Bell Ranch. Part of the Felipe Chaves Family Pictorial Collection PICT 000-010 (Box 1, Folder 3)
Bell Ranch was a ranch of more than 700, 000 acres located in eastern San Miguel County about 50 miles northwest of Tucumcari, New Mexico. It was originally two Mexican land grants, the Baca Location No. 2 and the Pablo Montoya Grant of 1824. After the war with Mexico in 1846-1847, the Pablo Montoya heirs applied for confirmation of their grant. John S. Watts who led the confirmation process took a large part of the grant as his legal fee; he also acquired the adjoining Baca Location No. 2. Watts later sold a major part of this property to Wilson Waddingham. By 1885, Waddingham and his ranch manager, Michael Slattery were running large herds of cattle on the range with little regard to sustainability of the land. By 1893, overstocking and grazing of stock from other ranches combined with drought to leave the range severely overgrazed. Waddingham had to sell the land due to financial problems. In 1898, E.G. Stoddard, president of the New Haven Bank, founded the Red River Valley Company to buy the Bell Ranch. From then until 1946 this company, headed first by Stoddard and after 1923, by Julius G. Day, survived the ups and downs of the cattle markets of the 1920s and 1930s. In 1932, Bell Ranch manager Charles ODonel retired, but stayed on as vice president of the Red River Valley Company. Philip C. Garrett replaced him as ranch manager. Garretts tenure was short. He was succeeded by Albert K. Mitchell, who managed the Bell Ranch from January 1, 1933, until the Red River Valley Company sold it in 1947. The Bell Ranch was broken up into seven smaller ranches. Mrs. Harriet E. Keeney bought the headquarters unit consisting of 130,855 acres and acquired the rights to the Bell brand. She asked George F. Ellis to manage the "Old Bell Headquarters" unit.
George Forbes Ellis managed the Bell Ranch 1947-1970. He was born in Portales, New Mexico on May 11, 1903. In 1925, he graduated from Kansas State Agricultural College (Kansas State College) at Manhattan with a degree in animal husbandry. He had worked for 20 years in the ranching field and in agricultural extension work before joining the Bell organization as an assistant manager to Albert K. Mitchell in 1944. He also operated a personal cattle ranch near the Bell Ranch. In 1947 he became manager of the Bell Ranch. As manager for the next 23 years he did pioneering work in the field of production testing in commercial cattle operations. In 1948 he inaugurated the ranch's testing program working with John H. Knox and others at the New Mexico State University Animal Husbandry Department. He was interested in increasing the weight-gaining potential of the annual calf crops and improving the type, quality and conformation of the ranch's output. He adopted sound range and water conservation practices, extended and improved the network of ranch roads and maintenance of fences and corrals and earthen tanks, and developed the "Perra Corrals." For his work he was selected New Mexico "Cattleman of the Year" in 1952. Ellis was a member of the Cattle Sanitary Board of New Mexico and a Director of the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association and New Mexico Wool Growers Association. He wrote articles for various publications such as New Mexico Stockman and American Hereford Journal, and gave presentations at various meetings such as the Hereford Congress in August 1954 in Colorado Springs. He served on the Board of Regents for New Mexico State University of Agriculture, Engineering, and Science, 1956-1958. When William N. Lane bought the Bell Ranch in April 1970, Ellis retired and Don D. Hofman became manager. Ellis died in 1972.
Albert K. Mitchell was manager of the Bell Ranch from 1933-1947. He was born in Clayton, New Mexico. He graduated from Cornell University (Ithaca, N.Y.) in 1917 with a degree in animal husbandry. Mitchell had a ranch in Mosquero, formerly the Roy Smith estate ranch, and renamed the Tequesquite Ranch. Mitchell served as president of the American Hereford Cattle Breeders Association, a member of the New Mexico House of Representatives, president of the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association (1932-1934) and was selected as the New Mexico "Cattleman of the Year" in 1963 by the New Mexico Cattle Growers Association. Mitchell was on the Board of Directors of the Foundation for American Agriculture, the National Live Stock and Meat Board, and the American Quarter Horse Association, president of the American National Live Stock Association, chairman of the National Livestock and Meat Board, Republican National Committeeman, one of the founders of the New Mexico Boys Ranch and Regent for New Mexico State University (1940-1946). He was a founder of the Cowboy Hall of Fame and Western Heritage in Oklahoma City in 1975. Mitchell died in May 1980 at age 86.
From the guide to the George F. Ellis Papers, 1929-1970, (University of New Mexico. Center for Southwest Research.)
