Woodson "Woods" Coffee, Panhandle Pioneer

News Item, Amarillo Daily News, Amarillo, TX, Jun. 13, 1953

Death Claims Woods Coffee

Woodson "Woods" Coffee, 1948

One of the real pioneers of the Panhandle, Woods Coffee, died yesterday at 5:10 PM at his home at 1603 Madison.

He was 91 years old and had lived in the Panhandle more than 70 years.

Woods Coffee was scarcely more than a boy when he came to the Panhandle.  But the Panhandle was young then, too.

He grew up with the country.

It was in the spring of 1882 that he arrived at the Quarter-Circle T outfit in Hutchinson County, riding a pony he called Yellow Boy and got a job, at $25 a month.

That was what he had in mind the fall before when he and a neighbor left South Texas, headed for the cow country.

Woods Coffee spent his boyhood in South Texas.  He picked cotton and raised a few cattle trying to get enough money together to go to medical school - he wanted to be a doctor.

He was looking for a job to pay for the schooling when he started west.

He started west in August of 1881 and got as far as Comanche before he came down with the measles. When he recovered he and his partner started again.  Their route led through Cisco and Albany to Fort Griffin.

At the Watt Reynolds Ranch on the Clear Fork of the Brazos, he took a job herding sheep.  It didn't suit him and he took another job cooking for a cow outfit.

The next spring he reached the Panhandle and got a job with T. S. Bugbee, owner of the Quarter-Circle T. The first year he made $312 and saved $300 of it.

His first work was on the Canadian River, at the round-up of the Turkey Track and Quarter-Circle T ranches, about where Borger now stands.

Then he went up the trail.  Soon afterward the Turkey Track and the Double H ranches were consolidated into the Handsford Land and Cattle Company and Woods Coffee was a cowboy on that ranch.

That fall Cape Willingham became superintendent of the outfit.

Soon after that the wagon boss of the outfit rode up to Woods one day and said: "Look after things until I get back."

Ollie Pickens Stribling

First Wife of Woods Coffee

He didn't come back and Woods Coffee became wagon boss.  The job paid $75 a month. He saved his money and bought a quarter interest in a ranch his father had acquired in Throckmorton County.

In August of 1890 he married Miss Ollie Stribling and started ranching in the Brazos River country.

Three years later he moved to Oklahoma.  In 1894 he was back in Hutchinson County.

He became manager of the Creswell Cattle Company, operating in Roberts and Hutchinson counties.

While manager of this outfit, known as the Bar C, he did a great deal of trading in cattle, buying steers in lower Texas and finishing them in the Panhandle.

Late in the nineties he moved his wife and two children to Miami.  He bought 303 acres near the town and in 1900 added five sections of land.

He was one of the original stockholders of the First State Bank at Miami, organized in 1907. In 1913 he sold his bank interests and invested in land in Moore County.

From time to time he added to his holdings in Moore County until he had extensive holdings when the oil boom hit Moore County in 1926.

He bought his home in Amarillo in 1926.

He became a Master Mason in 1889, in the Throckmorton Lodge.  He helped organize Miami Lodge No. 805 and was a past master of that lodge.  He was a member of the Royal Arch, the Commandery and was a member of Khiva Temple.

He was a member of the Baptist Church.

The first Mrs. Coffee died here in 1930.

Velda M. Bangs Coffee

Second Wife of Woods Coffee

He was married in 1932 to Velda Bangs, who survives him.

Besides his wife he is survived by two daughters and four sons.  Daughters are Mrs. Ruth Coffee Coble of Amarillo and Mrs. Ollie Coffee Willis of San Antonio. Sons are Woodson Coffee Jr. of Miami, Oran Coffee of Amarillo, Roy Coffee of Datil, NM, and Jack Coffee of Estes Park, Colo.

Also surviving are three brothers, Henry and Glen Coffee of Pampa and James V. Coffee of Miami, and a sister, Mrs. Mary Coffee Locke of Big Spring.

The body is at Blackburn-Shaw Funeral Home.  Funeral arrangements will be announced. The family has requested that no flowers be sent, requesting that friends make contributions to Boys Ranch, in which Mr. Coffee had been greatly interested.

[Woodson was buried on Jun. 15, 1953 at the Llano Cemetery in Amarillo. His Find-A-Grave memorial is no. 21287478. His first wife, Ollie Stribling, was born in Palo Pinto Co. on Aug. 14, 1868 and died Jan. 23, 1930. She is also buried at Llano. His second wife, Velda Marguerite Bangs was born Feb. 21, 1895 in Illinois and died Mar 20 1986. She was buried at Wauconda Cemetery in Lake Co., Ill]