MEXIA – To your Tuesday, parents off over the condition and the country gained to possess a good reunion from the Fort Parker State Playground just southern out of Mexia. Specific exchanged hugs that have common confronts, while others lead by themselves the very first time.
However, this is zero ordinary family reunion. The connections renowned Saturday was forged as the result of an excellent tragic enjoy a large number of Texans found out about in history classification or learn about into the dozens of retellings during the guides.
On the early morning off May 19, 1836, a ring regarding Comanche and you may Kiowa Indians raided Fort Parker, brutally raping and you can destroying members of the fresh master Parker family unit members.
Five people were removed captive, along with nine-year old Cynthia Ann Parker, which invested most of the woman lives among the many Comanche, after the vocabulary and you can heritage of one’s tribe, and you will marrying a leader, Peta Nocona.
Nine years afterwards, Cynthia Ann provided beginning so you’re able to Quanah Parker, who would become the tribe’s history captain, a friend from Theodore Roosevelt, and you can a leisure keeper anywhere between certain rings of Indians and you may whites.
Whenever Quanah was only several, a company away from Tx Rangers killed his father and you can captured their mom, likely to reintroduce the girl in order to community. Cynthia Ann spent the remainder of her life seeking to return towards Comanche before this lady demise, once the legend goes, away from a broken cardio.
All more than 100 descendants within reunion trace its ancestry back into the fresh new Older John Parker, a radical Combat soldier out-of Illinois, who founded new fort in 1835 and you may is murdered in the massacre.
Trevor Wardlaw, just who stays in Waco and delivered his wife and you may around three babies along, are a monetary adviser during the day and a faraway cousin out-of Quanah Parker by blood. He’s the great-great-great-grandson of Older Daniel Parker, this new oldest boy out of John Parker’s five college students. Senior Daniel Parker, a personal-taught preacher, created the original Protestant chapel when you look at the Texas and you may is actually crucial within the undertaking the newest Texas Ranger devices.
“I suppose selfishly we realize family history to discover more regarding our own private history,” Wardlaw said. “Men areas the newest Colorado Rangers, however, so partners understand in which they originated – in fact it is my sort of origin.”
As well as continue to have a powerful distinct relatives info matchmaking back once again to 1833
“Simple fact is that facts by itself one to holds some body along with her,” told you Jack Selden, the author out-of Go back: The newest Parker Facts. Their later partner is actually a good Parker. “New persuasive facts away from Cynthia Ann and her get back – she’s one’s heart, regardless of the you will do.” Selden, who has got along with composed a gamble about the Parkers, provides went to the new reunions the past two decades.
The fresh deep-resting Colorado pleasure is obvious one of the “Parker cousins,” because they call themselves. It is really not unusual to know people allege he’s related to cousin Quanah, Auntie Cynthia Ann, or Papa John Parker.
Scott Nicholson could have been planning to this new social gatherings as far back as they can consider. The brand new Senior John Parker try their fifth great-parent towards his mother’s front side, and then he is actually descended from your twice (throughout the 1800s it wasn’t uncommon for next cousins so you’re able to marry).
“This are trained to me by the my personal pops, who had been tily – and Colorado – record goes on now. “My 12-year-old kid can tell you the entire tale,” Nicholson told you. “When he was 6 or 7, he wished to 
hear about our house records to have bed time tales.”
Because the fort dropped 176 years back, a significant number of Parkers enjoys lived-in the fresh Palestine-Elkhart area. “We failed to move around adequate to get rid of her or him,” Nicholson told you.
Those individuals yellowed black-and-light pictures and you may dated relationship suggestions is steeped relics. However, though some are happy with only new tales that the grandparents informed her or him, others, like Wardlaw and you will Nicholson, keeps embraced the trend from inside the genealogy and family history – having its DNA examined to confirm their family.
As is community, Saturday’s plan began for the “organization conference.” As the cicadas whirred loudly in the trees more than, new descendants seated in the folding chairs outdoors. They said an excellent prayer, acknowledged Parkers that have died, determined who’s the latest youngest, the brand new oldest and you may and that Parker journeyed the newest farthest discover indeed there.
Winners found “Parker Family members” mugs. In 2010 the new cups visited 88-year-dated Jack Meredith, 9-month-old Emory Parker Cochran and Barry Parker, who with his girlfriend, Becky, drove into the out-of Charleston, Ill.
“We simply like to meet up and you may check out,” told you 83-year-dated Darwin Gilmore, vice chairman with the Parker Loved ones reunion board and you will past year’s champion just like the earliest attendee. “All of us are shopping for family members.”
Many years came and you may gone
The latest Comanche area of the household members keeps another annual reunion, always inside Cache, Okla., nearby the chair of tribal regulators. A gold pan, created by Nicholson’s maternal grandfather, was generally replaced amongst the white and you can Comanche corners of your family members on a yearly basis. The fresh new gesture is meant to indicate that while both parties out-of the family has their particular traditions, all of them are kin.
Following the a large potluck dinner was a market, where folk is also bid to the things such as a license plate that checks out “QUANAH1.” The market facilitate boost money to be sure the classification can keep in order to book the official playground.
Very early Week-end early morning, those who spent the night backpacking regarding park’s “barracks” – four traditional (however, sky-conditioned) cabins – finish off and you may say the goodbyes before going aside up to next year.