai Pierce years ago, like
I was a kid come to Texas here from Long" Island , why he came
from Rhode Island . He was a kid about nineteen; great big
chunky ole boy. They said every time he raised his arm, he'd
tear his shirt . clothes were too small for him.
M: Because he was so big.
C: Yes. And the cuffs on his britches were way up high.
high water cuffs. Anyway, Shang came to Texas . well, he
worked for this ole boy and that ole boy he worked for a
while and the ole Civil War broke out and Lord God, when that"·
Civil War broke out, ole Shang joined up with the Confederate
Army. See? And this ole boy says, "Now, Shang, when you come
back, I will have you five hundred dollars, saved." And
Shanghai says, "that's fine" so he went off to war. When he
came back; went up to that ole ranch and that ole boy smiled
and said, "Good to see you." But he was a rascal. Ole Shang
said, " I 'd like to have my money ; I sure could use it." He
said, "Help yourself" And he had a barrel over there full of
Confederate money. He said, "Take as much as you want, you
can have interest on it." Well Shang got mad, and red in the
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CORKERY
c : face and his ears twitched and he was really mad. He
rode off and he told that o l e boy, "Some day I'm gonna put
you out of the whole state of Texas." And sure enough,
years later , ole Shang bought up all that country around
him, pushed him out, a nd he final ly wound up in Kans a s .
So it didn 't pay to c heat ole Shang .
M: How did he get the name Shanghai?
C: Here's how Shang got his name: Now he had a pair of
spurs made up and they had long shanks on 'em, see? big ole
rowels . He'd buckle 'em on his boots and he got up a nd he
walked around like that. There he was hopping around l i ke
an~ o l e Shanghai rooster goin' to fight. And he got the
name Shanghai.
M: Shang hai rooster! I didn't know that. That 's i nte r­esting.
C: Now here 's another t hing: Ole Shang, he had a voice. He
could go out on his porch in the mornin' on the ranch house
and give orders to boys a bout a half a mile away and they
could hear him. And i f he was in a railroad train, he
could sit in the back and the people up f ront could he ar him
j us t as clear. He had a boomi ng voice.
M: You've s tudied about him, apparently .
C: Well, I've studied a bit because the ole time cow men
t he comical part is that many peopl e s ay , "Oh, he 's
nuthin' but a dam Yankee " you see. And the f unny part, I
20.
CORKERY
C: laugh sometime, because some of the ole boys, cattleman
years ago, like Shanghai Pierce and ole Captain Richard King
was born in New York City. There you are , see ? The King
Ranch is the biggest ranch in Texas. He was Texas all the
way home . no matter where he was born.
M: You w·ere born in Long Island.
C: That's right. And after all these years down here, if I
aint Texas now I never will be.
M: You've sure got Texas talk!
C: Well, honey, it rubs off on you.
M: I want to know about the food . When you were at the
ranch and working at headquarters, what was the food like?
What did they g ive you?
C: Well, here's the thing: now you had beef and you did
have fresh-killed beef . They'd take a side of beef; put it
in a wagon with the bed rolls on top to keep the sun off; to
keep it cool. That way they kinda preserved it. . them
21.
days they didn't have no refrigeration on ranches. Sometimes,
mostly the Mexican hands, would take bee f ; they would cut it
up in about inch strips and hang it up. And that ole sun
would dry it out and they' d put salt and pepper on it, while
it was drying out and that was called jerky beef. In Spanish
I believe they call it seco (con) carne. (Carne Seca) Dry
meat. And you know, I saw a picture one time, ole Mexican,
had a big ole hat on and I looked close and he had pieces of
jerky beef hanging off it where if he wanted one to put in his
CORKERY
c: mouth like you'd have chewing gum, he 'd just take it
off his hat and put it in his mouth . That's kinda cute.
M: That's carrying your provisions with you.
C: It's laughable; I mean the things you see.
M: Did you eat lots of beans?
c: I have eaten so many beans in my time that whe n I die
they're gonna bury a pot of beans with me.
M: Still like 'em, eh?
c: Oh! Honey, if beans are cooked right for about four
hours on a slow fire and they just melt in your mouth. That's
the way you want it.
M: What did you have for bread? Biscuits?
c: We had hot biscuits and sometimes . some ole cooks,
if you treated 'em right , they was good to you, but if you got
to joshing 'em all the time and kiddin ' ' em; some 'd get
cantankerous at times. If they liked you and if there was
good bunch of boys and everybody 's workin' together , they'd
make up pies now that's only once in a while. They used
dried fruit. They had ole dried fruit; they'd soak it in
water, loosen it up, and make you a pie.
M: What kind of dried fruit?
c: You might have apricots, peaches, apples, anything that
was dried, honey. You might even have dried up ole raisins
in it. You know, whatever was handy.
M: Tasted good , I bet.
C: Them ole wagon cooks cooked somethin' up . they'd been
cookin' for years. Now if they had beans on the fire and it
22.
CORKERY
c: happened to be a windy day, now they'd put just a certain
amount of coals underneath that ole dutch oven there because
if they put a whole bunch under them beans 'd burn up. That
air blowin' through there is like a draught . And them boys
knew just how long to cook them beans. And the same with their
meat. They trimmed it and they cut it up . When you had fresh
killed beef that way, you chewed on it, it was a taste to it
and flavor that's gone now . You don 't have it any more.
