INSTITUTE OF TEXAN CULTURES
ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM
FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL
MULE SKINNER
INTERVIEW WITH: TRAVIS KUYKENDAL
INTERVIEWER : ESTHER MACMILLAN
DATE: Augus t 6 , 1983
PLACE: Oral History Office, ITC
TK : It ' s really pronounced K I K E N D A L, but everybody
says K E R K E N D A L.
EM: That's a German name, isn't it?
TK: Holland Dutch, I believe. Anyway it's Dutch. Last time
I went to get a haircut, it cost me 4 bits a corner.
EM: You ' re a square head! (laughter)
(laughter)
Mr . Kuykendal is listed in the program this year as "Mul e
Skinner." And I have a great curiosity about mule skinner;
what it means and all kinds of things about mules because
they were so important in the early days of Texas.
TK: That ' s right. That ' s the reason we have organized our­selves
and called ourselves The Frontiersmen of Uval de, Texas ,
and to go along with frontiersmen, we figured pack mules
would be the most appropriate thing that we could bring to
help to show what we meant by fr onti ers. And so bringin' the
pack mules- -and then we have, of course, as old as I am, I
know quite a b i t about pack mules anyway.
KUYKENDAL 2
EM: Sure you do .
TK: Years ago, they used to have as many as 20 , 30 or more
one right behind the other and they called them mule trains .
They were packed. That was the way we moved all the supplies
that they had regardless of what it was. Whether it was guns ,
ammunition, gun powder or whether it was horseshoes or clothes
or food or whatever, they were moved on mule back .
They didn't have no--finally they began to build wagons .
Finally they moved freight trains in, something like that. But
at that time , that was the only way they had to do that.
During that time, the man that handled the mul es , they
called him mule skinner because mules are a little hard­headed
like these square-headed Dutchmen; they're hard­headed
. My mules that come in , they ' re all about half Irish.
Because they're hard-headed I give ' em all Irish names.
EM: You named them!
TK: Yes. But the mule skinner, he got the name by--he had a
whip or a big, long strap of leather, line , and he could throw
that line that they called it, throwin' a line , and pop 3 he
could pop the hair off those mules. That was skinnin' a
mule.
EM: That ' s where the t erm came from!
TK: That ' s where it came from. That's where the t erm mule
skinner come from.
EM: I didn't know that .
TK: So after that , you hire d somebody to pack your mules,
whatever, you hired a mule skinner. That's where the name
KUYKENDAL 3
TK: originated from .
EM: Isn ' t that interesting. I always wondered what that
meant. I hoped it didn ' t mean taking the skin off of a mule .
TK : The way t hey jerked the line , t hey could almost take the
hair off the mul e. I couldn 't do it; I don' t know how .
Throwing that way and jerki ng back. You coul d see a few hairs
fly off and they called it skinnin ' the mule .
EM : Normally , what was in a mule trai n? How many mul es?
TK : Wel l , lon g t i me ago, t he way I' ve studied it, normally
it was about 20 mules .
EM : That many.
TK: Yeah . I t hink that ' s where the 20 Mule Team [Borax a~
come from . Originally, I think , that they used about 20 mules
in a mule trai n . However, they wasn ' t hitched up to a wagon
way back then . One right behind the other, each one of ' em.
And most of t he time, they didn ' t have to put a line on those
mules at all. They had one mule in the lead with a bell on
and all of those other would follow him. They taught 'em to
follow. So here they ' d come, be one mul e right behind the
other. And t hey called it a mule train.
EM: Where is the mule skinner? He's at the back?
TK : Well , he might be at the back; he might be at the front.
Generall y t here was always two men. One went towards the l ead
and he led t he bell mare, they called it. Lot of times it
woul d be an old mare with a bell on. And all these mul es just
followed along behind, just like they were---
EM: An old mare. A mare is not a mule?
KUYKENDAL 4
TK: No, not necessarily . However, sometimes it would be a
mule but a lot of times it would be an old bell mare.
EM: Really?
TK: Yeah. Female horse.
EM: For instance , you have a mule leading this pack train--
what do you call a bunch of mules? A herd? A flock?
TK : You call 'em a team of mules mostly. Then you can have a
2-up team; 4-up team; 6-up team .
EM: 2-up?
