“Stars Over Texas,” a three-volume hardbound boxed book set of the histories of Texas’ 254 county elected sheriffs was recently gifted to The Freestone County Historical Museum by Dr. Ronnie E. Erwin.
The book details each county’s law enforcement history with the names, pictures, and dates of each Texas county sheriff, male and female from their county’s formation to the present. The book set is hardbound in tooled faux leather with inserted black and white, colorized pictures of all known sheriffs, their county jails and courthouses, date of service, etc. Western art embellishments are added randomly throughout the books making for an educational as well as entertaining read. Erwin also gifted a set to Freestone County Sheriff Jeremy Shipley.
The idea of taking on a massive assignment came from Erwin’s late wife, Lynn McKee Erwin, after their years of collecting sheriff badges (stars) and any memorabilia associated with Texas histories of sheriffs going back to the 1800s frontier era. Their first effort was the publication of “Stars over Tennessee” – their home state which detailed all that state’s sheriff histories by county.
Because of Erwin’s affiliation with Texas A&M University where he obtained his M.S. and PhD. degrees, he and his wife had lived in Texas and established numerous lifelong friendships and warm Texas A&M memories of the “always courteous” Texas Corps of Cadets. These associations paved the way for their kinship with Texas and Texas frontier history. Receiving encouragement from Texas’ McLennan County Sheriff Parnell McNamara, who had read Erwin’s “Stars Over Tennessee” book, the Erwin’s were challenged by the formidable task of visiting and collecting the necessary sheriff histories with illustrations of all 254 Texas counties. They were encouraged and inspired by their personal kinship with Texas and its historic connections to Tennessee.
Other inspirations came from notable Texas historian Joe Gish, curator of the Old West Museum in Fredericksburg, and Sammy Tise, author of “Texas County Sheriffs.”
With the recent completion and publishing of “Stars Over Texas” Freestone County is the fortunate recipient of these iconic and beautiful books and is grateful for this generous and thoughtful gift. It should be noted that the proceeds from sales of this book are being donated to the Lynn M. Erwin Memorial Fund. This fund was established to annually publicly recognize a Texas sheriff who has served faithfully with distinction and merit to their oath of office and community.
Purchase of the three-volume boxed set can be done by contacting Erwin directly at 3442 Neeley Hollow Road, Columbia, TN 38401, or [email protected] or via his website: www.RebelSprings.com.