M: It's too refined now.
C: I'm awfu l put out about it because people are gettin'
greedy today and pushin' on. And Lord God , they're takin'
farm land and ranch land and try in ' to build big ole buildin '.s
on it.
Right here in San Antonio, we got a place . them
Belgium people out there . wonderful farms out there.
They were pushed out and there's a factory there.
M: I didn't know that .
C: Yes. And it's comical: I picked up that ole black dirt
in my hand and said, "Look at this stuff. "
M: Getting back to the food . did you have a lot of
onions? Did you have vegetables? Potatoes?
c: We had what we could get a hold of. An ole boy might
come out with a sack of onions there ; they might run short on
supplies and send an ole boy back to pick you up some more
things if you need them. But we always ate well. I'd say a
23.
24.
CORKERY
C: man in the city during that time, see, back i n the 30's
was starvin' to death but we were workin' and e atin'.
Dang glad to get it, y e s, but we were healthy. We had a
life outside ; we didn ' t have n one of this ole pol lution.
Many a time I've got off my horse and drank out of a ole
stream there and that ole horse sloppin' up alongside me,
splasin' on me and I'd say, "Listen he re, move down a little
bit. Give me a little room; you ' re crowdin' me." And I
d i dn 't get polluted from it.
Now today if you went probably that same place, it'd be
full of pollution. Somebody'd tell you , "Don't drink out of
there, you ' d die. "
M: Did you have bacon? Or fat back or anything like t hat?
C: We had ole salt pork . And of course, sometimes at a
ranch they ' d have some hog s there and then you had plenty of
bacon and stuff. But each ranch had a different .
Now take for instance, a little ole small ranch. That
was kinda p itiful because a small ranch back in the 30's
wa s just holdin ' on. I came up to a ranch gate one day ,
went on in , and here 's an ole man standin' there and he's
kinda drawn lookin'. I looked at him and I said, "Can you
use a hand?" You see we never said, "Can you use a cowboy?"
"Can you use a hand?" was our expression. Or, he ' s a ranch
hand . Nowadays , cowboys are ridin' the rodeo circuit.
I a lways think, even today, with your pick up s and all
your heliocopters (sic) even today, that man is still a
25.
CORKERY
c: cowboy, even if he aint ridin' a horse; and he's ridin'
a dam heliocopter. He's doin' cattle work.
M: As long as h e 's doing cattle work , he's cowboy?
c: He's a cowboy. If he's drivin' a bunch of milk cows up
to the barn, he's still a cowboy.
M: Now, you came in the gate and here was a man .
did he say?
. what
c: He looked pitiful. He said, "I shore could use a hand."
I said, "Now all right-- t e ll me a place to stay" I worked
for him and his cattle were poor; oh, Lord God, you could
walk by and rub your hands on their ribs. Just boney. Some
of those ole horse s looked awful; the place was all dried up.
M: Was this during Depression times?
C: It was during Depression, mama. It was jest what you
call holdin' on . 'God send me some rain'. And that poor
devil . . finally the sheriff came out and the town banker
and they foreclosed on him. They said, "You know how it is,
Mr . Haley, I'm sorry, but that's business." And he stood
there and he jest shook his head. Well, after they had left,
he walked over to me, "Bill," he said, "I can't pay you."
I said, "Listen, Mr. Haley, I knew you couldn't pay me. If
I wasn't' man enough to h elp you out when you'se in a tight,
I'd be a dam poor ole boy."
M: So you didn't get paid.
C: No, I didn't get paid. But he went into the barn and he
26.
CORKERY
C: brought out an ole saddle and put it in my arms. He said,
"I want you to take this." Now that saddle today is right in
this Institute of Texan Cultures.
M: Is it really?
C: It's up in that French section up there.
M: French? What 's it doing in the French section?
C: That's what I'd like to know. But you don't tell people
what to do. If they want to put it where they want it, they
do. It's a real ole time saddle .
END OF TAPE I SIDE 1
Side 2.
M: So you went through the Depression. Did you ever regret
choosing the life of a cowboy? Did you ever wish you ' d done
something else?
C: No. Because if a person has horse blood in 'em, as I say,
in other words, they like horses, livestock, it's their life.
M: You were l ucky, weren't you, to do what you wanted to do.
C: I was lucky that at that time I was at a kind of an in
between time in life. And it was a time when people had it
hard and rough and they tried to all pull together.
Now you might be travelin' down that ole road of life and
there'd be an ole farmer standin ' there. "Hi, hill
might be about noon time and you look at him and he's a great
big ole Polish farmer, see? And you'd get to talkin ' about
the weather, maybe about crops or what have you, or give him
CORKERY
c: some news from the other side of the world there,
other part of Texas . . how are things up in North Texas,
West Texas, and maybe he has some kin folk up there .
and he'd say, "Listen, let's go over yonder there where
them benches are . I have some water melons out there;
they'd be just right." And he'd take a big ole water melon
and cut it up and you know that ole fresh watermelon sure
tasted good on a hot summer day.