TK : Yeah. As many as you want but if you have 4 mules, you
call it 4- up.
EM: Wonder why they call it "up?"
TK: Well, it's another one of those old terms that those
people started a long time ago that nobody knows about . Just
like the pack on the mule back , originally they didn't have
packsaddles. Now we have packsaddles which makes it a lot
easier to pack the mule . I don 't know when the packsaddle was
invented. It was a long time ago. But the original mule
skinner didn't have packsaddles. They just put the pack on
there and they 'd take rope and when they got through tyin' it~­they
didn 't say tyin' it, they'd say, "We throwed a diamond
hitch on it." The diamond hitch, the way they had that hitched,
it was a diamond up here on top. It helped the cargo from
moving in any direction. It h eld it on the mule 's back.
Called it a diamond hitch. And they said, we throwed a dia­mond
hitch on--well, load 'em up, throw a diamond hitch on
each one of 'em so we won't lose a load .
EM: You don't know where the 2-up, the 2-up 1 and the 4-up
KUYKENDAL 5
EM: came from?
TK: Well now, that's when you started working them . Puttin'
t he harness on ' em and workin ' em . If it was 2 mules , it was
a t eam of mules. If it was 4 mules, it was still a team, but
it was a 4-up team . And if it was 6 mul es , a 6-up team . Or
8 mules, i t was a 8-up team. I don't know where the up started
from. Just probabl y slang l anguage , I guess.
EM: Part of the mule vocabulary. You have a whole bunch of
mules together, does one stand out a s a l eader? How do you
pick leaders?
TK: Yes ma 'am. Most of the time, it creates leadership itself.
The one that can whip a ll the rest of ' em is the leader .
EM: Oh?
TK: In horses , the same way . You have a big bunch of ho rses
out there and there'll be one horse, most of the time it ' s a
mare , fema l e . She can just whip all the rest of ' em. And
they 'll f ollow her . She can just take o f f on the run and
they 'll al l f ollow her.
EM : But she--the mule has to prove i t. How do they- -do they
actu a lly fight?
TK : No, not actual ly . I f one gets a little rambunctious in
the herd, gettin ' off , well this l ead just takes it on itself
to be a leader . All of a sudden t hey'l l j ust go and whip the
heck out of ' em . Just back ' em into a corner of the pen , if
they 're in a pen.
EM: In other words , they discipline ' em , and the same thing
h appens with mules so t hat particular mule is des ignated the
l ead mule.
KUYKENDAL 6
TK: Yes ma 'am. And years ago, that leader, they put a bell
on him. All you had to find was the leader, the bell animal,
and take it in and al l the rest of 'em would follow the leader;
come on in, if they were out in the pasture.
EM: Normally, if things were O. K. , you'd have a man in the
front and a man in the back.
TK : Yes ma 'am. Most all the time. One reason, I guess ,
years ago they rode shotgun. They carried guns because peo-ple
would try to staal their cargo. It was very bad. Probab l y
in bad country, there was more than two men . There'd be maybe
several.
EM: Were the men that were accompanying the mul e train on
horses?
TK: Yes ma'am.
EM: They weren 't walking?
TK : They were on horseback.
EM: Have I heard some where or other, or read , that mules
and horses don 't like each other?
TK: No ma 'am. Mostly the ranch man, the owner, separates
' em . But they ' ll run together.
EM : They will?
TK: Yes ma'am.
EM: The mules aren't going to get obstreperous because there
are horses front and back?
TK: Not necessarily, no.
EM : Tell me about the packing. I have been told that certain
men were expert in packing mules. How do you get that exper­t
ise?
KUYKENDAL 7
TK: Just from experience, I guess. Just start in and some­one
that was real good a t packin' and tyin' this diamond hitch,
they called it , why he 'd take on helpers and if they liked
to, naturally they're going to take a lot of interest in it.
It was a prof ession like nowdays, you send 'em to college.
In that day and time you just learned from someone else.
EM: I suppose the thing was to get as much on a mule as the
mule could carry and yet not be---
TK: Yeah. A mule could carry just practically his own
weight.
EM: He can?
TK: Yes ma'am.
EM: Without being hurt?
TK: Yes , ma'am. Of course that was a little bit heavy .
