The sprawling Texas ranch isn’t just a silver screen set where Jimmy gets sent to shape up—it’s an iconic (and very real) ranch forged by more than 150 years of history with horses, cattle and cowboys.
The ranch has been owned and operated by the same family since Samuel Burk Burnett took his 6666-branded cattle up the trail to Abilene in 1873. It’s not just family that has longevity on the ranch. A number of second- and third-generation cowboys still work there, but the family legacy is coming to an end.
Owner Anne Marion died in 2020 and the terms of her will dictate that all her ranching operations should be sold. Pending the sale, the ranch is being operated by Anne’s daughter, Anne Windfohr “Windi” Grimes, who is Burk’s great-great-granddaughter.
The 6666 brand has a background that closely parallels the history of America’s westward expansion and the rise of cowboys in cow country. Photo courtesy Wyman Meinzer and Sam Middleton.
Anne is gone, but the influence she had on the ranch is not gone. “Anne expected excellence in her crew,” says general manager Joe Leathers. “She wanted the best of the best. She wanted good cattle. She knew cattle and she knew horses, but what makes this ranch special is that Anne expected ‘special,’ and she instilled that belief in the people who work here.”
The slogan of the ranch is “Horses with a history… Brands with a background.” The 6666 brand has a background that closely parallels the history of America’s westward expansion and the rise of cowboys in cow country.
At age 19, Burk Burnett was already a seasoned cowboy. By then he had made one trip up the Chisholm Trail from Texas to Abilene, Kan., with a herd of Longhorns belonging to rancher Wiley Robbins. When Burk’s father, Jerry Burnett, suggested his son act as trail boss and take another herd for him, Burk was ready to go.
At age 19, Burk Burnett went into business for himself with the purchase of 100 head of cattle wearing the 6666 brand. The historic and massive ranch was never won in a poker game and no one knows the origin of the brand, but every rancher in America knows the brand.
Burk was not a native Texan. He was born in Bates County, Mo., on Jan. 1, 1849. His family was engaged in stock farming in Missouri, but in the late 1850s prior to the Civil War, they suffered from attacks by both the Jayhawkers and the Border Ruffians, two groups that preyed upon families that lived along the Missouri-Kansas border. Jerry moved his family to Texas.
Burk was 10 years old when the Burnett family settled alongside Denton Creek in Denton County, Texas. Jerry was able to put together a small herd of cattle, but both his herd and the amount of land on which he operated grew considerably in nine years. Needing to market some of his cattle, he sent Burk north with a herd of 1,700 Longhorns.
Everything went well until Burk and his crew reached the Osage country in northern Indian Territory. Indians hit the camp one night and drove off all but the night horses the men were either riding or had hobbled close to their beds. Burk had his men move the herd the next morning with half of the men horseback and the other half walking. They continued swapping off until he was able to procure more horses.
When Burk returned from Abilene with money from the cattle sale, Jerry made Burk a partner in the stock running on Denton Creek. Then Burk bought from Frank Crowley, another rancher in Denton County, 100 head that were wearing the 6666 brand. Ownership of the brand came with the cattle, and that purchase became the basis of an even larger herd for the young man.
Burk drove 1,100 steers bearing his 6666 brand to Wichita, Kan., in 1873, but a major depression hit both this country and Europe by the time he got to Kansas. Realizing he would take a tremendous loss if he sold his steers at such a low price, Burk dropped back down into the Osage country and wintered the cattle on grass. He was able to sell his herd for a $10,000 profit the next spring after an extra year’s growth.
In 1871 before the drive to Kansas, Burk had married Ruth Loyd, the daughter of M.B. Loyd, a Fort Worth banker who came to Texas from Missouri after the Civil War. Loyd gathered and sold wild South Texas cattle for five years before using his cattle profits to open the Loyd Exchange Office on the square in Fort Worth in the early 1870s. This made him the first permanent banker in the city. Loyd later joined some associates in founding the First National Bank in Fort Worth, the ninth national bank chartered in the United States.
With the help of his father-in-law in the mid-1870s, Burk moved his cattle on land he purchased in Wichita County between the Red and Wichita rivers. But in the 1880s when much of the land was still open range, Burk found another place to graze his cattle north of the Red River in Indian Territory.