Now, young boys today: everything is education and col­lege;
oh it's a wonderful thing and everything but sometime
you can git too educated. And the sometime, you get too
gr eedy.
C: Now you t ake the ole wild mustangs. . they aint many
of them left and up in the north country there, Wyoming,
Nevada, where they got them wild horses runnin'. . that
cattleman is tryin' to push out there and take all that.
he's greedy , he wants everything . He don't want them ole
horses there .
There's a woman called wild Horse Annie.
,-\: I know about he r .
C: That ole rascal , she's fought that.
M: She's staying right in the fight.
C: That poor soul.
M: Did you ever work down on the border? Any of the ranches
in the border country?
C: I worked border country for a while. You had to be
27.
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c: careful of that ole border country. Back in them days .
M: It was kind of dangerous, wasn't it?
c: Around that Rio Grande, you'd feel a shot go over your
head and you'd just head out. You don't talk much about it;
you just think about it.
~1 :
c:
But you don't stay too long, e h?
No, you don't stay too long. Don't let that ground get
too warm. You keep movin ' .
M: I've heard about that. . shoot at anything that moves .
c: Today it's even rough because people are comin' across
the border all the time. And there's some stock inspectors
they call 'em today, that's checkin' cattle for anthrax, hoof
and mouth di s ease , all them things. And there's only a few
of ' em. They don't carry guns and they gettin ' shot at and
finally said, "Give us permission to carry them guns ."
1-1: Did they get permission?
c: Finally give 'em permission.
1-1: You were a young man, you started in when you were fif­teen,
and you went along from ranch to ranch because you
wanted to see a lot of Texas. Did you have any social life?
Did you have any g i r ls? Did you get marrired?
c: Well, now, I got married here in San Antonio about 1948.
And I've been here since.
M: Oh, you have?
28.
CORKERY
c: Yes mam.
M: You quit the cowboy business in .
c: 1948. Then I went into construction work. From a dollar
a day to a dollar an hour. I was a rich man! But, all
right, it was hard work , but I was used to hard work. Didn't
phase me none. And that dollar, oh, I tell you, I felt so
wealthy.
But of course your prices weren't high then. I'd say we made
about fifty dollars a week. But you could still get Levis
and stuff for S2.00, S2.50, and a shirt there for about Sl .OO,
Sl.OO two bits. Nowadays you go out to buy a chambray work
shirt that I used to buy for 75¢, they're $15.00, $18.00,
tailor made. Who cares about tailor made as long as you got
a shirt on your back.
M: What made you quit the cowboying business?
c: I came into San Antonio here, had a little money,
decided to roam around, met this girl, and after that time,
boom!
M: That's what did it.
c: That's what did it.
M: Did you ever meet J. Frank Dobie in your travels?
c: No, I have never met that man but I've heard a lot about
him. Met people that have knowed him. He had quite a few
books about the cattle and that ole brush country. He's
tellin' his side of that there; now I 'l l tell you my side of
that.
29.
30.
CORKERY
C: Mexican cowboy, as we called him, vaquero. . I worked
one ranch, me and just a couple of what they call Anglos .
. where we say white men, see? Anyway, we' re wor k in , that
ranch, too, and these Mexican hands on the ranch. Now,
that l-lexican has a way about him, when he handles horses or
handles cattle, he had the cow sense and the know-how. Some­time
we 'd be in a pen; might be three, four calves in that
pen; there'd be a bout four, five Mexican boys with ropes in
their hands. Now, they would take a little loop, about that
big . ' course a calf aint got no horns . and they'd
make it just about as big as the calf's head and leave ~bout
a inch on each side; be talkin' in Spanish; an wamp that ole
rope across and catch that ole calf every time. The one who
missed, hadda payoff. Yeah, it was cute.
They were r eally ropers. You hadda hand it to 'em. And
to watch them use a rope; go out there and rope a dam cow and
stretch he r out. We u sed to doctor cattle that way. We had
a ole pocket kni fe ; would cut them ole worms out of their
ears and clean 'em all out .
M: Really?
C: Oh yeah. We u sed doctor 's tools, too, as well as cowboy
M: You had to do that?
C: We ~ to do it. We'd cut all them worms out and clean
M: Worms get into the ears of cattle?
CORKERY
c: I've seen ears almost eaten off.
M: Really?
C: Yes mam. And what you call ole screw worms . now
with horses you have what they call bot flies. They'll hit
the horse; they'll fly around; they'll hit a horse, the bot
fly, and l eave a little white mark there and them ole eggs
will turn into worms. In time they'll get into a horse's
intestines and kill a horse.
M: You had to be a veterinarian on top of everything else.
C: Well, there's things that you l earned as you went on.
From ole timers, all diff erent people.
M: Then what they say about the vaquero is true; that he
had a feeling for horses.
C: He not only had a feeling for horses; he knew cattle.
31.
And he knew, he could ride along and he'd say. "Look , l ook,
over there. Better go, huh?" And we'd ride over there and
doctor that ole cow.
M: He could spot them right away.
C: Yeah. Like the American Indian had a sense; he could
tell when somebody was comin' up on him. What you call in­stinct.