They didn 't generally pack em--but they'd look at a mule and
they ' d guess, well that mule weighs 700 pounds . They'd try
to pack about half their weight .
EM: Is that so !
TK : So that mule would carry 350 pounds. And these old expert
packers they were experts at that, too. They could look at a
mule and tell you within a few pounds how much he weighed. So
they knew how much weight to put on there . So that was another
thing , the packer was-- and even in our military service , you
know we had a pack train in the army. Had what we called a
pack train. That ' s how they moved their supplies out r ight
along with a regiment of soldiers. Even their stoves, they
apparently packed on top of the mule.
KUYKENDAL 8
EM: Poor mule!
TK: They f i gured that mule was big enough to carry that stove
and they'd put the stove up there a nd put a diamond hitch on
it and that was all t here was to it . Away he went with it.
EM: I f you were a mule , you ' d want to be darn sure that
burden on your back wasn't going to slip.
TK: Yes, that's right. That was the purpose of the d iamond
hitch . The diamond hitch, if the load got loose , why they ' d
go back and you'd just pul l this one rope, just keep pullin '
it, takin' up the slack on it . It pulled a ltogether and i t
formed a web more or l ess. It just webbed it ont o the animal ' s
back .
EM : I 'm glad I wasn't a mule! When they were going, for in­stance,
on a long haul , say delivering ammunition to a fort
out in West Texas , was there a limit on how many hours that
pack train could travel?
TK : No ma ' am, I don ' t think there ever was a limit. They
just had to use their own judgement in t hat day and time.
They depended on the weather, how many miles they could go
weather- wise. If the weather was too hot, they only traveled
so many hours or they ' d travel so many hours in the morning
and lay up through the heat of the day and that evenin' , they ' d
go back out and travel some more . They averaged around 6, 7
miles an hour, something like that.
EM: They did?
TK: Yes ma ' am.
EM : That much! Those little creatures must have been trotting.
KUYKENDAL 9
TK: Yeah. A slow jaunt. I t was kind of natural for t hem to
be in a s low jog. They could take a pretty big load .
EM: Were the mules awfully dependent on water , l ike all the
othe r animals?
TK: They could go a little better farther, longesthan a
horse . Not like a camel, of c ourse. They could go a little
bit longer . They're a tougher animal than a horse . I think
they have even found in late r years, they 've cross -bred cattle
for probab l y a little bit more d urabl e, a l ittle bit more
prosperous cattle or thrifty cattle , I' d say, than the regis­t
ered cattle are. If they are cross-bred--that way wi t h a
mu l e, a cross-bred animal, so he has a l ittl e bit more stamina.
EM: We read in Texas about the cattle going up the trai l-­the
cattle drives up to Abilene a nd over to Kansas. Were
there pack trains along with those cat tle drives?
TK: There were before they got the wagons 1 yes ma'am, They
carried their supplies.
EM: There were?
TK: That ' s when, I guess, when they began to have their ups
and 4-ups depending on--they might leave out here in flat
country , drivin' a 2-up team , team of mules. When they began
to get in rough country, they had to have some more mu l es.
So finally , we ll, they had to have 4-ups, 6-ups .
And then the freighters , the freight wagon people, well,
naturally i t would depend on how much load they were going to
haul --that ' s how many mules they hooked up to the wagon.
That ' s when they began to make the 2-ups, 4-ups, 8-ups .
KUYKENDAL 10
EM: The mule was a very i mportant part of the development of
Texas, right?
TK: It was . It was very important.
EM: You read about the horses and cows all the time but the
little mule was a prett y vital animal , wasn 't he?
TK: It's kind of l ike we talk a bout everything but the farmer .
But the farmer is really the most important person that 's ever
been in Texas or any other part of the wor ld. Yet he gets
less credit. The mul e was his main animal. Long time ago,
they had oxen but oxen were slow. With the mule , they could
get out; they coul d plough; they could cultivate much faster
with the mule because they were a littl e quicker moving ani-mal
.
EM: Suppose you were short of money and you needed a creature
to plough or carry something , would it be cheaper to buy a
mul e or an ox?
TK: I don ' t know . I imagine it would have been cheaper to
buy an ox ; because cattle weren ' t worth hardly any thing. But
a we ll-trained mule always brought a pretty good price.
