Journal of a Hound Dog Man: George Pyron's "Wolf Races - 1934-1935"
Bernard Pyron

These are the notes that my older brother George Pyron (1918-1998) made in the thirties about a number of what he calls "Wolf Races," or coyote hunts, by the Pyron hounds and the hounds of other Somerset, Texas men. Somerset is in southwest Bexar county, down in the brush country. George was born February 17, 1918 and would have been 16 in February of 1934. The "Wolf Hunters" hunted only in the winter months because the coyotes left more of a scent trail in the colder weather. If one had calendars for the years 1934 and 1935 the dates of many of these hunts would have been on Saturdays. George and Daddy both worked all day Saturdays in the Will Kenney Red and White grocery store in Somerset and then went out with their dogs on the hunts.

I was only three years old in October of 1934 and four in 1935. I don't have much memory of 1934, or 1935, but I have some selected memories of 1936 and later in the thirties. And - I had all the coyote hound pups to play with and I heard many stories that Uncle Casey, Daddy and George used to tell of coyote hunts of the twenties and thirties. I have only a vague memory of one hunt I was on when I was about four in the Quesenberry and of the hounds barking some distance away. I went with Daddy to sit around the camp fires of John McCain who still had hounds in 1946-47, and I heard the barking of his dogs, but that was only 6 or 7 hounds. George mentions one hunt in which there were 45 hounds running on the trail in the mid thirties.

One thing that interests me is that George says they went to the camp of P.G. Caruthers in the Black Jacks and there they heard Luther James's dogs running. Now, very few people have ears trained to hear and identify particular dogs in someone else's pack barking. But Daddy - and apparently George too - knew the sounds of the Luther James pack.

Another thing that is interesting about George's notes on Wolf Races of 1934-35 is that there were so many men who ran hounds after coyotes in that area of South Bexar county, Texas, then about 20 miles southwest of San Antonio.



George Pyron With One of His Coyote Hounds

November 30, 1934 - Caught one wolf in south-east part of Ballard pasture. Ran one hour and fifteen minutes. Caught two more in McDonald's pasture, first one in two hours, second one two and a half hours.About 45 dogs. S. Guynes, Ed Pakowitz, Woods, Jasper Newman, McKon brothers. Pep and three others caught in traps. Left Jack and he came home.

My comments: Woods is the only name I recognize of those who were along on this hunt. I remember that when several Somerset area coyote hunters were gathered around a camp fire and turned most or all their hounds loose when a trail dog jumped a coyote to start a hot trail, there could be fifty of more hounds running behind the coyote. Pep was one of George and Daddy's lead dogs, a female, who was later shot and killed by C.L. Kight apparently in 1936. I remember Jack when I was a young boy, but not Pep.



George Pyron At the 1936 Wolf Hunters Field Trials

December 8, 1934 - Ran first wolf five hours and was lost or caught by hog wire fence on the Poteet Road. Jumped in Wheeler pasture. Ran second one four hours and caught on creek below. Beulah, Cricket, Speck, Lad, Young Runt, Patsy and Crumy ran last one. Lost Old Aunt, Elgin's four pups and Qed. L.M. James 4, Bob Woods 5, we (George and Blake Pyron) 9, Elgin 4 and Simmons turned loose one. Ran one hour, star - Jack.

My comments: They always called coyotes wolves. I do not have a clear memory of any of the dogs listed in this December 8, 1934 hunt, except I remember that Beulah was one of the hounds George, Casey Pyron and Blake Pyron talked about in the thirties. Elgin is Elgin Kilborn, a Somerset man who became a policeman in San Antonio, and brother of Ernest Kilborn who married my mother's sister Bessie. The Kilborns originally lived southeast of the A.M.Pyron homestead tract in a house that could be seen from our house. The house was roughly west of the Gus Kurz house which was on Payne Road. L.M. James above is almost certainly Luther James, father of Bill James. So, they only turned loose about 23 hounds on this hunt.



Pyron Coyote Hounds Of the Thirties In Their Dog Pen

December 22, 1934 - Went to Polk Lee pasture, and jumped on east side of the road. Caught one or more. Collins caught one alive. Ran six hours. John McCain 2, Woods, 4, Luther 3, Claud Johnson 4, and some others. Lost Speck and found him at McDonald's house next week.

