By Marie Hughes, director of the Chambers County Museum at Wallisville
There is a tranquil sense of satisfaction and joy that washes over the soul of someone who walks the same land generations of family have walked before them.
Those generations whisper their secrets from every pasture, well-worn path and ancient tree, echoing stories of struggle, joy, hard work, faith, love, laughter and loss. The essence of who they were is woven into the very fabric of the land, leaving not only a heritage but also a deep sense of belonging that roots the heart and brings peace.
That feeling resonates deeply with Liberty County resident Jo Ann Hill Whittaker of Cypress Hill Ranch.
She has the distinct privilege of living on land steeped in history—her land, her history. She stands as a steadfast guardian of the enduring legacy entrusted to her.
The noise and commotion of the modern world faded behind me as I turned into the entrance of Jo Ann’s ranch. As I followed the long, tree-shrouded, winding lane, the beauty of the Cherokee roses seemed to smile down on me.
The arching branches overhead reached toward one another as if pulling me into their welcoming arms, transporting me back to a quieter, more distant time.
A legacy rooted in Liberty County
Jo Ann was born in Liberty, Texas, to Elbert Coret Hill and Madie Marie Vinson. The Hill family has called Liberty County home since the mid-1850s and takes great pride in its connections to many of the area’s pioneer families.
Jo Ann’s great-grandfather, Pleasant Coleman “P.C.” Hill, was born in Stewart County, Georgia, in 1839. He later moved with his family to Florida and, according to family tradition, boarded a ship off the Florida coast and sailed to Galveston around early 1855.
The family settled on the Moses Carroll Survey in what is now Chambers County. P.C. first married Sarah E. Adair, daughter of Benjamin Adair and Mary Wiggins, and together they had six children. Following Sarah’s death, he married Elenor Lacour DeBlanc, the widow of Raymond DeBlanc, and together they had five children.
Jo Ann’s grandfather, Sidney, was the eldest of P.C. and Elenor’s children.
P.C. served honorably in Company F of Spaight’s Battalion during the Civil War, enlisting in Liberty on April 26, 1862, at the age of 22.
“Spaight’s Ditch runs through the property,” said Jo Ann. “Colonel A.W. Spaight purchased a 1,102-acre plantation in 1860 in the southeast corner of the Jacob E. Self League. A portion of that land is included in our property. Spaight’s Marsh in Liberty County was also owned by him. He had men with shovels dig Spaight’s Ditch to drain water from the marsh and preserve his crops. It was dug three months after he purchased the land at a cost of $720. So, there’s lots of history on our land—lots I don’t even know about.”
After the war, P.C. spent most of his life in Moss Bluff. During the last several years of his life, he served as a justice of the peace in Liberty County.
P.C.’s wife, Elena Elenor Lacour, was the daughter of Jean Marie Corette “Joe” Lacour. On Oct. 12, 1889, Elena was deeded 75 acres of the original Cypress Hill Ranch by her uncle, Adolph Gillard. Jo Ann’s father, Elbert Coret Hill, carries the middle name of his great-grandfather, Jean Marie Corette Lacour.
Jo Ann’s grandmother, Agnes Hill, was the daughter of Leon Davis and Julia Barrow. Julia was the daughter of Reuben Shadrack Barrow, who arrived in Texas in 1824, when the Mexican flag still flew over the land.
The Barrow name remains prominent in the rich tapestry of Chambers County. As you can see, the Hill family tree boasts prolific, prestigious foliage.
Jo Ann’s grandmother was quite comfortable on the back of a horse, as it was the primary mode of transportation during her early years.
“I have my grandmother’s side saddle, which she rode in the photo of the Moss Bluff Riders,” said Jo Ann. “It’s in horrible condition now. My husband, Barry, took it to the Harmon Saddle Shop years ago to have it repaired, and they said they would have to redo it completely. I wanted to keep some of it original, so I did not have it repaired. It is such a treasure to me.”
Another piece of history flows through the ranch as well.
