|
Oscar
Warnke spent more than half a century in law enforcement, but his
career as a Texas Ranger lasted only three hours.
As a bread wagon driver (actually, he drove a Model T Ford but it
had not been all that much earlier that horses pulled bread delivery
wagons and that's what most folks still called them) for San
Antonio Richter's Bakery in 1925, young Warnke had no notion
of becoming a peace officer. Warnke's route covered all the downtown
cafes and hotels, including the Southland Hotel at 105 1/2 South
Flores St. Unknown to him, that's where the Texas Rangers happened
to have their San Antonio
office.
On his afternoon run one day, Warnke stopped at the Southland to
replace bread sold earlier in the day and collect the bakery's money.
Inside the hotel, he ran into Ranger Sgt. Dan Coleman. The state
lawman had known Warnke since he was a boy growing up in Karnes
City, where everyone called him "Punkin."
More than fifty years later, Warnke recalled what Coleman said that
afternoon:
"Say, Punkin, we've got a vacancy on the Rangers. Wouldn't you like
to join?"
That struck the young man as a tremendous career advancement over
driving a bread truck.
"I couldn't say 'Yes' quick enough," he recalled. "Coleman took
me over to Captain Will Wright and told him all about me. Wright
called Austin, got me accepted, and I signed up. By that time it
was between 4 and 5 o'clock."
The veteran Ranger captain told Warnke that he and some of his men
would be leaving San
Antonio that night for a scout along the Rio Grande out of Laredo.
"I didn't have a pistol so they took me down to a pawnshop and I
bought a single-action Colt .45, the gun all Rangers carried," Warnke
said.
Then he drove the Model T bread wagon back to the bakery, turned
in the day's receipts, and announced his resignation as a truck
driver, effective immediately.
From the bakery, Warnke rushed home to tell his wife Clara the good
news, that she was no longer married to a lowly bread wagon driver.
Her husband was now a Texas Ranger and right proud of it!
Warnke figured she'd be impressed, but Mrs. Warnke broke into tears
which he quickly realized were not tears of joy.
"She thought my joining the Rangers meant that I was signing my
death warrant," Warnke remembered from the vantage point of five
decades. "Her mother was there and joined in the protests."
Warnke's wife and mother-in-law would not listen to his assurances
that he would be safe with the other rangers. Finally, Mrs. Warnke
put the situation in perspective: If he left for Laredo
that night, she would not be home when he came back -- assuming
he lived to come back.
"She insisted that I resign at once," he said. "I told her how embarrassed
I would be to have to face the rangers and resign and asked her
if she wouldn't go to town and tell them I was quitting."
If Warnke were man enough to be a ranger, she said, he was tough
enough to tell them thanks, but no thanks.
"So I headed back to the hotel, turned in my still unloaded pistol
and quit the Rangers," he said.
By then it was about 7 o'clock in the evening. He had been a Texas
Ranger roughly three hours.
Early the next morning, "Punkin" showed up at the bakery to explain
that he had had a sudden change of mind and really preferred bread
delivery to rangering. Fortunately for him, he got his job back
and went to load the bread "wagon".
Warnke never got to wear a Ranger badge, but he did go on to a long
law enforcement career in Bexar
County, starting with a job under one of the county's constables.
He spent eight years as a motorcycle patrolman, later working as
a vice officer with the San Antonio Police Department and then as
a deputy with the Bexar County Sheriff's Department. For many years,
he served as chief jailer. After retiring from the county in 1969,
he worked as head of security for the San Antonio Livestock Show
and Rodeo.
Clara Warnke clearly adjusted to the idea of her husband carrying
a badge and gun. When the veteran officer died at ninety-one in
1989, the couple had been married for sixty-five years.
© Mike Cox
"Texas Tales"
- January 28, 2016 Column
Related Topics: Love
& Marriage Texas Style |
People
| Columns | Texas
Towns | Texas Counties |
Texas
|