My comments: Jumped means the dogs jumped a coyote and started running him on a hot trail. John McCain was a regular Somerset Wolf Hunter in the thirties and I remember going on hunts with my father, Blake Pyron, in the forties in which John McCain had the hounds. For most of those hunts I was along in the forties we camped at spots down a narrow dirt road running toward Atascosa Creek. The narrow road turned off just east of the ruins of an old rock schoolhouse, we called the Old Box School House. Luther above is Luther James, and I don't know who Claud Johnson was.

December 29, 1934 - John McCain and Luther jumped in Reed Thicket at 5 PM, ran to Black Hill, Kirk, Vogt, Bilhardt and Quesenberry. Ed Kampf tuned loose at 12 P.M., Otto at two A.M., we at five A.M. Ran on this side of Elm Creek when we turned loose and caught ay 8 A.M. under a house on a road below the light line. Curley cut bad by wolf.

My comments: Otto is Otto Koehler who was another regular wolf hunter with George and Daddy.


Pyron Coyote Hounds Outside Their Pen
January 2, 1935 - Lost Pep.

By "lost Pep" George must have meant that she did not come back to the campfire, but she was not killed at that time. She was one of their lead dogs and was killed apparently in 1936 by C.L. Kight. There was an article on the killing of the Lead Dog, Pep in the
Hunter's Horn, April 1936 page 16, about how in a Bexar county, Texas
court trial in San Antonio my father, Blake Pyron, testified that he
could tell what his hounds were running by the sound of their barking.
He said the dogs "never changed their tune," when the lead Dog Pep was
killed. The man who killed her said the hounds were running his hogs.
Since the address of the farmer who killed Pep and another Pyron hound
that night was given as Von Ormy, its likely that the incident
occurred in the general area of the Quesenberry, which was on the north
side of the Medina River between the Somerset Road crossing and the Poteet highway.

January 5, 1935 - Went below Woods and turned loose on pack that had been running
an hour and a half. Ran until 7: 30 A.M. All of ours ran whole race except Lemon, Mack and
Irishman. Guynes, Mosely, Young, Rogers, Woods, Elgin. Stars, Jack, Dixie and Rowdy.



This car was used to pull the dog trailer, shown below, to the camps where the Wolf Hunters built their camp fires and listened to the dogs out on the trail.

My Comments: George names some wolf hunters on this hunt I have never heard of before. I think what he means by "went to Woods" was that they camped on land belonging to Woods, a regular in their
group.

January 26, 1935 - Went to pasture below woods and heard wolves howl in Byrom's pasture. Drove up road and Jerry and Dixie jumped hot and Jack and Pep trailed to Ballard and came back to the others.
Ran about forty five minutes and house dogs broke up the race. Beulah and Mack jumped another and ran an hour, and Jerry got caught in a trap and broke race up. Beulah and Smut and Mack trailed and jumped another one. About 2: 30 A.M. caught in Ballard. Elgin 4, Woods 3, We 10. Stars: Beulah, Dixie Smut, Pep.

My comments: So, Pep was still alive for this January 1935 hunt. I remember Smut clearly, because when I was four to five he had been retired from hunting and was allowed to stay outside the regular dog pen which was beside and to the south of the Blake Pyron cow pen. He hung around me a lot then and there was a story that one time a car was pulling in to the parking area at the Blake Pyron home and Smut got between the car and me to protect me.



The Pyron Dog Trailer Without Its Top, Used to Take Dogs to Camps

February 2, 1935 - Went to Ballard and Jack, Beulah, Queen, Pep and Smut jumped and ran for three hours and out of hearing. Finally located them in lower Ballard and turned young dogs loose. Ran back toward Wilson's goat proof fence. Left Cricket, Speck, Arp and Red in McDonald's still running. John McCain, Woods and us.

February 4, 1935 - Got Crickett, Speck, Arp and Red.

My comment: I am not sure where the Ballard land was, but it might have been in the Black Jacks. I remember several times in the thirties, probably about 1936,, that Daddy and George would be gone almost all night on a Saturday night coyote hunt in the Black Jacks, and then on Sunday Daddy would drive back down there to try to find hounds which had not come to the camp when they were called in by the horn. George and Daddy had horns made from the horns of Texas long horn cattle that they trained their dogs to come to. They would train them by blowing the horn before they fed the dogs and then on a hunt, if the dogs were in hearing distance and were not on a hot chase, they would come to the call of the horn.

