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Women of Beef

Mollie Taylor Stevenson, Mother and Daughter, Keepers of a Houston Ranch

Mother and daughter stewarded one of the oldest Black-owned ranches in America and became the first living African American women in the Cowgirl Hall of Fame.

Who are Mollie Taylor Stevenson Sr. and Jr.?

Mollie Taylor Stevenson Sr. (1911-2003) and her daughter Mollie Taylor Stevenson Jr. (born 1946) are the family faces of the Taylor-Stevenson Ranch, a 640-acre working ranch in Houston, Texas. The ranch was bought in 1875 by Mollie Jr.'s great-grandfather, Edward Ruthven Taylor, and it is described as one of the oldest Black-owned ranches in the United States.

Both women were inducted into the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame in November 2001, according to the Texas Trail of Fame listing, and were the first living African American women to receive that honor. Mollie Sr. was a Fisk University graduate and a granddaughter of the ranch's founders.

The Taylor-Stevenson Ranch: how it began

The ranch story starts with Edward Ruthven Taylor (1845-1924), who bought the land at Pierce Junction, south of Houston, in 1875. He did so, according to the account summarized on the ranch's Wikipedia page, at the urging of Ann George, a woman who had been enslaved by the Taylor family. Taylor and George lived openly as husband and wife but could not legally marry because interracial marriage was illegal in Texas at the time.

They raised six children, all of whom received a college education, and sources describe them as among the first African Americans in Texas to do so. The land was used for hay, livestock and farming. Taylor's family background was complicated: his father, a prominent Houston merchant, had also brokered in the slave trade, and Taylor himself served in a Confederate unit before returning home ill.

Oil was discovered under the property decades later, and by 1921 a producing well had been drilled in what became the Pierce Junction field.

Mollie Taylor Stevenson Jr. and the American Cowboy Museum

Mollie Jr. graduated from Jack Yates High School in Houston in 1963 and attended Texas Southern University for four years as a business major. She also modeled for about fifteen years, and she appeared in magazines including Ebony and Essence as a woman in a nontraditional occupation.

In 1988 she and her mother founded the American Cowboy Museum on the ranch. Its mission is to preserve the Western heritage of Native Americans, Black people, Hispanic people and women, and to introduce a new generation to a history that is often overlooked. Exhibits include saddles, spurs, hats, chaps, boots, historic papers and photographs, and outdoor displays of ranch equipment such as tractors, plows and planters. She frequently organizes tours so children can meet ranch animals.

Cattle, horses and a working ranch today

The ranch remains a working operation with horses, cattle, hay production and oil, according to the biography of Mollie Jr. Herd sizes are not given in the sources, so none are stated here. The Taylor Stevenson Ranch Meat Co., founded by Major W. Stevenson Jr. and his wife Anitria Stevenson, now operates on the property.

Mollie Jr. was also a charter member of several Texas organizations built around Western heritage and Black landowners, including the Speakers and Black Go Texan Committee, the Houston Livestock Show & Rodeo, the Professional Black Cowboy & Cowgirl Association, the Landowners of Texas and the Diamond L Riding & Roping Club.

The Key to Their Success

Keeping the ranch for well over a century is the central achievement, and the record points to concrete reasons. The ranch also holds a Texas Century Ranch designation for more than a hundred years of ownership by one family, and it has been described as the only Black-owned ranch in Texas with that status.

The story has costs and complications on the record, from the legal barrier to marriage that Edward Taylor and Ann George faced to Taylor's own Confederate service and family ties to the slave trade.

  • They kept title. The land stayed in family hands from 1875 through the Century Ranch designation and into the present.
  • They invested in education. Edward and Ann's six children all attended college, and Mollie Sr. graduated from Fisk University.
  • They used the land in several ways: hay, livestock, farming, oil, and later a meat company and a museum.
  • They opened the gate. Mollie Jr. organized tours so children could meet ranch animals and learn Western history.
  • They built networks, joining Houston rodeo, riding and landowner groups that connected the ranch to a wider community.

Sky Ranch and other chapters

The ranch has other documented chapters. In 1946 aviators Azellia White, Hulon "Pappy" White, Ben Stevenson and Elton "Ray" Thomas opened Sky Ranch Flying Service on the property. Stevenson, Thomas and Hulon White were Tuskegee Airmen, and Azellia White was the first African American woman to earn a private pilot's license in Texas. The airfield had three runways up to 2,200 feet long and closed when new restrictions on G.I. Bill use reduced customers.

Mollie Jr.'s father, Benjamin Franklin "Big Ben" Stevenson, was a football star at Tuskegee Institute.

Honors and recognition

Beyond the 2001 Cowgirl Hall of Fame induction, a Congressional Record extension honoring the two women was published on March 11, 2002. The Texas Trail of Fame lists them under 2022, and Mollie Jr. also received the Chester A. Reynolds Memorial Award, one of only two women to do so, according to her Wikipedia biography.

Learn more about ranches like this one in the ranching section of farm.FM, or read a farm.FM story about Black cowboys and ranchers.

Timeline

  1. 1875Edward Ruthven Taylor buys the Pierce Junction land south of Houston
  2. 1911Mollie Taylor Stevenson Sr. is born
  3. 1921A producing oil well is drilled in the Pierce Junction field
  4. 1946Sky Ranch Flying Service opens on the property; Mollie Jr. is born
  5. 1963Mollie Jr. graduates from Jack Yates High School
  6. 1988Mollie Jr. and her mother found the American Cowboy Museum
  7. 2001Both are inducted into the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame
  8. 2003Mollie Sr. dies
  9. 2022Listed in the Texas Trail of Fame

Frequently asked questions

Who are Mollie Taylor Stevenson Sr. and Jr.?

They are a mother and daughter who stewarded the Taylor-Stevenson Ranch in Houston, Texas. Mollie Sr. lived from 1911 to 2003, and Mollie Jr. was born in 1946. Both were inducted into the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame in 2001.

What is the Taylor-Stevenson Ranch?

It is a historic 640-acre working ranch in Houston, bought in 1875 by Edward Ruthven Taylor. It holds a Texas Century Ranch designation and is described as one of the oldest Black-owned ranches in America.

What is the American Cowboy Museum?

It is a museum founded in 1988 by Mollie Taylor Stevenson Jr. and her mother on the ranch. It preserves the Western heritage of Native Americans, Black people, Hispanic people and women.

Were they the first African American women in the Cowgirl Hall of Fame?

Sources describe them as the first living African American women inducted into the National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame, in November 2001.

Sources and further reading

Profiles are compiled from public sources and reviewed against them. See our editorial policy to suggest a correction.

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