EM: Now suppose you ' d been on the trail all day and you ' re
pulling in for the night. They unload the mules don't they?
I
They don ' t leave the packs on the mules overnight?
TK: No ma ' am. They unload ' em and let ' em rest . Let ' em
lay down , roll and get some exercise-- loosen their back up
I guess you 'd call it . They don ' t lay down to sleep, neces-sarily
but they lay down to roll and loosen up their muscles
and everything .
KUYKENDAL
EM: Are t hey grazers?
TK: Yes ma 'am, they are.
11
EM: When you've got a mule team going a long, long way--mule
train--do they have to carry suppl ementary f ood or do they
have to depend on t he grass?
TK: They tried to get on the grass back in t hat day and time .
Years ago , more than a nything , there'd be a scout go ahead
and find a place where they ' d make it to that particular
place that night . Then they could tur n all the animals
loose, put the bell on this bell animal , and either stake it
or watch i t, kind of herd it through t he n ight. So t he next
morning they 'd get this bell mul e , bell mare , whatever it was
and here they come , all the rest of 'em, come following.
They 'd catch ' em.
EM : So they never lost any?
TK : That way they coul d not l ose any time.
EM: Goodness , that mule ' s important! When we were talking
up t here in front of y our booth-- tell a little bit about the
contribution you've made t o the Fol klife Festival. Tell
about when you started, at the very beginning.
TK: We ll, we started t h e f irst Folklife Festival t hat was
held here in San Antonio.
EM : Twelve years ago.
TK : Twelve years ago. There was a man came--O.T. Baker-­called
this man, they were friends. We lived at Pearsall at
that time. And they were old friends . He called this fri e nd
and he said , " I wish you ' d try to find us a t eam to come to
KUYKENDAL 12
TK : t he Festival." So the man came to me and told me- -we had
just had the centennial celebration in Pearsall and I was
parade chairman. We had the bigges t parade . We had more
western gear i n t hat parade, I guess , than they ' ve had in
years and years. We never had anything mi litaryi we got after
i t t oo late. Al l the mi l itary were busyi they had already
set up to go somewhere else. So we had to build it from the
c ount ry . We had some l adies even r ode side saddl e . And we
had , I forget , how many wagons with mules and horses and
buggies. We had a wonderful parade .
So Dolph Briscoe- -that was before he run for governor-­he
was our parade mar shal l. He rode a horse. Most every­thing
we had i n that parade was more or l ess western .
So this man came to me and said, " I know you know all
about where all these wagons and everything are. Couldn't
you find a wagon for the Fol klife Festival ? "
Well , I had no idea where the Folklife Festival was .
Ri gh t out of the clear. "Well, we 'll see what we can find."
He suggested- -there was an old black man had some o l d hors es .
He says, "You coul d get that man's horses and wagon." I said,
"No , that would be a disgrace. " And I remembered a little
t eam of gray mules that were j ust real nice and gentle. He
didn ' t have three . So I went and inquired from another ranch
man who had borrowed ' em to use in the parade. And he t old me
who they belonged to and he said-- and I said, "But I don't
know that man." And he sai d, "Yes , you do . He knows who you
are . If you don ' t know each other you know something about
KUYKENDAL 13
TK: each other . He ' d loan you those mules, I'm s ure."
So I drove to Encinal , Texas and Mr . J . B. Parker and told
him what I was looking for a nd he said , " I ' ve got the mules. "
We t alked awhile and he sai d , "Yeah, I ' ll loan ' em to you .
You can take ' em and use ' em . That will be f i ne . I know all
your family. I know all the Kuykendals over the country . I
know who you are and what you are. As long a s you ' re going
to take care of the mules , I 'll let you have ' em. "
That was about a month before they were having the first
Festival . So when it got time, I went down there and picked
the mules up and we brought 'em to San Antonio Fol k l i fe
Festival . And there was no one e l se had a team of mules .
Ther e was a team of big old oxen f rom over East Texas .
EM: I remember that.
TK : So my wife and me brought those two mul e s up h ere . We
stayed with ' em and we run , drove ' ern with t hat cane mill .
EM : Oh you did! Sure.
TK : She helped me. She drove part time . I drove part time .