The seventh sense I think they call it today. What
to me was jest keepin ' alive.
M: Were these vaqueros on the ranches legally or illegally?
C: Well, in them days , we didn't have no legal and illegal.
They jes' come across that ole border.
M: Did they work cheaper than you guys?
C: Well, I was gettin' thirty a month and they were gettin'
CORKERY
c: ten dollars a month and still sendin' money back to
their people in Mexico .
M: That thirty and ten includes keep, doesn't it?
c: Thirty dollars a month includes keep.
M: When you were out in the ranch, rounding up cattle and
stuff, how long did you stay at a time?
c: If it was a big outfit, plenty of cattle, you could go
out there in the mornin' and work them dad gum cattle and
work in another section of brush and keep drivin'
you'd be gatherin' cows and calves. and runnin' 'em out
on the flats we cal led 'em. . clearing. And then the ole
boys would take over and drive 'em to a pen . Or hold 'em in
a dam circle. Ridin' around 'em, what you call, keep millin'
'em, goin' around, see? But most of the ranches had pens
where you could drive ' em in.
And then come your work of brandin'.
M: You just went out for t he day and came back at night?
You didn 't go out for weeks at a time?
C: Not on some of them ranches there because if you're too
far away from the main quarters that way, we stayed out
there. We had bed rolls we could sleep out.
M: You did stay out .
C: We had our food right there. We kep ' on movin ' all t he
time. We'd work one section and we 'd go work another section
fo r miles and miles around that way.
32 .
CORKERY
M: But you didn't go back to the ranch house when you
were doing that?
C: Not right away. Now today with pick up trucks and what
have you, a man can work 40, 50 miles out and still be back
<Y
at the main house for supper. And~heliocopter (sic) can
come down and pick ' em up and take 'em off.
I have never seen a heliocopter work cattle. That 's
somethin' I have to see yet.
M: Do they do that?
C: They do it, honey. And listen: a ole boy come in f rom
Oklahoma and he told me, he said, "Bill, would you believe
it, they're drivin' cattle on motorcycles today." I said,
"Listen, please don't tell me no more. That makes me cry."
M: Awful. You started to talk about branding.
33.
C: Brandin', honey . . they had older men doin' the brandin'.
The older men knew when that iron first come off the fire, they
let it cool just a bit, because if you sock a big ole hot iron
on there, you blotch the brand, smear it . it won't be
clear. A man that's brandin' knows jest when to put that iron
on to make the brand clear and readable. Now that's somethin'
a lot of people don't know.
M: Did one man handle the brand and get it hot and did another
man have to hold the cattle, were they braced?
C: You see , here 's a ole boy in that pen. h e 's on
horseback ... might be two or three of ' em in there.
CORKERY
M: Oh, he's on horseback?
C: That's right. We have nuthin' but calves in the pen.
Now he ropes a calf. . these two ole boys go over there
one grabs him by the . as they said years ago, what
they call a mugger and a flanker. In other words a mugger
was workin' up around the head; a f lanker was workin'
around the flank of the calf .
Now of course, in rodeos you see 'em flip a calf over
. well that's contest , but years ago two ole boys would
slap that ole calf down--
You got 'em like that there and you held a hind l eg back and
the other ole boy .
holdin' him.
M: He's down now.
. now had that calf down and you were
34.
C: He's down; you've got your knee in him on the ground this
way. . you've got your knee around his neck there where he
can 't move. And the other ole boy is sittin' on the flank
M: Two of 'em?
C: Yes. Two ole boys. One man can do it, you know. But
its much easier to work ' em that way, not as tiresome. Any­way,
that ole boy had a young kid runnin' irons in the fire
about fifteen foot away . and he'd run with them
irons and hand that ole boy .
M: A kid would do that? Did you do that when you were a
kid?
35.
CORKERY
c: Yeah. I run irons many a time.
M: They had more than one iron, then?
c: Honey, they had a whole mess of irons. After they used a
iron and brought it back to the fire .
M: About fifteen feet away.
c: Yeah. I'd say fifteen foot . maybe ten foot .
just so that the fire wasn't up on you.
fall into it.
. you wouldn't
c: That ole fellow's brandin' would holler, "Hot Iron" .
he wanted another iron. He 'd come with another iron; hand it
to him .
M: What kind of fuel did they use to get a hot fire?
c: Well, you had ole mesquite years ago but a lot of people
today were using something like butane they would heat it up
with. They can heat them irons faster and quicker. Today,
I'm not too up on it , but they can even say that they're usin'
an acid brand. It just burns in so far and that's it. But
of course you have to be careful when you used acid .
it 'd burn you up.
M: I don 't like the sound of that, do you?
c: Different methods used now which are way out. But the
whole idea today , you 're in there to make that money and your
foreman and your rancher today . Lord God, the way things
are goin' now it looks like farmers are sellin' out. Up
around Wyoming where people have lived all their life on
CORKERY
C: ranches . they don't know no other way. . they're
bein pushed out for stip minin'. Them ole cowboys are
leavin' the ranch; 'course they'll make more money in these
oil fields as rough necks and what have you. You see it
takes away from the rancher.
M: It's too bad. Have you got any storie s about West Texas
weather? Winter? Summer?
