The Jeweler Who Named a Town RoadyGoat

The town spreading out around you carries the name of a Fort Worth jeweler who never really lived here. George Washington Haltom was born in an Arkansas log house in 1872, decided as a boy picking cotton that he would become a watchmaker, and by 1893 had sold his little shop for thirty dollars and headed for Texas. He built Haltom's Jewelers into a Cowtown institution and earned the nickname the King of Diamonds. With the profits he bought roughly three thousand acres of rolling grassland six miles northeast of downtown along the Denton Highway, where he ran the Diamond H Ranch and raised Hereford cattle. When a new highway pulled businesses out this way in the early 1930s, a settlement took root on his land. Haltom died in 1943, and the year after, his namesake community incorporated as Haltom City Village; in 1950 it shortened the name to plain Haltom City. So the place is named not for a founder or a battle, but for a cattle-ranching watch repairman who sold sparkle to Fort Worth. (Source: Handbook of Texas; Hometown by Handlebar.)

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When This Was the County Seat (Before the Whiskey) RoadyGoat

Tucked inside today's Haltom City is the old community of Birdville, named for Texas Ranger captain Jonathan Bird, and in 1850 it won the vote to become Tarrant County's very first seat of government. For a few years it was the place that mattered: it had a log courthouse, prominent settlers like legislator Isaac Parker and judge Edward Hovencamp, and two newspapers, the Birdville Western Express and the Birdville Union, before Fort Worth had even one. Then upstart Fort Worth came for the title. In an 1856 election long remembered as marred by free whiskey and imported voters, Fort Worth edged Birdville out by a razor-thin margin. Birdville's backers cried foul, and the feud festered into years of fistfights and even fatal duels. A decisive second vote in 1860 buried the dispute for good: Fort Worth, by then the bigger town, polled 548 votes to Birdville's four. The county seat never came back. What was once Tarrant County's capital is now a neighborhood swallowed by Haltom City. (Source: Handbook of Texas; Hometown by Handlebar.)

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The First Courthouse Site and the Pioneer Graves RoadyGoat

Near 6108 Broadway Avenue stands a marker noting the spot where Tarrant County's first courthouse once stood in Birdville, back when this ground governed the whole county. A short walk away is Birdville Cemetery, the resting place of the area's earliest settlers and one of the oldest burial grounds in the county. The one-acre tract was carved from the old George Akers land grant and set aside for burials before 1860; its oldest marked grave belongs to Wiley Wilda Potts, who died in December 1852. Land for the cemetery was first donated by Dr. B.F. Barkley, and the grounds grew over the decades to several acres holding well over a thousand graves. There's a quiet trick to walking it: the surnames on the headstones read like a street map, because so many roads across Haltom City, the Richland Hills, Smithfield, and northeast Fort Worth were named for the pioneers buried here. The dead, in effect, still label the living town. (Source: Texas Historical Commission marker; Birdville Cemetery records.)

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Tim Cole

1986

Timothy Brian Cole, born in Brenham in 1960, served in the U.S. Army and attended Texas Tech University in Lubbock. While there, Cole was accused of assaulting a fellow student. In September 1986, a jury convicted him and sentenced him to 25 years in prison. Prior to the trial, he was offered probation in exchange for a guilty plea, and while in prison, he was offered parole if he would admit guilt. He refused to take blame for a crime he did not commit. In December 1999, he died in prison at age 39 from complications from asthma. In 2007, the Innocence Project of Texas received a letter from an inmate confessing to the crime for which Cole was convicted. Physical evidence confirmed that this man was guilty and Cole was innocent. The crime victim joined Cole’s family in the effort to clear his name. In District Court in Travis County, Cole’s advocates successfully used a court of inquiry to obtain a hearing on his innocence. In April 2009, the court declared that Cole was innocent of the crime “to a 100% moral, legal and factual certainty.” Following this opinion and order of the court, the other two branches of state government also cleared Cole’s name and record. In 2009, the 81st Texas Legislature enacted the Tim Cole Act, to compensate wrongly convicted individuals, and created the timothy cole advisory panel on wrongful convictions to reverse other wrongful imprisonments and prevent future miscarriages of justice. In March 2010, the Texas Governor’s Ooffice issued the first posthumous pardon in state history. This promise of fairness for all Texans is the legacy of a man who once wrote from prison that "I still believe in the justice system, even though it doesn’t believe in me.” 175 Years of Texas Independence * 1836 - 2011

