Sargent Haymer's Home Life

Howdy folks and greetings from the Great Plains of North Texas!

We're in a series about one of the best Texas Rangers to ever wear the badge, the great Frank Hamer, who was brought out of retirement to take down Bonnie and Clyde.

Recap

In the last post of this series Frank's unit was working to stop drug smugglers along the Rio Grand and his closest comrade in the Rangers was killed, Sargent Timberlake.

Today's story

After that incident Frank was promoted to sargent to take Timberlake's place.

That was in 1918 and in the next two years, due to lawsuits against the Rangers and all kinds of political fights against the organization...Frank's team was temporarily suspended a few times and work was spotty until they hashed things out in court.

The only good thing about all the turmoil and being temporarily out of work is that Frank could get back home to his family.

Monster-in-law

One of the interesting personal aspects of Franks story is that his mother-in-law, Nannie, who had always been against her daughter marrying Frank, still had a major problem with him. And just flat out couldn't stand him.

I don't know why though. Gladys was crazy about him, so was her dad. She was so hostile towards Frank that he had to stay in a hotel in town whenever he got a chance to get home! (He and Gladys were still living at her parent's ranch.)

I think it was because everyone bowed down to her and let her control everything because she seemed to be a control freak, but of course Frank wasn't going to lick anyone's boots.

At one point Nannie said to him, "Oh, I wish I were a man for one minute!"

Frank growled, "Believe me madam, SO DO I." lol.

Nannie got really bad

She worked hard at turning the young girls against their step-dad. Beverly was unphased and loved him dearly.

Here's Beverly and Frank in 1918 with Frank's first car. This might look controversial today but when you lived on a ranch in West Texas in 1918 and Frank is going after vicious murderers and drug dealers...it was smart to teach the kids how to handle guns in case they had to help defend the family.

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Later in her old age she would say of her step-dad, "Frank Haymer was the best man I ever knew." Unfortunately Nannie succeeded in turning the other girl, Trix, against Frank. She was very cold towards him.

Frank's story continues on the next post. He's sent to help stop the violence in America's most violent city at the time, El Paso. (Nicknamed Hell Paso for all the killing).

Thanks for reading folks, God bless you all!
-jonboy
Texas

PS- I'm sure some of you saw the item about Keanu Reeves. Remember a few posts back I talked about the scorn and criticism that Dennis Quaid was getting because at age 65 his new fiancee is just 27?

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Ok, well Keanu Reeves is being called a "hero" and basically the world's greatest man because he is dating a woman similar to his age. (He's 55). She's actually 9 years younger but for Hollywood standards that's the same age. lol.

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Her name is Alexandra Grant and she's an artist. SHE is being hailed, complimented, and honored for letting her hair be it's natural color which has obviously turned gray. lol.

They both appear to be very non-Hollywood personalities so I think they're a great match and I wish them well. Not that their age is anyone's business!