The government reserved 488,000 acres for grazing use by the Kiowa, Comanche and Apache tribes. The area was known as the Big Pasture, and it was open prairie land with good grass. Burk worked out a deal with legendary Comanche chief Quanah Parker to lease some of that land from the tribes. Burk developed a close relationship with Quanah Parker despite Quanah having terrorized the plains in the early 1870s when he led the Comanche on raids against white settlers. As a sign of their regard for Burk, the Comanche called him Mas-sa-suta, which meant Big Boss.
The Burnetts, however, weren’t the only ranchers leasing land from the Indians. The Waggoners, Herrings and a few other early Texas ranchers also ran cattle in Indian Territory. The Big Pasture was maintained for grazing until the early 1900s when Congress ordered the land to be turned back to the tribes. Burk traveled to Washington, D.C., where he met with President Theodore Roosevelt to ask for an extension on the lease. Roosevelt gave the ranchers until 1906 to find new ranges for their cattle.
Burk was running 10,000 head of cattle on the Big Pasture when he began to look for other land before his lease expired. At the turn of the century, Burk bought the 140,000-acre 8 Ranch near Guthrie, Texas. The 1,500 head of livestock grazing on the land came with the purchase. The 8 Ranch was owned by the Louisville Land and Cattle Co., which was based in Louisville, Ky., and had purchased the grasslands in 1883 to expand its operation. In the Texas Panhandle near Borger, Burk bought the Dixon Creek Ranch from the Cunard Steamship Line. These two large purchases and later additions amounted to one-third of a million acres.
Burk and his wife Ruth had three children, but only their son Tom lived to adulthood. Tom learned the cattle business from working as a ranch hand for his dad. When he turned 21, Tom became wagon boss of the Indian Territory unit of the Four Sixes Ranch. He married Olive “Ollie” Lake of Fort Worth in 1891, and the couple lived in the Burnett Ranch House in Wichita County while he ran the Indian Territory unit. Tom and Ollie had one daughter, Anne Valiant Burnett.
Like his dad, Tom developed a relationship with Quanah Parker. In 1905, the Burnetts hosted a wolf hunt in the Big Pasture and invited both President Roosevelt and Quanah Parker. Tom took a chuck wagon, horses and a group of cowboys to a site near present-day Frederick, Okla., where he set up camp for Roosevelt’s10-day stay. As a result of this trip, the President and Burk remained friends for the rest of their lives.
This 1960s photo by Frank Reeves could just as easily have been taken today as 6666 cowboys continue traditional methods of branding cattle at the fire, eating at the chuck wagon and sleeping near the wagon during branding season.
Burk made the town of Guthrie the headquarters for his Four Sixes Ranch and erected the Four Sixes Supply House so cowboys could purchase basic provisions, such as clothes. To house the ranch manager and entertain guests, Burk decided in 1917 to build “the finest ranch house in West Texas” as his headquarters. At a cost of $100,000, he built a two-story, 11-bedroom home from stone quarried on the ranch. Other materials were brought by rail to Paducah and then hauled by wagon to Guthrie. Visitors to the home included President Roosevelt, Will Rogers and Quanah Parker, among others. When he was at the ranch, Burk had his own bedroom in the home but preferred to sleep in the back room of the Supply House, where he maintained his office.
Burk also had a home in Fort Worth, where his financial enterprises were located. His father-in-law, M.B. Loyd, had made him a director in the First National Bank shortly after he and Ruth married, but he made frequent trips to his ranches in his own custom-designed railroad car. He traveled to Paducah by rail and then used a horse and buggy for the 30-mile trip to Guthrie.
A forest of trees surrounding “The Big House” is evidence of the long life of the Four Sixes Ranch. Built in 1917 for $100,000, the 13,280-square-foot house was intended to be (and may still be) “the finest ranch house in West Texas.” Photo courtesy Wyman Meinzerand Sam Middleton
Burk and Ruth eventually divorced, and he married Mary Courts Barradel in 1892. Their only child died, and when Burk died in 1922, he willed the bulk of his estate to his granddaughter, Anne Valliant Burnett, in a trusteeship for her yet unborn child.
By the time Burk died, Tom had already established himself as a respected rancher and cowman. He first leased the old Burnett ranch in Wichita County and then established his home and headquarters on a ranch eight miles east of Electra. He acquired the 26,000-acre Triangle Ranch near Iowa Park in 1910 and expanded those holdings by buying five more ranches in the next 15 years—including another Triangle Ranch near Paducah—for a total of more than 100,000 acres.
Tom died in 1938 and left his estate to his only child, Anne Valiant Burnett, who became known as “Miss Anne.” Since her grandfather, Burk, had willed the bulk of his estate to her in a trusteeship for her yet unborn child, she operated both her father’s Triangle ranches as well as her grandfather’s Four Sixes ranches.