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Robert David Law

1969

_Specialist Four, United States Army_ Robert David Law was born on September 15, 1944, to Robert M. and Martha E. (Morris) Law in Fort Worth. He attended Fort Worth Technical High School, graduating in 1964, and was a member of Southcliff Baptist Church. Law enlisted in the U.S. Army at Dallas on October 17, 1967. He completed his Basic Combat Training and Infantry Advanced Individual Training at Fort Polk, Louisiana, and was advanced in rank to Private First Class. He graduated from Airborne School at Fort Benning, Georgia, in summer 1968, and received orders to join F Company (Ranger), 52nd Infantry Regiment, 1st Infantry Division in combat in the Republic of (South) Vietnam.
 From 1968-69, Law served as a scout observer and was promoted in rank to E-4 as a Specialist Four (SP4). Under a February 1969 reorganization, his unit became I Company (Ranger), 75th Infantry Regiment, 1st Infantry Division. SP4 Law had been in Vietnam for eight months when he volunteered for a mission to gather intelligence near the Cambodian border, northeast of the 1st Infantry Division base camp at Lai Khe. Law paced a patrol of six rangers beginning on February 20, 1969. Within an hour of their insertion by helicopter, the patrol was in a gunfight. Law sprayed rifle fire into the woods to cover the patrol’s retreat for the night. The next day, the rangers monitored enemy troops near a log bridge over a stream. On the morning of February 22, three Viet Cong soldiers spotted the rangers and opened fire. During the exchange, a grenade rolled close to three of the rangers. Law threw himself on the grenade to save his comrades and was killed instantly. When notified about her son’s death, his mother remarked that his letters home indicated that “He knew what he was fighting for.” In August 1970 at the White House in Washington, D.C., President Richard M. Nixon presented SP4 Law’s family with a posthumous Medal of Honor for his selfless and decisive actions. (2020)

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Fort Worth Stock Yards Company

1893

The Fort Worth Stock Yards Company was created in 1893, when Boston capitalist Greenlief W. Simpson led a group of investors in purchasing the Fort Worth Union Stock Yards. Under Simpson's leadership, the Company earned the support of the Texas Cattle Raisers Association and lured the prominent meatpacking companies of Armour and Swift to open plants here. Publicity through the Company's market newspaper and annual Fat Stock Show, both begun in 1896, resulted in a significant increase in the number of animals brought to market. The Stock Yards Co. built the area's livestock-related facilities and had controlling interest in many North Fort Worth businesses and properties. The first five decades of the 20th Century were the most successful for the Fort Worth Stock Yards Co. During World War I, foreign governments purchased draft animals, making Fort Worth the largest horse and mule market in the world. In 1917, overall livestock market receipts reached 3,500,000 and in 1944, sales exceeded 5,000,000 head of livestock. However, by the 1950s, local auctions were drawing sellers away from this central market. Today the Fort Worth Stock Yards Co. continues as a significant part of the city's unique heritage. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986.

Historical Marker → · 4.5 mi away

Bank One Tower Tornado

2000

F3 tornado climbed the 35-story Bank One Tower on March 28, 2000, blowing out nearly every pane of glass above the third floor. Building sat empty for almost five years before being converted to luxury residential.

Local Knowledge → · 4.7 mi away

Billy Bob's Texas

1981

Billed as the "World's Largest Honky-Tonk" and located in the historic Fort Worth Stockyards district, Billy Bob's Texas, which comprises a total interior space of 100,000 square feet, along with twenty acres for parking, is one of the most popular tourist attractions in the state. Many of the brightest stars in country music have played on its stage. In addition to nightly musical performances, Billy Bob offers live bull riding, dancing, drinking, games, and more to a capacity crowd of 6,000. Billy Bob's has been nominated numerous times and, as of 2011, had won eight titles as the country music "Club of the Year" by the Academy of Country Music. The Country Music Association also has recognized the nightclub with the "Club of the Year" title three times. Billy Bob's Texas was the brainchild of Texas A&M University graduate and professional football player Billy Bob Barnett. Joining Barnett in the venture was nightclub owner Spencer Taylor, a former car salesman. The two chose an abandoned 100,000-square-foot department store that had once been an open-air cattle barn in the Fort Worth Stockyards. The original structure was built in 1910 and underwent several transformations through the years. Additional animal stalls and an auction ring were constructed in 1936, and during World War II the Globe Aircraft Corporation used the building as an airplane factory. With the additional help of investment partners Thomas and Mitt Lloyd, Barnett renovated the facility and opened the doors for business on April 1, 1981. Following on the heels of the early 1980s Urban Cowboy craze and subsequent country music boom, Billy Bob's Texas was an instant hit. The first week featured Larry Gatlin and the Gatlin Brothers , Waylon Jennings , Janie Fricke, and Willie Nelson. A host of others followed, including rockers ZZ Top and the Beach Boys and country music legends Marty Robbins and Ernest Tubb . Billy Bob's Texas helped foster many new musical acts. As the club's marketing director, Pam Minick, wrote, "Billy Bob's became the place for country music musicians to hone their skills, build a fan following, and possibly secure a recording contract." George Strait, for example, played first as an opening act at Billy Bob's. Rick Treviño placed in a talent contest at the nightclub. Ty Herndon was a member of the house band, Southern Thunder. However, problems eventually beset the nightclub. In the late 1980s, country music, Billy Bob's biggest draw, declined in popularity. Financial mismanagement and unrealized projects drained the nightclub. Billy Bob's Texas was bankrupt, and on January 8, 1988, it closed, causing great loss to the tourism industry of Fort Worth, especially the Stockyards district. Soon afterward, however, entrepreneur Holt Hickman, a Fort Worth native, sought to revive the Stockyards. Hickman's long-time friend and businessman Steve Murrin encouraged him to reopen Billy Bob's Texas. Hickman and Murrin, along with Donald K. Jury, an original Billy Bob's Texas investor, reopened the place on November 28, 1988. In February 1989, Billy Minick became a partner and manager of the nightclub. He eventually became CEO, with his wife Pam as head of marketing. When Billy Bob's Texas reopened, new headliners took the stage, including Garth Brooks, Tim McGraw, and Texans LeAnn Rimes and Clint Black. As country music regained popularity, Billy Bob's focused on native talent, especially musicians who had crossover appeal. Such Texas acts as Robert Earl Keen and Pat Green became some of the club's biggest draws. The high-energy environment and close setting of Billy Bob's Texas allowed these performers to interact more with their fans. According to Pam Minick, most stars know they have made it when they have played the main stage at Billy Bob's. The club has a Handprint Wall of Fame that displays impressions of every performer who has played onstage. Many artists have recorded live at Billy Bob's. Among the first to do so were Chris LeDoux and D