We made that Festival. Before the next Festival, Yancy
Barnhart and me- - Yancy had told me t o buy if I could f i nd any
mul es or horses , h e wanted to buy ' em. So I found a pai r of
white mules in Encinal, Texas and I bought ' ern for Yancy
Barnhart . And those mules , then, we used ' ern continuously up
until one of ' em d i ed here two, three years ago. And then the
other one got crippled here three or four years ago . We---
So a very dear friend of mine from Pearsall , Texas,
Johnny Beal, called me and I found another mule . It was a
KUYKENDAL 14
TK: white mule. So we brought it to the Fest ival and they
used it .
EM: Still in the cane mill?
TK: Yeah . So then the next year, their mule was well again,
so we used him. Old Jack. And they used him. Last year
they used him but thi s year he ' s played out on ' em. Don ' t
know whether he's sick or crippled or what. So Johnny called
me again. He said , "Compadre , we need another mule . ..
EM: You were the mule guy!
TK : 11We need an extra mule. 11 "I ' l l find one somewhere . I 'll
try . " And he said , "Wel l , I' 11 be tryi ng ." He found a mule
that was so wild, so unruly , that we never could get him
tamed down , so he cal led me again t he other day and I said ,
I
"I l l bring Old Mike." He ' s not a mul e. He ' s a big old donkey
that I own .
EM: What' s the difference between a mule and a donkey?
TK: A mule is half donkey and hal f horse . A donkey is just
a donkey .
EM : He's a species by himself. I never could get that
straight.
TK : To get a mule, you have to cross a horse and a donkey .
Now some people say it has to be a male donkey and a female
horse. But it doesn ' t have to necessarily be. It can be the
other way.
EM: Oh it can?
TK: Yes ma'am. But most of the time, it is a male donkey and
a femal horse~-the biggest part of the mules. But occasionally
KUYKENDAL
TK: you 'll have some that ' s been reversed .
EM: You have a f ondness for mules, don't you?
15
TK: Yes. I have a fondness for animals. Horses or mules .
I raise a few quarter horses. I have a few registered quarter
horses. Very few. I have about four mares , registered mares .
And I have a registered stud horse.
Have you been at The Institute all this time?
EM: I've been here a long time. I was i n the very first
Folkl i fe Festival. Right out there in the Mexican Market .
I've been taping interviews at the Festival for four years .
TK: You know the first one we had, we went out what they
called the tunnel and there was where we had the cane mill
set up. Do you r emember that?
EM: No.
TK: Had the cane mill set up. Go out what they called the
tunnel on the east side and there we had set up out there and
that's where we had those mules.
EM: What are you doing with the mules this year?
TK: We have pack mules now.
EM: You 've got pack mules?
TK: Yes ma'am.
EM: And you're talking to people about what you're telling
me.
TK: Yes. We tell them before we had a l l these modern convey ­ances,
like the 18 wheelers and cargo planes and trains and
big things to move cargo around with , we used to have mules .
Our ancestors used mules .
KUYKENDAL 16
EM: What date do you put on this? On the mule train? 1880
and something?
TK : I t was probably earlier than that when they started the
mule t rain s . They still use 'em in Mexico . In the mines,
t hey still use the pack trains, the mul es . They 'll have ten
or fifteen mules in a pack train , loaded with ore , coming over
the mines over there. They keep some of those mules in there
so long that when they come out into the sun , they can't see.
EM: I know. I ' ve read that. They ' re not using mules much
any more, are they?
TK: No ma 'am .
EM : On ranches?
TK : No. Well, mul es are gettin ' popular again . Now they 're
even havin ' mule races. In Del Rio they have mule races all
year around. Three or four years ago , I don' t remember what
i t was--I bel ieve it was the first mule races they had in Del
Rio were Denver Pyle , you know, in the movie he has a mul e he
calls Old Number 7 . Denver Py l e , I don't remember the name of
the show now, but anyway , he was i n a show. It was a series
on t elevision, and he ' s an old man. The old man, the uncle
on the Dukes of Hazzard, that ' s Denver Pyle.
EM : All that h a ir!
TK : Yeah. Well, we knew Denver Pyle. We got to know him
when they made the picture of The Alamo a t Bracke~ille .
EM: Sure.
