There were plenty of other notable Texas connections in the Top 100, including Fort Worth native Taylor Sheridan.
DALLAS — Texas is not lacking for land.
So when The Land Report released its list of the largest private landowners in the U.S. this week, it was no surprise that nearly 40% of the list included Texans or people with significant holdings in the Lone Star State.
Like Jeff Bezos, for one example.
And the owners of the Los Angeles Dodgers, as another.
In fact, the top landowner on the list, Stan Kroenke, is the owner of the Los Angeles Rams (among other various teams and business interests). Kroenke in 2016 purchased the historic W.T. Waggoner Estate Ranch in North Texas, the largest ranch in the state under one fence, as The Land Report notes.
The Waggoner’s 535,000 acres, incredibly, are only a fraction of Kroenke’s total land ownership. Between his holdings in Texas, New Mexico, Montana and even Canada, Kroenke owns 2.7 million acres of land. This figure was boosted significantly in December, when he purchased the 937,000-acre Singleton Ranches in New Mexico.
There were plenty of other notable Texas connections in the Top 100, including Fort Worth native Taylor Sheridan and the heirs to the historic King Ranch in South Texas.
Here are some Texas-specific highlights from the full list:
Kroenke — owner of the Rams, Nuggets, and Avalanche, among other pro teams,, and husband to Walmart heiress Ann Walton — has snapped up ranches all over the American West (and Canada, too), but his purchase of the Waggoner Ranch in 2016 was among his most significant — and one of the most historic purchases of land in Texas.
The King Ranch remains, well, the king among Texas ranches at more than 800,000 acres. The King Family heirs, in total, own around 911,000 acres, according to The Land Report, and the King Ranch itself, located across several different divisions near the South Texas coast, is still alive and well as an operating cattle ranch.
The Briscoe Family, one of the historic ranching families of Texas (like the Kings), have amassed 738,000 acres, the bulk of which are near Uvalde.
The O’Connor ranch in South Texas traces back to the 1800s, and the family’s heirs still hold more than 400,000 acres, according to The Land Report.
Jeff Bezos isn’t a Texan, but he has a major investment in the Lone Star State through his Blue Origin space exploration company. Bezos owns a vast amount of ranchland in Far West Texas, where Blue Origin launches rockets into space. The Land Report puts Bezos’ total holdings at 462,000 acres.
The Bass Family is known locally in North Texas for their presence in Fort Worth, but as The Land Report noted, they also own more than 100,000 acres in Kansas and 381,000 acres total.
Taylor Sheridan, the creator of “Yellowstone” and “Landman,” made headlines a few years ago when he led a group that purchased the Four Sixes Ranch, which sits on more than 260,000 acres northwest of Fort Worth and also in the Texas Panhandle.
The Hunt Family, based in Dallas, still has significant land holdings, more than 240,000 acres, according to The Land Report. While the family made its fortune in the East Texas oil field, the Hunts now have ranch properties across Texas, Arizona and Montana, among other locations.
Bobby Patton, a Fort Worth resident who is part of the Los Angeles Dodgers ownership group, has partnered with fellow Dodgers co-owner Mark Walter on 223,000 acres of land in Texas and New Mexico, according to The Land Report. Patton’s Rocking P Ranch near Fort Worth is also home to the famed Metallic Cat stallion, the most valuable cutting horse alive.