Miss Anne was active in the cattle and horse operations of both ranches. When a meeting was held in Fort Worth in 1940 to found the American Quarter Horse Association (AQHA), she and her second husband, James (Jim) Goodwin Hall, hosted a dinner for those in town for the meeting. Some people speculation that many of the decisions that were made the next day regarding formation of the AQHA may actually have been made in Miss Anne’s dining room during dinner. AQHA was formed the next day and Jim Hall was elected treasurer.
Miss Anne and Jim Hall had only one child, who was also named Anne and became known in the West Texas ranch country as “Little Anne.” Born Anne Burnett Hall, she was the great-granddaughter of Burk Burnett, which meant that after the death of her mother, “Little Anne” inherited the Four Sixes ranches through directives stated in Burk’s will. She also inherited her grandfather Tom’s estate, which included the Triangle ranches.
Charley Hart, a veteran Burnett cowboy, was foreman of Triangle Ranch when this photo was taken in 1939. As a boy, he worked for Quanah Parker and later Burk Burnett while the Burnett cattle were grazing in old Indian Territory.
Horses have always been a major part of the Four Sixes Ranch. According to the ranch’s website, Burk loved paint horses, but all the paint horses were sold in 1923 after Burk’s death. When George Humphreys took over as ranch manager in 1932, only a few horses remained on the ranch to meet the needs of the cowboys. George assessed those horses as mostly old or worn out, but he had a desire to someday have the best horses in the country on the ranch. George started building a herd by purchasing 20 good broodmares and putting them on a stud that Tom Burnett sent over from the Triangles. The stud was by Midnight, and some on the ranch called him Scooter. Others just called him Tom.
Scooter did a good job, but he wasn’t the horse that George liked to talk about when he was asked about horses on the Four Sixes. That honor belonged to a dun stud that George liked from the first time he saw him.
Hollywood Gold was foaled in 1940 on the Triangle Ranch west of Iowa Park. He was by Gold Rush, a stud that Miss Anne bought on a trip to California, and out of a mare called Triangle Lady 17. Lige Reed, who managed the Iowa Park division of the Triangle, broke the colt as a 2-year-old and wanted to keep him on the Triangle, but George told Miss Anne that he wanted to bring him to the Sixes and raise some cow horses. She agreed.
Soon George was riding Hollywood Gold to work cattle on the Sixes. When spring came the next year, George turned the dun stud into a pasture with a band of mares that included daughters of another stud bought by Tom Burnett—a stud with the now infamous name of Joe Hancock.
Tom Burnett supposedly said that Joe Hancock was the finest horse he had ever seen. He instructed his manager, Lige Reed, to breed him to the biggest, roughest mares on the ranch because he wanted horses with a lot of size, strength, bone and power.
When Miss Anne took over the Four Sixes and the Triangle ranches after the death of Tom, she moved the breeding horses off the Triangle division at Iowa Park and put the studs and mares at the Triangle at Paducah and at the Four Sixes. As a result, George Humphreys had plenty of good Joe Hancock daughters to cross on Hollywood Gold.
People also mention a third horse when they talk about the foundation of the Four Sixes horses. Miss Anne bought Grey Badger II in 1949 and immediately put him on some daughters of Joe Hancock and Hollywood Gold. Grey Badger II was by Midnight Jr and out of a daughter of Billy The Tough. Grey Badger II was a fast runner and raised some good cow horses that the Four Sixes cowboys enjoyed riding. His daughters also produced some great horses, including Two Eyed Jack and Peppy San Badger.
The Four Sixes had other good stallions, including the only one George Humphreys ever bought—a son of the Thoroughbred Three Bars called Cee Bars. Although Cee Bars belonged to George, he was used on the Four Sixes. The ranch raised some good cow horses by crossing Cee Bars on some of those daughters of Joe Hancock, Hollywood Gold and Grey Badger II.
All horses on the ranch today are branded to indicate age, mare line and the stallion that sired them. A triangle branded on the left jaw signifies that those horses’ ancestors came off the Triangle Ranch. Those with an L brand on their left shoulder are horses whose ancestors came from the Four Sixes. Burk started using the L brand on his horses in honor of his father-in-law, M.B. Loyd.
