Art in Lubbock is not an Oxymoron Another of the Women In Texas Series

 "Riding into the Sunset" near the grave of Will Rogers in Claremore, Oklahoma

     In Lubbock, on the campus at Texas Tech, there is a life-size statue of Will Rogers mounted on his favorite horse, Soapsuds.  The statue was commissioned by Amon G. Carter, the Fort Worth philanthropist, and is named “Riding into the Sunset.”  Carter was a close friend of Will Rogers, and commissioned the statue in 1936, shortly after Rogers and Wiley Post died in a plane crash in Alaska.  The first casting was delivered to Fort Worth in 1940 and installed in front of the Will Rogers Coliseum.  For reasons unknown to me, but probably having to do with WWII, the statue was not uncrated or dedicated until 1947.

     The second casting, the one on the Tech Campus, was donated by Carter to Texas Tech, and dedicated in 1950.  I remember hearing about it and riding out to the campus on my bicycle to see this wonderful thing.  I examined it carefully and was impressed, but a friend who rode out with me, Carlton Huneke, didn’t think much about it--just a guy on a horse.

     The Statue faced due west, to simulate Will riding into the sunset.  Later, because an anal Lubbockite noticed the horse’s butt faced downtown Lubbock, the statue was turned 23 degrees south of east.  Legend has it that the horse’s butt then faced Texas A & M, but that was disproven by a group of students studying to become surveyors.  Whether by design or accident, the line through Soapsuds’ butt falls midway between Texas A & M and the University of Texas, and, by extension, passes near the campus of the University of Houston.  I can’t say exactly why catching all three of them with one horse’s butt warms my old Lubbock heart, but it does.

     A total of four castings of this work are known to have been made.  In addition to the two mentioned above, one is located at Will’s gravesite at the Will Rogers Memorial Museum in Claremore, Oklahoma, and I read somewhere the fourth is in Dallas, at the Anatole Hotel.

Will in the bushes at the Colesieum in Fort Worth

     This sculpture, 9 feet 11 inches tall and weighing over 3500 pounds, was done by slip of a girl, 24 year-old Electra Waggoner.   Amon Carter, a family friend, ordered the work when she was 20, and she delivered it four years later.  During the next several years, she became the most sought after sculptress in the country.  She did busts of many famous people of the time, including Knute Rockne, Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, and several Hollywood stars.  She was young, fresh, beautiful, talented, and very, very wealthy.

     Electra was born in Fort Worth in 1912 and spent her early years on the Waggoner Ranch, near Vernon.  She entered Bryn Mawr at the age of twelve, and later studied business law and accounting at Columbia University in New York City.  She discovered a love of art, found she was very good at sculpture, and attended art schools in New York City, Boston, and Europe.  Electra married John Biggs in 1942, and he became manager of the Waggoner Estate and ranch.  John applied himself to his work and was considered by many to have been the best ranch manager in the business.  He introduced the concept of herding cattle by helicopter that is still used on the Waggoner Ranch today.

     Electra's beauty was legendary.  In 1959, the chairman of Buick Motor Division, ‘Red’ Curtice, named the luxurious Buick “Electra” after her, and I read that Lockheed Aircraft Company named their new turbo-prop airliner after her.   (I also read that the Lockheed Electra 10B, an earlier model which Amelia Earhart flew, was named after a star in the Seven Sisters Constellation.   I expect that is nearer the truth.)  I know the play, Morning Becomes Electra, was written by Eugene O’Neil in 1935 and based on Greek Mythology.  It had nothing whatever to do with Electra Waggoner Biggs. 

     Because there were two Electra Waggoners and I want to tell something about each of them, a bit of clarification is needed.  Electra Waggoner Biggs, the sculptress, (Electra II) was named after her aunt, Electra Waggoner Wharton, the playgirl, (Electra I).  Electra I was born in 1882 and was named after her mother’s father, Electious Halsell.  She was the only daughter and favorite child of W.T. Waggoner, and grew up to become a head-strong, vivacious, spoiled, and beautiful girl--a regular “stem-winder.”  Electra I travelled the world, especially the Far East, and met her future husband in the Himalaya Mountains.  He was Albert Buckman Wharton, heir to a steel fortune and son of the man who founded the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.

     Bucky and Electra I married in 1902, and had two children, Tom Waggoner Wharton, who died at an early age, and Albert Buckman Wharton, II.   Albert II and Electra II would eventually become sole heirs to the Waggoner Ranch and all the assets involved.  Will Rogers once said that each of the thousands of cattle on the Waggoner Ranch had sixty acres and an oil well of its own.  The ranch was over thirty miles long and twenty-five miles wide, and is still the largest ranch inside a single fence in the country.  The first oil wells on the ranch were centered near the small town of Electra, named after Tom Waggoner’s feisty daughter.

     Electra I is my favorite—bigger than life, spoiled rotten, flamboyant, beautiful, and unbelievably wealthy--everything it takes to become a legend in Texas.  In 1921, she divorced her husband, Bucky Wharton, and began to have too much fun.  She built a mansion in Dallas at 4700 Preston Road which backed up to Turtle Creek.   It became “Party Central” for the movers and shakers of the twenties.  She made annual trips around the world and bought a home in Hong Kong, to have a place to stay when she visited.   During a trip to Japan, she had a butterfly tattooed scandalously high on her shapely leg.  Girls just didn’t do that in the twenties.

     Electra I’s long standing relationship with Neiman Marcus is well documented.  According to legend, Electra I made her first visit to Neiman's barefoot and wearing a house dress.  The clerks ignored her until she plunked down $20,000.00 and asked to see some clothing.  She went back the next day and spent $20,000.00 more on shoes, purses, and accessories.  Electra set records for single-day-spending at Neiman’s, then promptly broke those records.  Once, during a party at the ranch, a new oil well blew in and soaked her guests with crude oil.  She loaded them up, bussed them to Neimans, and bought new outfits for the whole group.  She was a hard act to follow.

     Electra I died in New York City in 1925, at age 43.  By this time, Electra II had entered finishing school at Bryn Mawr.  Electra I had three ex-husbands, but only one surviving child, A. B. Wharton, II.  Electra I and Electra II’s heirs eventually owned the entire Waggoner Estate. 

      As things happen when a lot of ego and a lot of money are involved, the two families disagreed.  Animosity started in the sixties; lawsuits started in 1991, and unless I’ve missed a judgment or settlement, continue today.  Electra II died in 2001, in Vernon, Texas.  Her daughters and Electra I’s grandson, along with dozens of distant relatives and minor claimants, are deeply involved in a series of lawsuits that no one will ever win.



Electra Waggoner Biggs with her statue, "Riding into the Sunset".  The Texas Tech Administration Building is in the background. This picture was probably taken at the dedication in1950, when she was thirty-eight.