Tsha Handbook → · 4.8 mi away

Fort Worth Stockyards

1876

The Fort Worth Stock Yards were officially incorporated on March 23, 1893, and the corporation was dissolved on May 31, 1944, but those who purchased it at the later date continued operations under the same name until November 1, 1981, when they leased the facilities to a company that continued using the same name. The Fort Worth livestock market became the largest in Texas and the Southwest, the biggest market south of Kansas City, and ranked between third and fourth consistently among the nation's large terminal livestock markets for five decades, from about 1905 to the mid-1950s. Texans started calling Fort Worth "Cowtown" soon after the Civil War , when drovers began herding cattle from South Texas northward to connect with the Chisholm Trail in Indian Territory and stopping in Fort Worth for supplies. Not until the Texas and Pacific Railway arrived on July 19, 1876, did promoters build pens to hold cattle, but business leaders of Fort Worth already dreamed of packing plants and stockyards to make their community a permanent focus of the cattle industry. By 1886 four stockyards had been built near the railroads. Businessmen chartered the Union Stock Yards on July 26, 1887, and opened their 258-acre facility north of the Trinity River in midsummer 1889. They also chartered a packing company. Local interests invited Boston capitalist Greenleif W. Simpson to visit, with the hope that he would invest. Simpson, with a half dozen Boston and Chicago associates, incorporated the Fort Worth Stock Yards Company in West Virginia because of more favorable tax laws there, and purchased the Union Stock Yards and the Fort Worth Packing Company in April 1893. A neighbor of Simpson in Boston, Louville V. Nile, bought half the shares. The investors struggled because of the financial panic of 1893 and other problems, but in 1896 the company began a fat-stock show that has survived to the present as one of the largest livestock shows in the nation, the Southwestern Exposition and Livestock Show . In 1896 stockyard owners also began a market newspaper that still exists today under independent ownership as the Weekly Livestock Reporter , the largest livestock newspaper in the Southwest. In 1897–98 the company, in connection with the Bureau of Animal Industry, gained nationwide attention by experimenting with cattle dipping to kill ticks ( see TEXAS FEVER ). An agreement Simpson and Niles made in 1902 with Armour and Swift brought in two of the nation's largest meatpackers, which constructed modern plants adjacent to the stockyards. In a stock reorganization, each packer received a third interest in the stockyards company, and Simpson, Niles, and smaller investors retained a third. In exchange for stock and land on which to build their plants, the packers agreed that each animal they slaughtered would pass through the stockyards at a standard fee. Boom years followed for the Fort Worth Stock Yards Company after the arrival of Armour and Swift. Immigrants came from Central Europe to work in the plants and settled in a community that stockyard officials incorporated in 1902 under the name North Fort Worth. The first decade of the twentieth century saw great growth in livestock-related industries in Fort Worth-grain elevators, livestock-pharmaceutical companies, and other meatpackers. The Fort Worth Stock Yards Company constituted the hub around which everything else revolved. The reorganized company spent $125,000 for a two-story Spanish-style exchange building and constructed brick-floored pens with a capacity of 24,500 animals. By 1905 the Fort Worth market had grown to fifth in the nation. In 1906 the calf market at Fort Worth ranked second only to Chicago. Because of rapid growth, the yards kept expanding. In March 1908, when a new $175,000 coliseum for the fat-stock show opened, the company hosted the first cutting-horse contest ever held indoors under electric lights. Population in Fort Worth tripled during the first decade after Armour and

Tsha Handbook → · 4.8 mi away

Haltom City, Texas

Music in Haltom City

Songs About Haltom City

Artists From Haltom City

Rivers & Roads in Song near Haltom City

History of Haltom City

The Jeweler Who Named a Town RoadyGoat

When This Was the County Seat (Before the Whiskey) RoadyGoat

The First Courthouse Site and the Pioneer Graves RoadyGoat

Tim Cole

Robert David Law

Fort Worth Stock Yards Company

Bank One Tower Tornado

Billy Bob's Texas

Fort Worth Stockyards

Things to Do in Haltom City

Everything Near Haltom City