C: Well, you know seasons change that way. Sometime you 'll
have a hard winte r and it makes it hard. Now, for instance
what's called ridin' fence in the winter you might get a job
36.
ridin' fence. . you and another ole boy. 'Course this was
years ago; they probably have a pick-up now and check the
fenc e .
M: What were you checking? For breaks in fence?
C: Fences are weak or you might be a post rotted out or
somethin'. You had what you called a line track (?) and post
hole diggers, you've got your staples and stuff and you got
a ole saddle bag you put your staples in.
M: What did you call it line what?
C: Line shack. You know that share cropper's shack up in The
Institute with the paper on it? That's the kind of shack I
slep' in.
M: Did you?
C: With t he papers on the wall; just the same way. Only the
papers were 1889 in my shack. I'd catch up on my readin' by
readin' the walls. (laughter)
CORKERY
M: For goodness sake. When you were riding fence you
sometimes stayed over night. And had your supplies there?
c: You stayed up in that line shack.
sometimes there'd be two ole boys . One ride one way
and the other the other way. And you know after a month or
two, they'd get kinda edgy
they ' d get cantankerous.
. seein' each other and
Now the boss'd say, "Bill, I want you to go up to that
line shack there and tell ole John to come back here. The
reason I'm doin' that is they're about to kill one another."
M: But you're out a long time when you're riding fence on a
big ranch?
C: When you're movin ' down the line that way and you try to
get back so you can cook or you can take your beans and stuff;
set ' em up in the open there ; make a fire and cook your beans
outside and come back to that spot later. Say you 're 15
miles from where the shack is and you have a place where
you're cookin' your beans and your ole and you
come back to it. But you can ride around that way and you
aint ridin' around at a full gallop or anything.
slow and easy, checkin'.
ridin'
A man that's a good fence rider that way, he's checkin'
all the time for breaks. And everything you have in your
saddle bag you can fix that.
37.
M: By the time you came on , at the age of 14 in 1927, the
fencing was pretty much all done, wasn't it? The ranche s were
CORKERY
M: all fenced?
c: Well, that is a comical part. They talked about bobwire
but they don 't really tell the story. It ought to be told.
M: Oh?
C: Now that man i nvented t hat "bobbed" wire and he didn ' t
care whether it cut up horses or cattle as long as he sold it.
That was the pitiful part because . I talked to a ole
trail driver years ago and he told me he said, "Bill it was
somethin' awful when that "bobbed wire" come in. Them ole
cattle were all tore up and many a horse was killed runnin'
into "bob n wire.
M: Really? I never heard that.
C: You see they were used to open country. They don't tell
you that today but them ole timers passed it on to me.
M: Was that barbed wire man the one they called "Bet a
11illion Gates"?
C: That was one of 'em; another one was named Glidden, I
think it was. He was supposed to be the inventor. Another
guy Ellsworth or Farnsworth he went in with it. Each one
made different type of bar.
But it was cruel. I'm just thinkin' today. . I
went past ranch one time and they had a el.ectric fence
around; there were hogs there; and all them hogs were in the
center of that electric fence. I said, "How come they don 't
stir out?" Said, "They won't go near that e lectric fence."
All in the middle. None of 'em 'd go near that fence.
38.
CORKERY
M: They must have been smarter than horses.
C: Tickled me. You know what I mean, that's later on in
life.
M: There's a story that Gates came down here and set up by
the City Hall.
C: Right down in front of the San Fernando Cathedral.
M: And they bet on it and he said, "I'll bet this will con­tain
that cow."
C: That's what they tell you. Of course years ago ole Will
Rogers in 1907, he did some steer ropin' down around there,
too. And ole Clay McGonagle. that was an ole time roper
you don't hear that name any more.
M: There's a McGonagle family here in town.
C: Well, I'll have to look 'em up. They're probably re-lated
to him and Kokernut . they were big ranch people.
M: That's an old San Antonio name. An old German name .
C: Ole German name, right. Now you take like even today
there's a man that still believes in the ole way. Now
this is right around Alpine, Texas, there's a place called
the 0 six ranch. Now there's a foreman on that ranch
that's that Kokernut family. . they owned it. Now ole
Lacey is the foreman; oh they give him a write up in this
Geographical magazine that tickled me. Because that kid
came out, he's a younger man, great big ole chunky boy but
good natured, you can see by the way he looks. A person
you'd like to call a friend even though you hadn't met.
39.
CORKERY
C: Well anyway , ole Lacey there, t hese Geographical magazine
people asked him about it. They said, "How come these other
places use heliocopters?" Now in the summer time they take
the cattle up in the high country and graze 'em. And as it's
comin' down toward fall of the year, they drive ' em down into
the valley there, see? And you got your gras s for the winter,
see? Now when they're bringin' 'em down and use a heliocopter
you start runnin' them cattle, what's goin' t o happen?
gonna fall and break a leg and get all tore up . So the only
way is to work'em slow and easy from that ole mountain side.
Common sense '11 tell you that.
These ole boys want to get it down : "Let's go get a
heliocopter". Costs $150 an hour some ole boy up around
Mountain Home, Texas, had a sheep ranch and he was bothered
with coyotes and he hired one of them heliocopters, flew all
over his ranch to get coyotes, didn't see a one.