“The Devers Canal runs through our property. I have canal-front property. The canal is now owned by the Lower Neches Valley Authority,” said Jo Ann. “When my grandfather, Sidney Hill, was 10 years old, he was the water boy for the men who dug the canal with hand scoops. The canal is 10 or 12 feet deep and was dug with hand slips pulled by teams of mules. They are made of metal, and I have one. The mules would drag them forward while the men held onto the handles, making sure the slips angled down into the dirt to lift it up. It’s amazing what they did back in the day.”
Jo Ann later showed me a well-worn slip, quietly preserving the memory of those bygone days from its place of prominence in her backyard.
As we toured Cypress Hill Ranch, Jo Ann pointed to a solitary tree standing proudly atop a small knoll.
“This is one of the oldest walnut trees in this area,” said Jo Ann, adding that she would like to have a tree specialist determine its age. “This spot is the old homestead of Jack Moss.”
Sheryl Shaw and I later returned to the ranch to measure the tree’s girth, which was an impressive 17 feet, 4 inches. Walnut trees are not native to this area, but this one has evidently found a place where it thrives.
Growing up at Cypress Hill Ranch
“My grandparents, Agnes and Sidney, were married in 1915. I loved my grandparents very much and spent every Friday night with them until I was in the fifth grade—every single Friday night,” said Jo Ann. “I loved the outdoors. I was the tomboy of the family, I guess.”
“My grandmother Hill was a hard worker, and she was a very serious person. She never drove a car, so she rarely left the farm except with Grandpa. That’s probably why she was so serious, because she was always working so hard.
“She went to church once a year and took her yearly tithe to Shiloh Baptist Church. I always thought it was interesting that she didn’t go every week. She was at home cooking the Sunday meal that we would always eat.
“When she became a grandmother, she refused to be called Grandmother and insisted her grandchildren call her ‘Mother.’ It wasn’t confusing to us to call both her and our mom by the same name. It was just accepted that was the way it was.”
For this article, when “Mother” appears in quotation marks, it refers to Jo Ann’s grandmother.
“Mother was a great cook. I especially loved her tea cakes, or what we call sugar cookies today. They had plum and peach trees, and her peach cobbler was wonderful. Every once in a while, I can still conjure up the flavor of that delicious peach cobbler with homemade butter and, of course, the fresh eggs that I helped her gather.
“We didn’t have ice cream. We would pour fresh cow’s cream over the top. Rice Krispies never tasted so good with cow’s cream and sugar on top,” said Jo Ann with a laugh.
“My grandmother cooked on a wood stove. One time, when I was about 4 or 5 years old, I was standing beside the stove when she lifted the lid where she set the pot to boil dumplings or whatever she was cooking, and flames shot out. I thought, ‘Oh, my goodness!’ That was scary!”
“Grandpa Hill was easygoing and fun-loving. He told jokes, made people laugh, and everyone loved listening to his stories. I remember how he smoked a cigar every evening on the front porch.
“He would always make us stick horses, and they were so beautiful. He would cut a straight limb from a tree, peel the bark into swirls, and carve stars or hearts into it. When we played cops and robbers, like Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, if someone stepped on the tail of our horse, they were in trouble.
“That was fighting terms!” she said with a laugh.
Grandpa raised about 50 head of mixed-breed range cattle. He milked the cows each morning and brought in fresh milk, while I helped my grandmother churn butter. I still have her butter churn.
Life on the farm revolved around making use of what you had, and Jo Ann’s grandmother was no exception.
“She washed her clothes on a rub board. What was neat about that was she had beautiful gardenias that would get black soot on them. She would wash her clothes and then pour the wash water over the gardenias, and it would get rid of the black soot, or fungus. When she got an electric washing machine, she was worried that the newfangled thing was going to tear her clothes up,” said Jo Ann.
“I loved to help her when she washed on the rub board, but I probably played in the water and made bubbles with my hands more than I washed clothes,” she said with a laugh.
Behind the house was a small outbuilding where her grandmother stored jars of home-canned fruits and vegetables.
But to young Jo Ann, the smokehouse was the most mysterious place on the farm.
“It was always so dark inside. When the sausage links and bacon were being smoked, small curls of smoke would drift upward through the cracks in the walls. To me, the building looked haunted. It was frightening and had a strange beauty all at once.”
