JACOBS, JOHN CLOUD (1854-ca. 1930). John Cloud Jacobs, cattleman and hunter, the son of Jackson and Jane (Russell) Jacobs, was born in Greenup County, Kentucky, on February 25, 1854. When he was nineteen years old he moved to Texas and the following year, 1874, was elected sheriff of Shackelford County. Jacobs was a cattle drover for several years and one of the first to undertake buffalo hunting as an occupation in the Texas Panhandle. When the herds became scarce he moved to Southwest Texas. In 1893 he was employed to collect tropical birds, animals, and museum and zoo specimens in southern Mexico and Yucatán. He followed this occupation until 1904, when he moved to San Antonio and established Deer Park Polo Ranch, where he maintained a herd of deer, specialized in raising and training polo ponies, kept an aviary of tropical birds, and bred champion blooded cattle and sheep. Jacobs died in the early 1930s.