TK : See, my wife worked in tha t movie. My youngest son was
assistant to the casting director in that movie. So when h e
KUYKENDAL 17
TK: came in and come through Uvalde to go promotin' it, he
come here to help promote those mul e races at Del Ri o. He
stopped and we visited with him awhile . And he gave us a card
to take to the boy. But anyway, he wrote something on the
card, said , "Give this to Travis."
But that was the first year they had the mule races so
now it's an annual thing in Del Rio. They have mule races
every year. I cain't tell you the date but I think it's
along about in April .
EM: Tell me , you ' re standing up there with your lovely smile
and friendly attitude, what do the people ask you?
TK: Most of the time, "What is that? Is that a horse?
(laughter) Is that a camel?" We had the pack saddle on the
mule and it has posts at each e nd of the saddle and a camel
is kind of shaped like that. So he walked up there and said ,
"Is that a camel?"
EM: I noticed as I walked by, that one of the littl e mules
has a Mexican wooden saddle on him. Is that a wooden saddle?
TK: Yes. That's a pack saddle.
EM: That's a pack saddle? Those saddles look so uncomfort­able.
TK: Well, you don't ride those saddles.
cargo to that.
EM: It's not for anybody to ride?
TK : No , that's not to ride.
It's to help tie the
EM: I've seen people riding horses in Mexico on those wooden
saddles and they look so uncomfortable, mostly for the horse!
KUYKENDAL
TK: It's made a little bit different from them .
EM: Oh, this is a saddle just for the pack .
TK: Yes.
18
EM: That's interesting. Did they get the idea from Mexico?
TK : I woul dn 't be surprised because the Mexican people are a
very inventive people . They 're people who could--in fact, one
of 'em told my son one time, he said , "Why we can get r i ch off
of what you Gringos throw away ."
EM: It ' s true.
TK: But anyway, that saddle is made specially because you
have something to hook your rope on to tie the cargo.
EM: That's what that bar thing is.
TK: Helps to hold the pack more centrally located.
EM: Is there something under tha t so the mule ' s back is pro­tected?
TK: Oh yes ma'am. We have a good saddle pad under.
EM: That would be so uncomfortable.
TK: We're very particular to put a saddle pad under so it
won 't hurt, won't injure.
EM: Do you find that the kids are interested in this old­time
camp? I would think so.
TK: They love those animals . They want to get in there with
' em; they want to hug ' em, kiss 'em. And they do . They ' ll
get up there and if you don ' t watch ' em, they get over there
close to ' em; they 'll go up and kiss 'em anywhere on the face
that they can.
EM: Do the mules stand for it?
KUYKENDAL 19
TK: Yes ma'am. They get aggravated before the day ' s over.
You have to watch ' em because we ' re afraid the mule might
snap at 'em.
EM: They're getting hot and tired.
TK : Yeah. They ' re tired, aggravated.
EM: Do they have to stand like tnat all day long? And all
night?
TK: At night we t ake the pack and everything off of them.
EM: Are they l eft there in the pens at night?
TK: Yes ma'am.
EM: Somebody to watch 'em?
TK: The police, you know, they come. They do a ll right.
EM: It's been cooling off at night. You worry about animals
when it's so hot.
TK: If we feed ' em, they eat good. Course, they're gettin '
sort of disgusted with the feed now because they 're used to
bein' turned loose. Where I come from, we turn ' em loose.
Let 'em get out and roll . We don 't have that much room .
And they'll get aggravated and fight at each other so we are
afraid they might get injured so we keep ' em tied one over
here and one over here.
EM: You obviously have put so much into the Folklife Festival
all these years, you think it worth while, don 't you? You
think it's a good experience for people?
TK: I think it's the greatest show i n the world.
EM: The nice thing, it seems to me, is there are so many
children .
KUYKENDAL 20
TK : Yes , t hat' s right.
EM: So many little kids taking th i s all i n . Maybe they ' re
not saying anything but they ' re going to remember a lot of
things they wouldn ' t have otherwise .
TK : One year we brought our grandson with us . He ' s now six­teen
years old and he still talks about it, what a good time
he h a d ; what he seen . He really e njoyed t o drive that mul e
around , that cane deal , and he l pin ' wit h the mule . All kids
love an imals.
EM: They seem to , don ' t they?
TK: Some k i nd of an animal. I think t hat every kid shoul d
have some kind of an animal .
