M Walker

Shead Ranch Cemetery M Walker

At the Alamo in 1836, Manson Sheid, a Tennessee native falls. His brother, William, survives the tumutuous Texas Revolution to return to Tennessee alone. In 1850 William comes to Texas with land grants from the revolution and establishes a cattle ranch that straddles the county line of McLennan and Limestone, and eventually reaches north into Hill County. The Shead Ranch see the evolution from stockmen to cowboys on the open grasslands of frontier days. In the heart of the ranch, William establishes a frontier cemetery. In later decades the ranch also becomes the home of farmers from the east and immigrants from Europe. The frontier cemetery is still surrounded by cattle grazing land to this day. Here is a lok at the art of frontier Texas tombstones, the names of pioneering families, and memories of long-gone customs.