February 13, 1935 - John McCain got Jack, Pep and Dixie and jumped by Fox's house at 3: 30 P.M. Ran until 6: 30. Lost.

February 14, 1935 - Went to John Caruthers camp and heard Luther's dogs running. Followed them and turned loose in White's pasture, Jack, Pep, Queen, Smut and Beulah. Ran up to Lytle and crossed highway. Caught by Ball's house.

My comments: John Caruthers is probably John P.G. Carthurs, whose name was John Punch Grant Caruthers, father of Hansel Caruthers and son of George Caruthers, who was one of the men involved in the First Town Site Company, with Carl Kurz, A.M. Pyron and Joe Dixon, who founded the town of Somerset. George says above that they heard the hounds of Luther James running. To recognize the barking of particular dogs in a pack requires some listening skill, which many of the Somerset Wolf Hunters had. Many of those hound dog men had "good ears."

February 16, 1935 - Went to Langley pasture. Pep jumped one hot. The dogs made two circles around Langley, one and a half hours and then left straight out to Black Hill. Part of the dogs went out of hearing. Jack came home. John McCain 2, We, 9. Stars: Pep and Queen.

March 13, 1935 - Drove in lane up to Bush pasture. Luther and I walked through to Box House lane. Pep jumped on Cockrell Hill. Ran below John Sharbers and lost. Luther 4, We, 3.

My comment: By "Box House" George might have meant the Old Box School House.

April 6, 1935 - Went to Ed Wells. Jack and Pep jumped hot fifty yards from car. Ran through by Sharbers to Hartungs and ran out of hearing most of the time. Jack, Pep and Queen. Left Jack and Beaulah.

My Comments: Ed Wells owned more than one tract of land in the Somerset-Lytle area.

April 13, 1935 - Went to Ed Wells. Jumped on Cockrell Hill, ran three and a half hours. Otto, John McCain. Campbells's dogs came to ours, and Elgin's, John Sharber's and Luther's came to ours.

My comments: Again, George lists Wolf Hunters here I do not remember.

Great read,thankyou sir

Having spent my Summers and vacation time in a general store listening to the men of this era talk about stories past, I thoroughly enjoyed the Journal.
BK

Great read. My Great Grandfather, Erskine Outlaw was one of the founders of the South Texas Wolf Hunters Assn. back in the '20s. I have a LIFE magazine dated Dec. 7, 1936 that has an article covering the South Texas Wolf Hunters Meet held on the Story Ranch at Cotulla. The event was so big that TIME and LIFE sent reporters to cover the event. I also have Sterling Silver Loving cups won by my Grandfather, Julian Roberson with a dog called Tulsa. Tulsa won the hunt and bench show which does not happen very often.
I think the Claud Johnson you referred to lived at Kyote, a community between Devine and Jourdanton. I remember your family and the Pyron's Store in Lytle. I am not nearly as old as you, '53 model but have heard the old stories and some of the names you refer to.
Those were the days when there were truly hunters. Every opportunity they had, they were in the woods. No TV, the campfire was the center of their social life. They kept the hogs, coyotes and other predators in check.

Gary Roberson, I am sure that George Pyron would enjoy talking to you, if he were still alive.

Most likely the December 7, 1936 Life Magazine article on the South Texas Wolf Hunters Assoc Field Trials was the one in which Robert Baucom, preacher of the South San Antonio Baptist Church was mentioned:

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,757026,00.html

This is an account of a huge coyote hunt in 1936 run by the South Texas Wolf Hunters Association. My older brother, George Pyron, took many of the Pyron coyote hounds to the hunt. I remember grandmother Virginia Blackburn Pyron saying at that time that George liked his "sport."

The article on the hunt starts by saying:

"A wet, grey dawn was breaking over Texas last week when a strapping, six-foot figure in cowhand clothes strode out on the 80,000-acre Storey Ranch near Cotulla. The hard-preaching, hard-riding pastor of South San Antonio's First Baptist Church, Reverend Robert Gaddy Baucom, faced an impressive, tensely quiet assemblage. Lined up in front, 257 eager hounds strained at their leashes. At one side a Master of Hounds and twelve field judges sat their horses. Behind the dogs ranged 150 other mounted Texans, more than 1,000 in automobiles and trucks of every size and shape.