$150 fo r nuthin'.
. spent
M: Are you saying that this Kokernut ranch is still using the
old way of getting the cattle down?
C: Yes, the ole way of life, you know. They have squeeze
chutes and what they call a cradle which is a outfit has a
lever on and it stands up straight it's like a chute
. and when you pull that, it comes down like a cradle. Your
calf is in there; you don't have to rope him or nuthin'; he
just walks right into it.
M: He's off the ground i sn't he?
40.
CORKERY
c: Yes, he's off the ground in a cradle. And there your
brandin' is done quicker and faster; you can castrate, ear
mark or whatever you have to do in a few seconds, where it
used to take us a little while to get around it.
M: Did you say squeeze?
C: Squeeze chute: that means it's just wide enough for 'em
to get in and he can't move around much. And then you must
pull it tighter so that when you lay 'em down that way, you
got him tight in there to where you can castrate him or
whatever you want. It's like an operation table in a hos-pital.
Of course that cradle falls on 'em; you bring 'em
back up and you release your gate and run your calf out.
M: Does it hurt him at all?
C: Well, honey, it's done so quick. just like I touch
you with hot iron that way, you'd say, "Oh!" and then if I
put somethin' on there r ight away, they rub somethin' on
s\.>-\ ole r:
there, like a slave. Like when you doctor for screw worms
you know how axle grease looks? Used for wagons years
ago. That's what we used to put i n that ole cow's ear so
them ole flies couldn't get back in again. Jum it up good.
M: I bet the cows objected to that.
C: They didn't object to it as long as it didn't hurt no
more. Them ole screw worms . she'd be shaking her head
and quiverin' and jumpin! And then again, you have another
thing called heel flies.
41.
You see cattle i.n the back here, right down near the hoof,
CORKERY
c: right above t here . you migh t s ay where it bends
t hat way around and in t here you have a fly that gets
down in your cow's foot that way and that ole heel fly will
come and jest hit that ole cow . just bite 'em. Them
ole heel flies git to bitin' them cattle and they'll run
around run off weight in the summer time . It's pitiful you
!
know; you'll see 'em ole cows jest takin ' off . A strang-er
' d say , "What in the hell is t he matter with ' em? " But
you know right away.
M: He's trying to get away from it. Did you ever have any-thing
to do with sheep?
c : (laughter) No . Sheep and I don 't agree.
M: I figured I' d get that answer from you .
You stayed with cattle all your l ife on the ranch?
c: Well, say cattle a nd horses; mostly horses. Because I
enjoyed ' em . I enjoyed horses because t here 's a lot to be
done and it 's somethin' to bring up a l ittl e col t ; i t hits
the ground and you l ook at that l i ttle wobbley ole thing and
you say to yourself, "Well, a li ttle while now it will be up
on its feet , runnin' around nursin'." And you know 'sometimes
them o l e mares . that l ittle ole colt get bitin' on that
dinner there see? and that ole mare'd just side kick that way
and slap that colt and say, "Li s ten , take it easy" some of
them horses will hit 'em pretty hard you know and you got to
watch ' em .
M: That 's disciplining . the kid .
42.
43.
CORKERY
c: Just like Daddy take a strap to your ole butt there.
straighten you out.
M: After you came to San Antonio and went into the con-struction
business, did you miss the range, the wide open
spaces?
c: Honey, I'd be up on a scaffold there with bunch of brick
layers that were layin' brick and of course, as I say, I've
always had a sense of humor, and, it's comical, them ole boys
they'd say, "Bill, you never worry about anything" I
said, "What in the hell is there to worry about? Look, I'm
makin' good wages . "Oh 1 well, this islPard work" I'd say,
"Well, you're all layin' brick there . " I'd kid with 'em ..
The end of the day'd come and they'd be tired, and I'd pop
off and say "You know why a chicken crosses the street?"
"anybody knows that . to get on the other side." I said,
"No, you're all wrong. That chicken crosses the street to
watch a bunch of brick layers lay brick." That would get 'em
laughin', see, and they'd spruce up a bit and carryon the
rest of the day. A little bit a humor; not he huhhhh
way of life that's hard. I never had that and I aint never
goin' to have it.
M: Have you got things in there you want to put on this
tape?
C: Now we're talkin' about a sense of humor, there.
years ago, as an ole time cowboy, see? here he is ridin'
across the plains. Now he happened to look down and he seen
CORKERY
C: a Indian layin' on the ground on his belly with his head
sideway and his ear on the wagon track. So he rolls over
and his ear on the wagon track. So he rolls over and he
said , "cowboy," "Indian, what do you hear?" He said, "One
wagon, two horses: one white, one black; man drivin',
black hat, woman, sun bonnet." That ole cowboy says, "You
mean to tell me you know all that by jest listenin' to that
wagon track?" And he said, "No . Wagon run over me half
hour ago." So there you have it.
M: That's good. You're coming to Folklife this year, aren't
you?
C: I'll be at the Folklife Festival. There's a lot of
people that come back year after year and know who I am.
M: Of course, you tell s tories.