“We would tie a rope around this post,” said Jo Ann, pointing to one near the steps. “I would hold on tight while I was on the swing that became my stagecoach. We had to go fast because we were either on a schedule or being chased by robbers. Oh man, we would get to swinging so high.”
Saturday mornings brought another favorite memory.
“Every Saturday, Mother would scrub that porch with soap and water, and instead of working, we would slip and slide,” she said with a laugh.
Jo Ann also cherished the quieter moments she shared with her grandparents.
“I loved sleeping in the feather bed at my grandparents’ house. We could hardly climb out of it in the morning. When I got older, my goal was to stay up as late as my grandmother. She would cook, wash the dishes, then sit by the wood stove around 10 or 11 o’clock at night, after she had finished all her work, and rock in her rocking chair. If I could stay up as late as she did, I felt like I had really accomplished something, but I rarely did.
“She would build smoke fires in the chicken pen to keep the mosquitoes away, and we would run and play through the smoke. Of course, we smelled like smoke afterward and had to take a bath.”
The rhythms of farm life
Another treasured reminder of her grandfather’s hard work is the old sugar cane crusher that still remains.
“My grandfather raised sugar cane and provided molasses for people throughout the Liberty area. I still have the old cane crusher. I never saw them making syrup because he had stopped before I came along, but some of the men in the community would come help during syrup-making time.
“One man stopped by years later and said, ‘I just wanted to see if this place was still here. I helped your grandfather make syrup.’
“My mother remembered the process because it had to be done just right. They would cut the sugar cane in the field and bring it by wagon to the cane crusher. The crusher had two metal rollers, and they would feed the cane between them to squeeze out the juice. The juice ran into troughs where it was heated over a fire. You had to tend the fire carefully so it didn’t get too hot.
“The foam that formed on top of the syrup was almost like beer, and sometimes the workers would drink some of it. Mother said she wore a bandana over her head because the flames and smoke would leave her face covered with soot.
“Grandpa poured the finished syrup into metal gallon buckets. After my parents died, we were going through some of their things and found a postcard from Carl Pickett’s grandfather. It said, ‘Sid, please save me ten buckets of syrup.’ Grandpa sold his syrup throughout the Liberty area, and Mr. Pickett, who was away on business, wanted to make sure he got his share.
“I was raised on sugar cane molasses, and for years it was the only syrup I knew. Then, when I was in about the sixth grade, I spent the night with a friend in Liberty, and they served fake maple syrup. I remember thinking, ‘What kind of syrup is this?'” she said with a laugh.
Along with sugar cane, Grandpa raised sweet potatoes.
“They would dig a hole and build a mound of dirt over them to store them during the winter. He always took good care of his sweet potato slips so he could start his garden the following year.
“He also raised corn and peas. When the corn came in, everybody would sit under the tree—Mother, my cousins, Aunt Lois—everyone had a part in it. That was fun. He raised field corn, and we would make creamed corn from it. I’m sure they raised field corn because it served so many purposes. It fed the animals and was also used to make stone-ground cornmeal.”
The kitchen was always filled with the simple comforts of farm life.
“In Mother’s pie safe, there was always fried bacon and biscuits, so if you got hungry, you could grab a piece of bacon and a cold biscuit. Every Sunday afternoon, coffee was served at 3 o’clock. You never knew how many people were going to show up, but folks always came to Grandpa and Mother’s for coffee.
“I still have her coffee grinder. She would parch and grind her own coffee beans. I also have the basket she used to hold the coffee grounds while she poured the hot water through them. I keep both displayed on a shelf in my kitchen, and I tell each of my grandchildren what they are. I tell them, ‘When I die, these aren’t antique trash. They are to always stay here,'” said Jo Ann.
Jo Ann’s grandmother also passed along a love for gardening.
“Grandmother Hill raised beautiful flowers, and we loved cutting zinnias and roses from her garden. They were always beautiful. I spent a lot of time with her in the garden. We got our water from the hand pump on the front porch. It was such a simple, pure, organic way of growing up,” said Jo Ann.
