Dan Blocker Memorial - Hoss's Head

O'Donnell, Texas

A small lot turned town park -- Heritage Plaza -- is where you find the head of native son Dan Blocker, Bonanza's Hoss Cartwright. Dedicated on July 4, 1973, Hoss's ample noggin has been preserved for posterity in a life-size bronze bust by artist Glenna Goodacre.

The plaque beneath the head reads "Thanks To Film Hoss Cartwright Will Live, But All Too Seldom Does The World Get To Keep A Dan Blocker."

The park is on the same block as a shuttered business labeled "BLOCKER," apparently the old family grocery store. The plywood covering the entrance features a handpainted "Hoss" hat.

Across the street is the O'Donnell Museum, with a Dan Blocker Room that displays some Hoss memorabilia. Dan's other claim to fame is that he was the largest baby ever born in Bowie County (14 lbs.), in the town of DeKalb in 1928. While still in school Dan stood six-foot-three and weighed 300 pounds.

Cable reruns guarantee that we won't forget Dan Blocker, but this humble head also does its part. Coincidentally, sculptor Goodacre and Dan Blocker were memorialized on the same day in 1997, when they were added to the West Texas Walk of Fame around the Buddy Holly statue in nearby Lubbock.

Dan Blocker's grave -- he died the year before his head was enshrined -- is in a cemetery in DeKalb (I-30 DeKalb Exit, 12 mi. to cemetery on right, 2nd road to left, Blocker's headstone on left about 15 plots in).