The Jones Girls of Wheeler County, Texas: A Dual Memoir - Paperback

by Millie Jones Porter (Author), Leanna Jones Harvey (Author), Ruth Rogers Beasley (Author)

When the Jones girls arrived there in 1886, the Texas Panhandle was an open frontier. Fort Elliott fired a cannon every daybreak, dancehall girls courted gamblers in Old Mobeetie, and vast herds of sheep and cattle grazed the rolling plains. "Footings" for "nesters" were not easily had, so the ever-growing Jones family farmed, freighted, and herded sheep before establishing a ranch in Wheeler County. Sisters Millie and Leanna later described their childhoods in various books, published and unpublished - yet the Jones family story has never really been told in full until now.
What began as a puzzle of passages from four disparate books is now reordered into a shared life story in two parts. "The Jones Girls" utilizes two unpublished memoirs and two published books: Leanna Jones Harvey's 1940 novel, "Generation unto Generation," and Millie Jones Porter's 1945 area history, "Memory Cups of Panhandle Pioneers." Each sister tells her version of a shared family history. Two memoirs verify the truth of Leanna's "novel," and Millie's personal "memory cups" add color and context to a vivid depiction of life in the early Texas Panhandle.

Author Biography

Ruth Rogers Beasley set out to make an archive of the family books, and assembled this dual memoir when she discovered the larger story hidden within the writings of Millie and Leanna Jones.