What are these things? Are these the things you've
collected for the Folklife Festival? to tell stories?
C: Now here's an ole boy over in East Texas. His name is
Bill Britt. He comes here every year that Folklife Festival
and he knows that I only tell the gospel truth. 'Course his
wife says, "Ole Bill Britt, he started sleepin' with his
horse at night." And I asked her why. . that's Bill's
wife her name is Annamae . She said, "Teddy got
plum tired of sleep walkin' so it straightened him out."
M: Slept with his horse to get over sleep walking!
C: See, he didn't have to walk. He could ride around; he
wouldn't be as tired when he woke up. ( laughter)
44.
CORKERY
c: Some ole stories that we catch up with.
M: Maybe I can catch those when you're telling them this
year at the Folklife.
C: That's what I wanted them to do but they never did
do it. I used to work there about two years or more. I
was up on the floor.
M: I remember just vaguely up there . Jack Maguire said,
"You've got to interview "Cowboy Bill", I thought he called
you that.
c: He probably did but I don't care for that name.
That's like someone who's Buffalo Bob or .
that.
M: You like to be called Old Bill.
C: I'm old enough and I'm Old Bill.
I don't like
M: Did they have a nickname for you when you were a young
kid? Just starting out?
C: They called me Button. 'Cause I was just a kid.
M: Did you ever get homesick for the East? Did you ever go
back?
C: Never.
M: Never missed the East.
C: Never missed it. I went up there I think it was 1949.
My Daddy had been operated on; he's way up in years. By
the time I got there he was better; well, and around again.
That's was the last time I was up there.
M: When was that?
45.
CORKERY
C: I think it was 1949. About a year after I was married .
M: And you didn't feel like you wanted to go back and live
there.
C: I looked at the place. Why they had . you know the
people on Long Island, they used to raise lots of ducks
Long Island ducks, known allover. They had vegetable farms
and stuff; they used to haul potatoes in what I called
freight wagons ... like you have your big ole trucks today.
And the thing - - --------- when they stacked them potatoes,
they put one row this way and the other row that way and
built 'em into a sort of a pyramid. One row on top and it
held everything. Crossed 'em in so they wouldn't roll off.
And them ole wagon wheels were pretty wide, eight to ten
inches wide. Big heavy wagons made out of oak wood. Some
were painted green with a sort of a yellow trim all around.
I don't know , they took pride in makin' up wagons years ago.
M: Studebaker made those. Do you remember?
C: Studebaker made quite a few of them, yes. And there
was what was called years ago in the west and around St.
Louis
wagon
an ole boy put out what was called a Murphy
that was a great big ole wagon.
Almost a s big as a house. The reason he made that wagon
because in New Mexico they were taxin' ' em on their wagons;
the Mexican government. And he said, " I 'm goin' to make a
wagon big enough to put everything in and bring it across
in one load; I won't have to pay taxes, see?
46.
CORKERY
c: Just on one load.
M: So you were in Long Island and you looked at these farms
and it didn't interest you at all.
C: I'd help folks out once in a while; like ------- might be
a rainy ole day -------- they had a potato house there where
they used to sort potatoes out big ones, little ones and
so on. And you'd take 'em and throw 'em in 'a different bin.
Separate 'em a bit . It wasn ' t bad ; you didn ' t have to spend
all day . just as long as you want. The ole boy might
throw you two bits for workin ' a hour or two.
M: Thi s was when you were a kid. Not when you went back for
a visit.
C: Oh no. Hell's fire, no . When I come back to visit, I
was surprised in places I had been as a boy, was all built
up into houses. One ole boy told me out there, "Why they have
a million homes in there " I thought to myself , "My God, I
didn't think the island was big enough to hold them .
Now t hey're fig htin' today , those people, fightin' be ­cause
they ' re tryin' to ho'ld their duck farms and they want
to keep it farm land. They don ' t want all this stuff goin'
on .
M: You can't blame them .
C: As I say , you take here, we got that Alamo Downs , that
country over there was farm land . Now they've got it Indus­trial
Park . How come? People are so greedy. They got a
bunch of hotels they ' re buildin ' there and you know what's
47 .
CORKERY
C: goin' to happen? They're only goin ' to have a drop
and that'll be housin' for poor f olks.
M: You think so?
C: I hope so cuz they sure need it. You know honey, this
at one time was a burro town. Now years ago in this town,
I've heard it from ole timers around here , every little boy
and girl had a burro . . cost about $5.00; $10.00 at most.
They used to take 'em out to Mission Park and race ' em .
Them ole burros would kick up and the kid's go flying
But they had a lot of fun; t hey had somethin' to do. Now
you get a kid and the only thing he knows is t elevision. He
don't know real life anymore .
M: Too bad . He's missing something .
e: Now we have the eharro Association .. if they ' d only
take them little ole Mexican boys and girls, and teach ' em to
spin a rope and do somethin' when that Fiesta i s on . Look, them
kids spinnin ' a rope. that's what I'd like to see.
M: Did you learn to spin a rope? Were you a good roper?
e: I was, I would say, fair . not good, fair. You know
what they call a hoolihan, don 't you?
