RICHARDSON, THOMAS CLARENCE (1877-1956). Thomas Clarence Richardson, publisher, editor, and writer, was born on March 25, 1877, near Cisco, Texas, the son of Andrew Jackson and Sarah (Latham) Richardson. He attended schools in Crowell and Quanah, a normal school in Mangum, Oklahoma, and, for a short time, Texas A&M. He held teaching certificates in Oklahoma and Texas and was a country schoolteacher from 1897 to 1904. He founded the Wheeler County Texan at Story in 1903 and the Shamrock Texan in 1904. He acquired, edited, or published several other papers, including the Sutherland Springs Health Resort, the Floresville Advocate, and the Seadrift Success; he worked on the San Angelo Standard in 1917 and on the Bryan Daily Eagle in 1918. The same year, he joined the extension staff of Texas A&M and became the agricultural agent for Cameron County. He later left to operate his own farm and to manage a seed plantation. In 1923 he returned to editing. He was the first editor of Valley Farmer and Citrus Grower and a member of the editorial staffs of Farm and Ranchqv and Holland's Magazine. In 1934 he submitted to the Texas legislature the first proposal to organize soil-conservation districts. After joining the staff of the Farmer-Stockman in 1943 he became the magazine's Texas editor and lived in Dallas. He wrote numerous articles on agricultural subjects, the four-volume East Texas, Its History and Its Makers (1940), and Autobiography of the Rambling Longhorn (1959). He was a widely known and respected authority on old cattle trails in the Southwest.
Richardson helped found the Dallas Agricultural Club and the Texas Agricultural Workers Association. He was a member of the Texas Academy of Science, the Texas State Historical Association,qv the Southwestern Social Science Association, and the National Agricultural History Society. In 1901 he married Dora Sutton of Mangum, Oklahoma; they had two daughters. He was of Scotch-Irish descent and a member, eventually an elder, of the Church of Christ. Richardson died in Palestine, Texas, on November 21, 1956, and was buried at Colorado City, Texas.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Texas Press Messenger, June 1954.
Sam Whitlow
