Quanah, born about 1845 to Cynthia Ann Parker, a white woman captured in 1836 on the Texas frontier, and Peta Nocona, a war chief of the Nokoni Comanche band, was orphaned after his mother was recaptured by the Texas Rangers in 1860 and his father died of an old wound a few years later. He nevertheless rose to lead as a war chief of the Kwahada Comanche band, whose people hunted bison, raised horses, traded for corn bread and other goods brought by New Mexican Comancheros, rode the Comanche War Trail to raid in Mexico, and camped in this area. In the 1874-75 Red River War, he led his people in resisting U.S. military efforts to remove Indians to reservations in Oklahoma. After accepting Colonel R. S. Mackenzie's surrender orders in 1875, he became principal chief of the Comanches on the reservation and led his people toward a new way of life.
