Who knows what ranching stories they’d tell?

The Matador Half-Dugout at the National Ranching Heritage Center in Lubbock, Texas (Courtesy of the National Ranching Heritage Center)

Riders who compete in versatility ranch horse events at AQHA shows know that the class hails back to the long history of the American Quarter Horse as a rancher’s compadre and partner.

A large part of that ranching history that the Quarter Horse has played a part in has been preserved at the National Ranching Heritage Center in Lubbock, Texas.

The visit reminded Jim Jennings (AQHA’s former executive director of publications and Journal editor) of a tale about his own grandparents, who homesteaded in the Oklahoma panhandle in 1902. Listen to him recount his visit to the center, a story he told in the August 2009 issue of The American Quarter Horse Journal.

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The slide show images are of the structures at the center, including:

• The El Capote Cabin built in 1838 near the Guadalupe River in Texas.
• Hedwig’s Hill Dog Trot House, built around 1855 down in the Texas Hill Country.
• The Matador Half-Dugout originally built in 1888 on land later sold to the Matador Ranch.
• The Barton House
• King Ranch Shipping Pens, circa 1910 and 1934, show how cattle and horses were once shipped by rail.
• The Ropes Santa Fe Depot, which was built in 1918 to serve the community of Ropesville, Texas.
• The Pitchfork Ranch Cookhouse which was used in three consecutive centuries.
• The U Lazy S Ranch Carriage House from Post, Texas, built in 1906 by legendary cattleman John B. Slaughter.

–Photos are courtesy of the National Ranching Heritage Center.