M: No.
e: That's when you throw a loop and you miss. And there was
an ole boy , an ole Irishman and out of ten times he throwed
that rope nine times he missed. So they called it a hool ihan.
M: Did you ever work on the King ranch?
C: No, I never worked on the King ranch. That's a big ranch;
48.
CORKERY
c: that's south Texas.
with a Mexican man, now years ago white man woul d hear
the Mexicans talking and he'd say, "macate" and that in Spanish
meant the rope.
Now a reata is made out of raw hide ... that's different.
By the way I got one up here over by that cowboy section.
M: I didn 't know a reata was leather. That's interesting.
c: It's 80 foot long.
M: Imagine handling an 80 foot long .
c: Well, honey, these Mexican cowboys . ole Mexico
when they rope they twist the dally around the horn.
M: What's a dally?
c: Look here . you make a twist ... dally welta is, in
Spanish, a twist .
You say "dally welta your macate," twist your rope. Now
some people will tie a dally and a lot. of men have lost their
fingers . "You s ee ole timers they have a fin ge r missin ' ,
you say, "You was a tie man, wasn't you?" "Oh yes, but I aint
no more ll
M: In other words, you don't tie.
C: Each ole boy has his own way of ropin'. And he has a way
of tyin' a dally. Some have what they call a fast tie da l ly;
some ole boy, just a twist around the saddle horn and a half
h itch, on the top there; that'll hold it.
Now that way, these ole men that didn't know Spanish that
49.
CORKERY
C: way, when they say macate', well they thought they was
usin' an Irish word McCarthy.
they called a rope a McCarthy.
"Let me have your McCarthy, here".
M: Did you learn to speak Spanish?
Irishman's name so
C: Oh, I never learned to speak Spanish; I mos·tly talked sign
language and them ole Mexican boys, they liked me. I was
never with my nose high in the air . I always treated everybody
the same way. Even to this day.
M: When you were.out with a group of horsemen, would you
rather ride with Mexicans or Anglos or didn't it make any
difference to you?
C: In the cow country years ago , there was no discrimination.
M: I just meant would you rather ride with the Mexicans be­cause
they were better at it than the Anglos? Or vice versa?
C: No, because everybody was considered the same. One t hing :
they were ranch hands. As long as they did their work, that's
all that the boss wanted. He didn 't care wether they were
Mexicans, black people or, some folks used to call them colored
people, . . now that other expression I don't want to ever
use. Hy mother taught me different. My mother said, "Just on
account of a person's skin--God made us all."
M: Were there very many negro cowboys?
C: There were in some parts. 'Course if you take right after
the Civil War , there were many blacks; they were slaves; and
they took to drivin' cattle up the trail. Don't hear about it
50.
CORKERY
C: but now it's comin' up.
M: You read about it every once in a while .
C: Then again, how did them ole time cowmen know, ridin' up
the trail with 'em, takin' readin 's on it. . and we've lost
a lot of history. They'll tell stories how there were stam­pedes
and how a man fell down and was just crushed to death.
Now there's a song, "Little Joe , the Wrangler" . the man
that wrote that song, he knew the work of a cowboy "this hot
roll was wrapped i n a c otton sack, and so loosely tied b e hind."
In other words, an ole cotton sack, he had his bed roll in it.
"An OK spur (he only had one spur) on one foot lightly swung
and a pair of brogan shoes (Runnin' away from home.)
I've sung "Ole Rye Whisky" and them songs but purely to
make people laugh and have a little fun out of it.
my voice is gettin' so I don't sing much any more.
E: Is "Old Rye Whisky" an old cowboy song?
'Course
C: That's an ole song. Now if I was to go out and here's
an ole boy in a nice flowered shirt and a " gittar" just beati n'
the hell out of it and singin' "Don't f enc e me in" or "I'm
an ole Cowhand from the Rio Grande"
Alley stuff . that's not Texas.
M: That's not authentic, then?
. now that's Tin Pan
C: No. Now all them ole cowboys didn't sing cowboy songs .
They might have sung "Oh, Sus anna" or the latest song that was
sent from the East. "Rosie O'Grady,"
M: Did they ever sing gospel songs?
51.
CORKERY
c: The country boys used to sing gospel songs. But God
bless them people because without an instrument or anything,
they can make music that a white man can never do. I have
many times stopped and listened and laughed at a ole boy .
. "sing it again" I'd tell him. He'd say, "Bill, you like
it, don't you?" but he was the typical, at the time, ole
colored boy.
M: And there was no prejudice then?
C: There was no prejudice with me; there was never ...
M: Was there any among the other cowboys?
C: No, because everybody had to do the work on the ranch.
END OF TAPE I, SIDE 2
52.
CORKERY , BILL
Biographical,1-7,9,27,28
Shanghai Pierce, 18-21
I NDEX
Texas ,Old Ti me Ranching,3-5,
8-12,14-1 8,21-26 ,2 8,31-37 ,
51
From Long Island, New YOrk, to Ft. worth , Texas in 1927 ,
Ol d Bill, at 15 , worked on ranches in west Texas for 21
years. He tells "how it was" in those days. His greatest
love was horses, though he did all the chores required of a
cowboy.
I ndexing was difficult because his bio and Old Times inter­mingle
.