Brown County Historical Scrapbook: John and Emma Banister
Brownwood Bulletin
John Riley Banister was a law officer. He was born in Banister, Missouri on May 24, 1854 to William Lawrence and Mary Banister. His father deserted the family after the Civil War and settled in Texas.
John, who had only three months of school, moved to Texas in 1867. He became a cowboy on Rufus Winn’s ranch near Menardville. He then worked for Sam Golson in Coleman and Mason counties in 1873.
Banister helped fight against several Native Americans and joined his first cattle drive to Kansas in 1874. After another drive in 1876, he joined the Texas Rangers in Austin for Frontier Battalion service. His company was involved in escorting murderer John Wesley Hardin from Austin to Comanche for trial, skirmishes with Native Americans and the capture of outlaw Sam Bass.