Kingsville, Texas

Cattle and horses still rule at a ranch larger than Rhode Island.

- Leo W. Banks

No Hollywood writer could invent the life of Richard King. He was born in New York in 1824 into an Irish family so poor that, at age 9, he apprenticed out to a Manhattan jeweler. At 11, he fled the city as a stowaway on a ship.

After making a fortune as a steamboat captain on the Rio Grande, he bought the Rincon de Santa Gertrudis Mexican land grant in South Texas, and in 1853 or 1854 formed a ranch that eventually grew to more than a million acres.

Designated a National Historic Landmark in 1961, the King Ranch today totals 825,000 acres, larger than the state of Rhode Island.

The town of Kingsville, named for the ranch and located near the Gulf Coast southwest of Corpus Christi, has 26,000 residents and a wealth of Western-themed activities.

At the ranch’s Santa de Gertrudis division—the massive spread consists of four divisions—visitors can take a bus tour that begins at Santa Gertrudis Creek, which Capt. King first crossed about 1852.