Out the back door of the Pitchfork Ranch Cookhouse, the land dropped off to the north bank of the South Wichita River and most days horses grazed quietly in nearby pastures. Tame wild turkeys milled around nearby eating corn chips thrown out for them by the cook. In all, it was an idyllic picture of both today and times gone by.
Pitchfork Ranch Cookhouse
c. 1900
The Pitchfork Land & Cattle Co. officially began in 1883. But its history goes back even earlier when Eugene F. Williams and Dan Gardner- Friends since their boyhood days in Mississippi- formed a partnership in December 1881.
The current boundaries of the Pitchfork Ranch encompass a cowboy’s dream of excellent grass and abundant streams, easy valleys to cross yet many breaks for protection from the rare “northerners.” Those conditions are what brought cattleman to Pitchfork Country after the military campaigns ended the threat of Indian attack.
Located in the Rolling Plains 80 miles east of Lubbock, the Pitchfork is a mix of flat, open terrain on the northeast side and the rougher Croton Breaks to the west and south. The South Wichita River runs 10 miles through the ranch and the headquarters sits near the north bank.
The Pitchfork Ranch is defined by its geography. The Big Croton and the Little Croton run together to form Croton Creek and the Croton Breaks. Such names as West Croton, Dripping Springs and River and Shinnery Pastures indicate the influence of the terrain. The breaks provide a challenge for horse and rider. Other areas of the ranch could have been named by a Hollywood scriptwriter- Brushy Pasture, Dark Canyon and West Long Canyon.
In so large an area, the one place where everyone could come together on the vast ranch was the cookhouse. The simple wood-frame structure was a sanctuary for family reunions, birthday parties and of course, daily meals for the ranch hands and cowboys since its construction around 1900.
It began as a one-room structure and was expanded over the years. The cookhouse consists of a kitchen and dining area and was in continuous use by Pitchfork Ranch cowboys for two meals a day until its move to the National Ranching Heritage Center in 2007. At mealtime, the cowboys waited outside on benches or under a tree until the cook rang the dinner bell.
Though the exterior walls were covered in modern shingles in the 1950s, the original wood clapboard siding was still intact and is exposed again. The interior walls and ceilings are clad with narrow 1-inch by 2-inch beveled plank paneling. The dining hall is a long spare space furnished with well-used wood tables and hand-made wood benches made by Pitchfork cowboys.
Over the years, a number of modifications and additions were made to the building. When a kitchen was built around 1900, a 14-foot by 16-foot structure stood alone as the ranch cookhouse and not, as previously thought, a two-room building. Later a porch was added to the north side. Then a 21-foot long addition was added, again on the north side. Up to this point the building rested on a dry-stack rock foundation. Then in the 1920s, one more 17-foot addition was made to the north end with a concrete beam foundation. The original siding was rough wood planking, at one time trimmed out as a board-and-batten finish. The clapboard siding was likely added during the final addition.
During the moving process, it was easy to determine a better construction history of the ranch building. By studying the floorboards and framing differences, the additions to the building were clearly defined. So much so that some of the initial description of the cookhouse had to change.
The kitchen is focused around a central work counter with the large gas stove on the east side and the sink and clean-up area on the west. There were no frills- this was a working ranch kitchen. The Pitchfork Ranch Cookhouse provides NRHC visitors with a unique opportunity to experience and understand an aspect of ranch life rarely seen by outsiders.