Grayson County TXGenWeb

Van Alstyne Leader
Thursday, January 19, 1939

BUNK BOWEN, 78-YEAR-OLD NEGRO, USES MULE AND BULL TEAM TO HAUL AND PLOW
Courtesy of Dallas News
Not being able to afford the finer luxuries of the farm, like a high-powered tractor, a team of fine mules, a manufactured wagon, etc., Bunk Bowen, 87-year-old (sic) residing two miles east of Van Alstyne, is not to be outdone when time rolls around for plowing and hauling his cotton and produce to town.
Bunk rigged up the outfit, shown i nthe above picture, and when Bunk comes into town over the railroad hill in east Van Alstyne, riding in his homemade wagon from wood gathered down on the creek near his home with his team consisting of a bull and a mule, he catches all eyes of Van Alstyne.
Bunk is a consistent worker and doesn't s pen any of his time loafing in town. He rigs up his team and comes to town only on business. In the summer and fall, he is always heard, going through the residential section of Van Alstyne, displaying his products with a lusty call, "roast'-nears, cantalopes, cucumbers."
When plowing time rolls around, Bunk hitches up his mule and bull to a walking plow and the team works consistently together, never balking, and they receive the same attention as if they were a $250 team of mules.
Bunk lives with his brother, Baker Bowen, and Baker's wife in a small house on a farm east of Van Alstyne where the Bowens have their own idea about farming. The three have resided on the farm for over fifty years.
Bunk and Baker plant all their cotton in checkrows. Diagonnally or laterally, the cotton appears in rows. Bunk believes this method gives the cotton more room to grow and produce. The good yield of an average of three quarters a bale to the acre on the farm bears witness to the fact that cotton does grow and produce.
The father of the Bowens was a slave for Capt. Tommy Bowen, who resided not over five miles from the present home of Bunk and Baker. Baker is very proud of the fact that he was a work hand at the age of 5 during the Civil War. Baker was 80 years old last September. He and hiw wife, Janey, have reared a family of ten children, all living.
The settlement of Van Alstyne and the coming of the railroad stands out vividly in the minds of baker and Bunk.