Whenever I talk to anyone about my involvement with the Former Texas Rangers Foundation, the conversation invariably turns to one of the most iconic representations of one of the most iconic organizations of the American West, the Texas Rangers. And, that iconic image is of Texas Ranger Joaquin Jackson, replete with a ranger’s cinco peso star badge, double rig gun belt, weathered chaps, and holding a Winchester model 1894 carbine while standing in the scrub of West Texas.
The image originally graced the cover of Texas Monthly magazine in the February 1994 issue, and accompanied an article titled “The Twilight of the Texas Rangers,” which discussed how the legendary organization’s history and traditions clashed with the changing realities of a modern world. Dan Winters’ photograph of the 6-foot-5-inch, square jawed Joaquin Jackson met the public’s more traditional expectations of what a Texas Ranger should be, prompting popular posters and the subsequent use of the photo on the cover of a book celebrating 25 years of Texas Monthly.
Who was Joaquin Jackson?
Haynie Joaquin Jackson was born in 1935, and worked his way from the early days doing day work as a cowboy on West Texas ranches, to a basketball scholarship at West Texas State University, to officer candidate school in the Marines, to the Texas…
