Roberts County lies in the northeast part of the Texas panhandle, its 924 square miles of high, lonesome emptiness occupied by fewer than 1,000 hardy and independent souls. Some of the most extreme weather on the planet – tornadoes, drought, blizzards – can be found there.

It is also a place where the whims of man – mortal dreams writ both large and small – are often shattered upon the face of nature’s unyielding anvil. But there is one dream that, through sheer force of will, has not only refused to shatter but has grown into something unmatched in this world.

That dream is Mesa Vista Ranch, and the force of will that relentlessly forged it into existence belongs to T. Boone Pickens, who 42 years ago set out on what many through a Quixotic fool’s quest: to shape and mold this harsh, abused landscape into a quail-hunting paradise the likes of which had never before been seen, to dare bend unyielding nature itself into his own unique vision of perfection.

Some said it couldn’t be done. And then T. Boone Pickens went out and did it.