Watermelon (Citrullus lanatus) was introduced to the Spanish missions in Florida in 1576, then Texas missions in the 1600’s, and from the missions to the horticultural Natives. An 1882 newspaper claimed that “A liberal diet of watermelon will keep the system in a healthy condition during the summer months – and cure the worst cases of yellow fever . . . the time will come when the watermelon cure will be as popular in this country as the grape cure is in Europe.” (Cleburne Enterprise) I don’t know about yellow fever but the watermelon is known to lower blood pressure, improve insulin sensitivity , and reduce muscle soreness, along with plenty of citrulline if you eat a bit of the white rind. Also it contains lycopene and vitamins. I don’t know how long watermelons have been grown in Erath County, but it’s generally known that Choctaw Natives traveled through the area in wagons selling fruit trees and seeds. The fragment of a photo shown above (I don’t know how to show it completely), from the 1920s is the V.O. Porter seed company showing off the Porter’s Pride, a very large watermelon that has become extinct because of some imported blight. Courtesy of his son, Gene Porter and family.