A love of the outdoors has remained a constant throughout the generations.
“My daddy and his brother, Sid Jr., always hunted—always. We always had squirrel and dumplings with cornbread. He was obsessed with ponds and dug one on our property. Now great egrets use it as a rookery, and they have babies there now.
“At the back of the property, we have an eagle’s nest, and they had two eaglets this year. That was so delightful to see. We have so many birds on our property. Every now and then, we get a flock of whooping cranes. They’re on the endangered species list, but I have to say, the eagle is the most special to me because it’s our nation’s bird.
“Yesterday, Benicia and Bryan were riding around the ranch. They came to a spot we call ‘the Nature Refuge,’ where Benicia spotted a little fawn lying in the grass. She sent me a picture, and it was precious.”
“On our land we have wild hogs and deer. Back in the day we didn’t have deer. Back then they had bears and panthers. I recently had the Garden Club come out and before we started our tour of the land, I said a little prayer to honor the land and the trees and the animals. We got to see the eagles’ nest and the great white egrets with their babies. The ladies were just in awe. I don’t take any of what I’ve been entrusted with for granted; it’s our slice of Heaven,” said Jo Ann.
A life built together
Jo Ann married her high school sweetheart, George Barry Whittaker, on June 8, 1968. Together they had two daughters, Benicia and Julie.
“Barry was raised as a country boy,” said Jo Ann. “While in Liberty 4-H at the age of 12, he raised a hog. Then, at the age of 13, he was in the Houston Fat Stock Show at the old coliseum and caught a calf, and the rest is history. He was in the ranching business from then on.
“He played football for the University of Houston on a scholarship. His grandchildren were the joy of his life.
“Barry built this house. The structure and all the cabinets and trim work. Every board in here was cut from the cypress trees on our property. I asked him, ‘Barry, you’re a banker. How did you learn to do this?’ But he was a project man and wasn’t happy unless he had a project to work on. He worked until the day he died.
“The weeks leading up to his death, he wanted to work with his bulldozer. I called it his girlfriend. I would drive him out there and tell him he could only work for an hour and then I was coming to get him.
“Barry died six years ago. He lived life to the fullest and did it his way. Three weeks before he died, he was on his bulldozer clearing some land we had just purchased. It was the last piece of land we bought together.
“My daughter, Benicia, and her husband, Bryan, have just moved onto that land. It’s a quarter-mile from me, and I can sit in my easy chair, look out and see their house.”
Even after Barry’s death, Jo Ann never lost her love of working the land.
“Sometimes I think, ‘Barry Whittaker, I can’t believe you put me through all this hard work,’ but I come from tough stock. We got a new Massey Ferguson tractor, and my daddy bought the air-conditioned cab for it, so for Valentine’s Day Barry bought me a cassette tape player to put in there.
“I was telling my teacher friends, and they said, ‘You are weird,’ but I was so excited. We had a ranch in Raywood, and I could plow Raywood and listen to all my self-help tapes and, man, I got an education. I was accomplishing something!
“We just loved to work. There’s a saying, ‘Seems the harder I work, the luckier I become.’
“Barry Whittaker could visualize things. One time he said he could see a rock road from the beginning of our property all the way to the back. About five years later, an oil company drilled a well at the back of our property. We didn’t own the mineral rights, but we got that rock road from the front of the property all the way to the back.”
Keeping the ranch in the family
Today, the ranch remains a true family operation.
“I have two daughters. Julie and Brian Feldott live in Austin, and Brian is my chief financial officer. Benicia and Bryan Bendele live on the ranch, and they are the chief operating officers. Yes, we have two Brians/Bryans, and our girls married two months apart!” she laughed. “I am blessed and highly favored.”
Working cattle has never been easy, but the family’s commitment to the ranch has never wavered.
“Every time we worked cattle we had to prop up fences and mend. It was a fiasco. When my husband Barry and I took over the ranch, he said we would never, ever have to prop up fences again.
“One thing I made Barry promise when we took over the ranch was that we would never have another gap gate. Those gap gates were so difficult, and that’s all we had…all we had! Opening and closing them kept you strong, but that’s about it!
