Information from one of Doke's grandsons, obtained in an interview by John Pandzic, great-grandson of Doke, in Jan. 2001:

I also tracked down [one] of the Family that I haven't seen or talked to in 25 years.  He was Doke's Grandson and spent many years (summers) on the ranch in Texas with him.  He says that Doke was a Texas Ranger and started at the age of 16.  Doke served under a Captain that awarded him with a signature Winchester that a relative has somewhere in Texas.  He also had a 44 calibur 6 inch barrel, Ranger-style six shot.  These weapons were given to pay a debt as he was a Heavy Gambler, but the rifle was given to a relative and not a stranger.

One of his porch stories that he recalls was about a gun fight with the Dalton gang and Doke had his horse shot out from under him.  He says that he was told you just didn't loose gun fights in those days as a Ranger.

He also said that he was taught how to add with a deck of cards, with his grandfather [Doke] on many summer evenings.   They would go out to the front porch and start with a full deck and add up all the cards, then start back and subtract with them as well.  This made him a great Blackjack player with single decks.

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Some contemplations on Doke and his possible connection with the Pinkerton Detective Agency.  By Hatch Graham (Jr.), Feb. 2001:

THE PINKERTON CONNECTION

Doke A Dawson was a Peace Officer and had been a Texas Ranger. My mother, Callie Lillian Dawson, second daughter of Doke and Genella Richardson Dawson, was born in Camanche, TX on March 28, 1907. The 1920 Census shows the Dawson family in Globe, AZ. In the census, Doke is listed as a Miner. My mother went to Globe High School and after graduation (?) around 1925, came to Los Angeles. She met and married my father, Hatch Graham (born 9/15/1898 in Canton, IL and christened Harold Haynes) on June 3, 1926.

Hatch Graham had graduated from the U of Illinois in 1923 with a law degree. In California, he worked as a law clerk while studying for the California Bar Exam. He also was discovered as a singer and was featured on the radio in 1924 and 25. He had a major supporting role in the Gershwin musical “Lady Be Good” which ran concurrently in Los Angeles with its opening in New York.  He passed the bar exam, married and gave up the high life to pursue his chosen profession – the law. In the meantime, he needed a steady job. According to my mother, her father, Doke, was able to get my father a job as an undercover investigator for Pinkerton Detective Agency. My father and mother moved to Butte, Montana, where my father got a job as a reporter and columnist for the Montana Free-Press, a new newspaper in Butte. He wrote what became a popular column entitled Butte Today in October and November 1928. During the Christmas season, he wrote as the Butte Shopper to give an additional boost to the Free-Press’s advertisers. He went back to Los Angeles in January 1929 and took an appointment in the County Public Defender’s Office.

Dad never told me about the Pinkerton connection until I was in college. And he swore me to secrecy regarding his role. Now, after his death 40 years ago, and over 70 years after the events, I feel I can make it public. Pinkerton was hired to investigate the Free-Press by the owners of the copper mine at Butte. They feared it was owned by liberals (or communists) who wanted to unionize the miners. Dad’s job was to find out as much as he could and report every Saturday night to the mine’s owner up on the hill overlooking the town. Dad said he never was able to come up with any ulterior motives on the part of the paper and, in the meantime, he helped them increase their circulation through his column.

The interesting thing to me is that the so-called miner in Globe, AZ, Doke Dawson, was able to get Dad a job with Pinkerton.  Later, in the Los Angeles area, Doke was working for Pinkerton in a semi-retired role of a security guard. Globe, as you know, is, like Butte, a copper mining town. What was a former horse trader, then peace officer, then Texas Ranger, doing as a miner in Globe?  I’ll bet Pinkerton knows.

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Original poem by Taylor Graham (Judith Ann Taylor Graham) based on true facts regarding Genella Richardson Dawson's Mendelian experiments in hybridizing the hottest peppers in Texas.

GRANDMA DAWSON'S GIRLS

Of the hottest she chose
the hottest.  Chiles
that made her Texas
Ranger blanch,
come up for air, "oh yes!
that's almost
hot enough."  He'd kiss
her on the mouth, his lips
burned through.  Seeds
from that same chile
chosen above all others
down generations of a hot
west Texas garden:
that heart-shaped pepper
hung till it was red
as Texas blood.
Just waved across the pot
it drew such piquancy to a stew
so you could hardly eat it,
so you fell in love
with hot.  Down generations
the Dawson girls
could hardly find young men
that weren't too mild
to marry.

Alice Dawson (md. Walter Harold Glenn)

Callie Lillian Dawson (md. Hatch Graham, Sr.)

Vivian Dawson (?)

Doke Anderson "Bud" Dawson, Jr. (md. Katherine Elizabeth "Betty" Ballis)

Link to John Pandzic's Dawson/Webb online family tree (thanks John!)