W
hen Captain Samuel “Burk” Burnett got involved in the cattle business at the age of 19 a mighty force entered the ranching business. Burnett went into business for himself with the purchase of 100 head of cattle, which were wearing the 6666 brand. With the cattle came ownership of the brand. Burnett was born the Bates County, Missouri, on January 1, 1849, but in 1857-58 his family decided to move to Texas and chose Denton County. Jerry Burnett, Burk’s father, became involved in the cattle business; since Burk was ten years old at the time, he began watching his father’s movements in the business and learned from his father. A few years later, Burk avoided the panic of 1873 by holding over 1,100 steers he had driven to market in Wichita, Kansas. Burk held the steers through the winter, and the next year, he sold the cattle for a $10,000 profit. He was the first rancher in Texas to buy steers and graze them for market. After that Burnett began negotiations with the Comanche Chief Quanah Parker for the lease of 300,000 acres of grassland. He not only gained the lease but also the friendship of the Chief. Quanah was the son of the white woman, Cynthia Ann Parker, who was captured in a raid of Parker’s Fort in 1836. Quanah became a great leader of his people and eventually a friend of white leaders and ranchers in the Southwest. Burk Burnett ran 10,000 cattle on that land until the end of his lease. Burnett had strong feelings for Indians, and a genuine respect for them. He learned the Comanche ways, passing both the love of the land and his friendship for the Indians to his family. The lease continued until the early 1900s when the federal government ordered the land turned back to the Indians. Burnett traveled to Washington, D.C. to meet with President Teddy Roosevelt. He asked for an extension on the lease, which Roosevelt granted for two years. That gave Burnett and other ranchers time to find grazing land for their herds. Around 1900 Burnett purchased the 8 Ranch near Guthrie, Texas, in King County from the Louisville Land and Cattle Company. He also purchased the Dixon Creek Ranch near Panhandle, Texas from the Cunard line. Those two ranches marked the beginning of the pres-
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ent day Four Sixes (6666) Ranch. That along with some later additions amounted to a third of a million acres. In his personal life, Burk had married Ruth B. Loyd, the daughter of Martin B. Loyd, the founder of the first National Bank of Fort Worth. Of their three children, two died young. Burnett and Ruth divorced, and he married Mary Couts Barradel in 1892. They had one son, Burk Burnett, Jr. who died in 1917. The one surviving heir of Burk Burnett was Thomas Loyd Burnett. He was born in 1871 and learned the cattle business in the 1880s and 1890s. He was educated in Fort Worth, Saint Louis and at the Virginia Military Institute. His grandfather on his mother’s side was Martin B. Loyd. Martin Loyd was passionate about racehorses. He began amassing his own stable of fine racehorses. He branded his stock with the single letter L. With his death in 1912, his interest in horses and the land surrounding Wichita Falls passed through inheritance to his grandson, Thomas Burnett. His L brand remained on his horses and is still used today. Thomas Burnett worked as a ranch hand on his father Burk’s land, drawing the same wages as the other cow hands. His marriage to Olive “Ollie” Lake of Fort Worth produced one daughter, Anne Valliant Burnett, born in 1900. Thomas Burnett was much admired and respected among cowmen and ranch hands. In 1898, in bitter cold, Tom had the task of moving 5000 steers across the Red River from Indian Territory to shipping pens in Texas. He got the herd across in weather that few cattlemen would have faced. In 1905, the Burk Burnett hosted a wolf hunt in Big Pasture, which was on land leased from the Comanche and Kiowa. Among the guests were President Teddy Roosevelt and Chief Quanah Parker. Tom took a chuck wagon, horses and a group of cowboys to a site near present day Frederick, Oklahoma. He set up camp for the President’s ten day hunting expedition. Roosevelt, Burk Burnett and other guests had a wonderful time hunting wolves. In a letter from Roosevelt to his son, Ted, Roosevelt is quoted as saying, “You would have loved Tom Burnett, son of the big cattleman. He is a splendid fellow, about 30 years old and just the ideal of what a young
