Clay County TXGenWeb Project

Tex Rickard & Deputies

Submitted by Jim Marshall

BACK WHEN -- Tex Rickard, famed sportsman and builder of old Madison Square Garden, New York, is shown above, second from left, as he visited in Henrietta around the mid-1920's.  Others, left to right, are Frank Marshall, Clair Hilburn and Charles Jacobs.  Henrietta was a wild frontier town in the 1890's when Rickard, generally known in the area as "Dink", took on the job of city marshal.  In 1895, he went to Alaska and the rest is history.  The only known sports memorial to the former Clay Countian is the Tex RIckard Arena on the Clay County Pioneers' Grounds, Henrietta.  The arena was dedicated to George (Tex) Rickard in 1952 by Jack Dempsey.  Hilburn was widely known as the "leader of the band".

(Photograph provided John Kosanke of Henrietta by John Ansley, 3707 Springdale, Fort Worth.  It is believed to have been made by D.B. Greene, Fort Worth Star-Telegram staff photographer.)

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