When Anne Tandy (Miss Anne) died, her daughter, Anne Marion, sold all of her grandfather Tom Burnett’s Triangle ranches and focused her attention on the Four Sixes, a ranch that had been important to her since she was a small child. Because her mother spent so much time on the ranch, Little Anne spent a lot of time growing up on the Four Sixes. In a 2019 Western Horseman article, Anne Marion said that the time she spent on the ranch as a child and young girl was one of the most important and life-forming periods of her life. She credited the cowboys and their families with instilling a set of values in her and teaching her how to raise livestock. She said that growing up on that ranch was one of the best things that ever happened to her because of the discipline, work and experience it provided.
Dr. Glenn Blodgett, resident veterinarian and horse division manager, directs the equine breeding program that has produced champion horses in arenas across the nation and top-quality ranch horses. (Photo by Nathan Canaday)
Anne Marion inherited a ranch that was steeped in history, but that’s not all. She also inherited her parents’ and her grandfather’s love of horses. In 1982, Anne hired Dr. Glenn Blodgett to be a veterinarian for the ranch and make the horse operation as efficient as possible by artificially inseminating the large band of broodmares on the ranch.
Anne Marion, fourth-generation owner of the Four Sixes, stands with J.J. Gibson, Jr., (left) and Mike Gibson, a father-son team that served separately as ranch managers of the Sixies. J.J. Gibson was ranch manager from 1970 to 1991. Mike succeeded his father and managed the ranch for 17 years during the phasing out of Hereford cattle and replacing them with Angus.
After Dr. Blodgett had been at the ranch a few years, Anne talked to him about expanding the horse operation and perhaps making a bigger impact in the industry. They brought Dash For Cash to the ranch, repurchased some shares in Streakin Six (he was bred by the ranch) and brought him back. They also bought Special Effort. These three horses were the most important horses in the Quarter Horse racing industry at the time. On the performance side, and to raise ranch horses, the ranch acquired Tanquery Gin and his full brother, Shot O’ Gin.
Suddenly, the Four Sixes horse operation became a major force in the industry. Through the next several years, more stallions were added in both the racing and performance industries. Hundreds of mares were soon being hauled to Guthrie during breeding season.
The horses were important, and especially so to Miss Anne and her daughter, Anne Marion, but the cattle also were important and have been since the beginning.
Burk recognized very early that his Longhorns didn’t produce the best beef quality, so in the early 1900s, he introduced Durham cattle onto his Longhorns. The Durhams were an early beef breed that had been imported from England and eventually formed the basis for the Shorthorn breed of cattle popular today. Crossed on the Longhorns, the Durhams gave Burk a beefier animal that was still very hardy. To improve the meat quality of his cattle, Burk later changed to Herefords, which, like the Durhams, are a beef breed that had been imported from England almost a hundred years earlier.
The Longhorns were phased out, and soon all the cattle on the ranch were Herefords. By 1936, about 20,000 Hereford cattle stocked the Four Sixes ranges. George Humphreys, who ran the ranch from 1932 until his retirement in 1970, was not only instrumental in developing the early horse program but also maintained a program of improving the ranch cattle by keeping purebred Hereford herds to supply the ranch with herd bulls and heifers.
When J. J. Gibson took over as manager after George’s retirement, he realized they needed a cow with more hybrid vigor to take full advantage of the rougher terrain on parts of the ranch. Gibson initiated a crossbreeding program using Brangus bulls on the Hereford cows to produce what is known as the black baldy. Brangus bulls were used in the program until about 1996 when they were replaced by Angus bulls.
After Mike Gibson succeeded his father as ranch manager, Hereford cows were phased out and replaced with Angus cows to take better advantage of today’s markets. That program has continued under current manager Joe Leathers. The ranch raises its own replacement heifers, and Joe buys the best Angus bulls he can find, stocking one bull for each 15 cows.
Four generations of the same family have put their mark on this Texas ranch and the business of ranching in America. In spite of the mystique sometimes associated with cowboy life, ranching is a business and businesses get sold every day. This one just happens to be “special,” which is exactly what Anne Marion wanted.
Legendary Four Sixes cowboy Boots O’Neal is 88 years old and has been taking care of livestock horseback for 75 of his 88 years. (Photo by Jim Jennings)
_________________
JIM JENNINGS is a longtime RHA members and is the retired executive director of publications for the American Quarter Horse Association. He serves as a consultant to the American Quarter Horse Journal and as a script writer for “Red Steagall Is Somewhere West of Wall Street.” He is a graduate of Texas A&M University and a recipient of numerous writing and photography awards. He and his wife, Mavis, live in Amarillo, Texas.
