LEVI PICKERING was born Dec.13,1824 in Greene Co.,TN. He was a Methodist-Episcopal Church South minister who married CYNTHIA ANN ERVIN of Greene County in 1849. The family later moved to Bulcher,Cooke Co.,TX. In February of 1879 Levi moved his family, household goods and 40 head of cattle across the Red River and up into what was then Chickasaw Nation,Indian Territory.(Carter County) They settled in an area near present-day Wilson-Hewitt near Walnut Bayou and the place given the name "Pickering's Prairie." A log building was constructed which served both as a school and church. This bright new land was rich in soil and yielded an abundance of crops. The grass was shoulder high as far as the eye could see. Game was plentiful...deer,turkey,ducks and flocks of Bald Eagles lived in the area.

The famed Chisholm Trail was to the west and family members spoke of traveling there to watch vast herds of cattle crossing the Red River near Spanish Fort,TX.,often taking the entire day to ford the river.

Though a minister, Levi was also a horseman who, along with other cowboys in the area wishing to suppliment their incomes, would round up wild horses, break them to ride, then sell them to the nearby U-Ranch. On a spring day in April 27, 1881, one of the animals escaped and Levi took after it on his black mare. As he threw the rope over it's head, the animal wheeled around and collided with his own mount, causing both horses to roll over on top of him. His chest was crushed from the fall, and 24 hours later he died and was buried on a hill called Bowman's Point. John Bowman had been buried there 42 years earlier by the Indians.

A sad and untimely departure for a Bible preaching cowboy who died doing what he loved. Beloved husband, father, neighbor, friend of Indians and whites.....a true man of the west.

The inscription on his gravestone at Bomar Point Cemetery reads:
Levi Pickering
b Dec 13,1824
d April 28,1881
"Remember friend as you pass by, as you are now, so once was I. As I am now, you soon shall be, prepare for death and follow me."