Hats went off, heads were bowed as Brother Baucom boomed a prayer. Master of Hounds John Aiken Rowan raised a Texas steer horn to his lips, blew long & loud. At this signal the hounds were loosed and, amid a great uproar of babbling dogs, roaring engines and shouting men, women & children, the whole assembly moved off into the brush. Thus began the 1936 field trials of the South Texas Wolf Hunters Association, biggest "wolf hunt" in U. S. history."

I remember Robert Baucom and his Model A truck he had set up for Wolf Hunts. He used to park it at our house near Somerset and go to the grocery store to wait on George and Daddy to get off from work so they could go Wolf Hunting.

I had never heard that Tulsa, from near Devine, won that 1936 Field Trials event. I remember an article in the Hunter's Horn about Tulsa, where the writer said that he would be in the lead of a pack behind the Wolf and he would scream every time his feet hit the ground. I have a dog beside me now who I named for that Tulsa. George and our father Blake Pyron used to talk about Tulsa.

Do you know why they named him Tulsa?

George's wife Ruby Nell is still alive now at 92. She sent me George's journal a couple of months ago and some photos he had, including the one of him at that 1936 Field Trials when he was 18.

Of all the Somerset-Lytle area Wolf Hunters of the thirties, I know of no one now in that area who runs hounds after coyotes. Uncle Casey Pyron turned Warren Healer of Somerset on to Wolf Hunting and I went on one hunt with him, in which George and Uncle Casey were along, in the winter of 1961. Warren Healer is still alive, or was a few months back, and is 81 now.

The name Claud Johnson is not familiar with me. I sent a copy of what I posted here to my older sister Louise, who is 91, but she does not remember any of the names of the Somerset area Wolf Hunters that I do not recognize. I don't know whether Nell, George's widow, would remember any of those names. George's son, Bud Pyron, and George's widow, run Pyron'Inc in Lytle, which is a kind of variety store. I am in Missouri.

I would like to know where what George called the Ballard, which was probably a large tract of land, was located. I remember the family Wolf Hunters talking about that pasture or ranch. It may have been in the Black Jacks.

Gary Roberson, are you in the Devine area, and know the Big Foot area? A couple of years ago a guy named Saddler was a star football player for Devine, and I wondered if he was a relative of the guy who was the left end on our 1948 Somerset Bulldogs football team, Jitter Saddler, who died a few years ago.

I just looked up the info on these two Saddler football players. The one who played for Devine in the last few years was Joseph Sadler, who was a running back. The older one who was the 1948 Somerset left end was named Ernest Saddler. I played next to Jitter or Ernest as the Somerset left tackle that year. I know his family was originally from the Big Foot area. An older brother of Jitter's is still alive, I think Edward Saddler, who goes to the meetings of the Somerset Historical Society.

Bernard Pyron northwye@hotmail.com

My father-in-law and his dad, along with a good many of their neighbors from the Bishop area ran coyotes way back when.
I think this would have been in the late forties and early fifties. Matter of fact, my FIL's leg was crushed in a rollover that occurred while following the greyhounds they used for coyote coursers. I heard stories, and they always sounded like great fun.

Enjoyed your journal entries and comments greatly.

Great post thanks for sharing

Thank you for sharing. My grandfather on my mother's side was a houndsman and hunted coyotes with scent and sight hounds in western oklahoma. When my family made the journey from western Oklahoma to California for a new beginning my grandfather on my dad's side did not survive the trip. My father still a kid was sent back to oklahoma to work for a man who also ran sight hounds. Though my time as a houndsman was for coonhunting, I miss the wolf hound stories from my grandfather more than anyone can know. Your post brings back memories of those few stories I do remember and my imagination of the hunt in his day. I wish i could have experienced it.
Great post.

Thank you for sharing the story.

Before my Dad passed away in 1963, him, my uncle Jack Hemphill and quite a few others in the Bastrop/Cedar Creek/Red Rock area ran wolves and coyotes almost every Friday and Saturday night.

After my Dad passed, they continued to run the dogs for quite some time.
I know they were still running coyotes in mid to late 70's.

Alas, I was only 9 when my Dad passed away and was considered too young to run with them but listened intently to the stories over the wood stove the next morning.....well, morning was usually closer to noon as they had been out most of the night.

Stirred the memories and brought back quite a few, again THANK YOU!