“You have to love cattle ranching because every day it’s work. Barry did a remarkable job taking care of the ranch, enhancing the property and leaving it much better than he found it.”
Today, Bryan and Benicia carry on that tradition with the next generation already learning alongside them.
“Bryan and Benicia own the cattle operation, so I’m now their assistant. We have 135 mama cows and six bulls. I’m there in the middle of working cattle, and I ride the ranch every day in the comfort of my air-conditioned car.
“In the summer I ride the Ranger with Rose dog. She likes to ride the ranch. I make sure there are no calves in distress, that the cows are where they’re supposed to be, and that one doesn’t have its head hung in a tree, which has happened, or caught in one of the hay rings.
“I’m very proud that my daughter Benicia and her husband Bryan are fifth-generation cattle ranchers in our family. Every time we work cattle, our grandchildren are working right beside us. They have a great work ethic and a love for the land instilled in them.
“My two granddaughters just purchased a cow each to raise on the ranch, and their father said, ‘That’s the way you get ’em hooked.'”
A place of peace and purpose
After Barry’s death, Jo Ann briefly considered leaving the ranch.
“After Barry died, I thought I would build a house in town and just come out on the weekends. Then I thought, no I’m not. I wouldn’t be happy there. I would miss all this beauty and hearing the birds in the morning.
“What’s interesting is I have an app on my phone that listens to the birds chirping and tells you what kind they are. I typically have my coffee on the front porch, and I usually hear five or six different birds.
“I went to Washington, D.C., with a group a month ago, and when I got back, I went out on the porch with my bird identifier the next morning. There were about 15 birds, and I thought, ‘Oh, they’re all excited I’m back.’ That was funny.
“I think the land and the trees and the nature spirits love me because I love them and I honor them.”
As we drove around the ranch, Jo Ann pointed toward a tree on a high spot deep in the back of the property.
“You see that high spot right there by that tree? Before Barry died, he made plans to build a log cabin there. He made a prototype of just four logs, but he didn’t get to accomplish that dream.”
She then shared one final story that still brings her comfort.
“One day I went out back to feed the birds. I only use this one set of steps, and nobody else had been there. I walked down them and saw a bright, shiny penny. I thought, ‘What is a penny doing here? And a shiny one?’
“A couple of days later I thought, I need to go look at that penny because I think Barry Whittaker gave me that penny from Heaven. On that penny was the picture of a man with his work sleeves rolled up. He had a book in his hand and was sitting on a fallen tree, and there was a huge mallet there. I thought, ‘Oh my God, Barry has made his log cabin in Heaven, and now he’s studying.’ I kid you not!”
“There are so many cypress trees, and that’s why our ranch is called Cypress Hill Ranch. There are just so many, and they give off such a positive, peaceful energy. Everyone who comes out feels it.”
She smiled as she shared one last story.
“Every now and then I’ll douse with a dowsing stick, a Y-shaped stick used for finding water. That’s the way Mother and Grandpa used to search for water to know where to dig the well.
“I went to my special spot the other day and, for the first time, asked if there was a tribe of little people there, and my dowsing stick moved with a yes answer. I have no idea if it was a correct answer, but if I was a little person, I would love it there.
“I took a dowsing class from Raymon Grace. He’s a world-renowned dowser, and he had a friend in Canada named Winnie who talked to him about the little people. I thought, well, why not little people at Cypress Hill Ranch? Who knows? Maybe one day I’ll see a little tribe. And if there are, great. And if there aren’t, great.”
As our visit came to an end, Jo Ann reflected on the life she has been blessed to live.
“Cypress Hill Ranch is a very spiritual location, and I am so thankful I ended up here. Being in touch with nature and the animals can teach us so much about the important things in life.
“Family is everything to me. My greatest hope is to set my children, my grandchildren and the generations that follow up for success, love and opportunity. I believe land and nature are gifts meant to be cherished, and I hope my family always takes time to slow down, look at the birds and smell the flowers.
“If I have made this world a better place, it will be through them—through the love, kindness and strength they carry forward. They are my legacy, my purpose and my most treasured gift.”