QUANAH  PARKER.

COMANCHE LAST LEADER.

In 1836, a 9-year-old pioneer girl named Cynthia Ann Parker was kidnapped during a Comanche raid in North Texas. She was strapped onto the back of a horse and taken north, back into the Plains where the powerful American Indian tribe lived.

Parker became a ward of the chief and later, a full member of the Comanches. She eventually married a highly respected Comanche chief and gave birth to three children, including Quanah — who would grow up to become the last and greatest Comanche leader.

He was reputed to be ruthless, clever, and fearless in battle.

If you go back through Comanche history, you see that they were the ones who stopped the Spanish from coming North," he explains. "Why did the French stop coming west from Louisiana? Comanches. ... Here was why the West Coast and the East Coast settled before the middle of the country. Here was why there was basically a 40-year wait before you could develop the state of Texas or before other Plain states could be developed.

Quanah Parker led Comanche raids against American villages and troops in the 1860s and 1870s, opposing American expansion into Comanche territory. However, he saw that further struggle was pointless and began negotiating with the US government.

Also Comanche had an integral role in preventing — and then opening up — the American West to white settlers.

Quanah Parker led the Comanche tribe until his death in 1911. He is recognized today as a Native American resistance hero and a symbol of the ongoing struggle for Native American rights and recognition. The Quanah Parker Society, which seeks to preserve Comanche history and culture, carries on his legacy.