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Andrew Jackson Buchanan was one of the first peace officers in Waco, McLennan County, Texas. He also operated the ferry across the Brazos River at Waco for several years. His daughter, Mollie Buchanan, married James Parrish. It was a busy winter and spring for the McLennan County Commissioners Court in 1864. In April two saloons were opened and a third asked for a license renewal. The two new foam flecked facilities and spirit shops were Buchanan’s and Duke’s Place which was located on Ferry Street and James Maguire’s Emporium on the southeast corner of the public square. Sandifer and Jones, who had opened their grog shop the previous fall “requested that their liquor license be renewed at their old stand on the public square. At $83.33 per license the county was $249.99 richer in April, 1864.
A. J. Buchanan must have been one of Waco’s more enterprising wartime businessmen. Besides his partnership in the saloon with Duke on Ferry Street, Buchanan applied for a license to operate a ferry on the Brazos at Waco Crossing. The court, during its regular February session, approved Buchanan’s application and ordered Acting County Clerk Thomas Killiher to issue him a temporary license at the cost of $25 after he had first posted a $2,000 bond. The license was to be in effect for one year and brought the number ferry boat operators at the Waco Crossing of the Brazos to four. Although owning a saloon and operating a ferry boat was not the most ideal combination to guarantee a sober, speedy spanning of the Brazos, there is no record of Buchanan’s license having been suspended or revoked for reckless oaring or unsteady poling. ("Gaines' Mill to Appomattox" - Colonel Harold B. Simpson, pg. 207-208)
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