EM : So do I .
TK : A cat or a dog or a pig or something . When we l ived in
Del Rio , I was with the sheriff ' s office, years ago when our
boys were little . People ' d come down there and say , "What
have your kids got up there, a kind of a menagerie?" They ' d
even have a javelina hog up there . They ' d have a bob cat;
have a donkey ; and they ' d have a goat in the yard, playin '
with i t all the time . And our yard was a sort of a public
place . Since we had two boys, there were no girls, all the
the boys in the country gathered at our house . Our house has
been a boy ' s horne always.
EM : That ' s wonde rful. I can tell you ' re nice parents .
TK : We had two boys. We don ' t get to see our grandchildren
very much. Both of our boys are Federal Drug Enforcement
agents. One of ' ern is stationed in Guadalajara, Jalisco,
KUYKENDAL 21
TK: Mexico and the other one is now in Tucson, Arizona. The
one in Tucson spent six years in Monterrey, Mexico. Then he
went to Washington D. C. and now he's in Arizona.
The other boy spent about six and a half years i n South
America and t hen spent about a year and a half in Houston
and now he's in Guadalajara, Jalisco.
EM: That's a nice place to be.
TK: Yeah, but the kind of jobs they have is dangerous . Hav­ing
been a pol iceman myself, I know what's what. What t hey
have to go through.
EM: Do you think of anything else we need on this tape about
mule skinners for future researchers?
TK : No, not that I can think of.
EM : You 're sweet to come . I've learned a lot.
TK: I want to quit, but I don ' t want to quit. I want some-body
to carry on and I want to be here every time, but the
work's gettin' a little rough.
EM: You don't want to work so hard .
a vacation.
I think you 've earned
TK: I 'm quite a bit older than most people think I am.
EM: You don't look old. Haven't you got somebody coming up
behind you that can do the work?
TK: So far I haven 't but I'm tryin'. I want to keep on until
I can get someone.
EM: Have you got anybody in Uvalde that's interested in do­ing
this?
TK: Well, t hey don't want to work. And it is hard work. You
KUYKENDAL 22
TK : have fun but you s till have--it's hard work and it's hot.
The time the year it happens , it ' s rough .
EM : It really is . But it's such a good thing . It's so
worthwhile for the kids, particularly.
TK : I think it's great and I'm going to keep on trying to
promote everything I can. If I can p r omote something else
besides this pack mule from Uvalde, I'm going to promote it .
We had dropped out for two years and we came up v isiting .
Run onto Claudia Ball. She had her feet in a tub of ice
water . I think it was the l ast day of the Festival and she
was just worn out ; her feet were swelled. She was, si ttin'
with her feet in a tub of ice water. We hugged and beat on
each other and greeted and so she said , "Well, Travis, why
don't you try to build something in Uvalde for here ? We've
never had any representation from Uval de . Uvalde has a lot
to offer. "
EM : Sure does .
TK : It does have a lot to offer. The home of John Garner ;
home of Dolph Briscoe. Dolph was born and raised in thi s
area. And I think he was one of the greatest governors we ' ve
ever had. And b eside that, we have--Uvalde ' s t he place where
Pat Garre tt, who was a very noted outlaw, lived at one time.
And it was the home of King Fisher who, I guess, was the most
noted outlaw and one of the worst outlaws , I guess , South
Texas ever knew. He was even elected Sheriff of Uvalde one
time and he had about 130 deputies and they wer e all outlaws .
Plus the Newton gang. And Joe Newton is one of my group of
KUYKENDAL 23
TK: Frontiersmen and he still comes with us. He's 82 years
old . They got quite a picture of him this morning in the San
Antonio Light. He comes . He doesn't do a whole lot but he's
very active . He's a good storytelleri very p leasant man ,
very nice. Although he robbed 80 banks and 6 trains, he's a
very nice man. (laughter) He's one of our gang . The reason
I wanted to add this in is to show it's not just the people
who are working here that thinks this is a wonderful thi ng,
it ' s all of us who are implicated at all . We fee l l ike all
of us, it's just part of our act here .
EM: Of course, it is . It's a wonderful down-to-earth thing.
TK: That is right.
EM: Done to simple things. And I love to see the kids'
faces.
END OF TAPE I, Side 2.