In the 1930s, Ennis resident John Louie Clarke recognized the beauty of Country Club Hills as bluebonnets swept across the meadow near his home each year, and he began clearing a walking path with hand-lettered signs to view the wildflowers across the Kachina Prairie. John Blasingame, an Ennis native employed as a landscape architect with the Texas Highway Department, suggested to Edna May McMurray and Elizabeth Stout of the newly formed Ennis Garden Club that the abundant fields would interest nature lovers. In 1952, with McMurray and Stout as co-chairs, the Ennis Garden Club sponsored the first annual Bluebonnet Trails over two weekends in mid-April. The event included three trails totaling 41.8 miles and drew an estimated 1,000 visitors, including several cars with out-of-state license plates. Within three years, attendance had grown to 10,000 persons. The Ennis community rallied behind the Garden Club, and in 1957 the Ennis Bluebonnet Festival began, featuring a parade, costumes, dances, an industrial display, races, a calf show and rodeo, and the crowning of the Ellis County Bluebonnet Queen. The state legislature later named the Ennis Trails the official Bluebonnet Trail of Texas. Visitors have never been charged admission to drive the trails, but the event has consistently brought economic growth to local businesses during festival weekends, and later community efforts included bluebonnet conservation and reseeding campaigns in partnership with TxDOT, along with bluebonnet-themed art shows, essay contests, and other events.