Helen Kleberg Groves, the only child of Robert J. and Helen C. Kleberg, was born October 20, 1927, in San Antonio, Texas, and was raised on the King Ranch in Kingville, Texas. She attended Foxcroft School in Middleberg, Virginia, and later Vassar College. Groves is the president and on the board of various family foundations and has been the director and president of numerous horse and cattle associations, including lifetime vice president of the Texas and Southwest Cattle Raisers Association. She is the recipient of the prestigious Order of Australia, bestowed by the Governor General on behalf of the Queen, as well as many distinctive honors from museums, boards, and foundations. Groves is a successful rancher, raising Santa Gertrudis and crossbred cattle, and she continues to breed and race Thoroughbreds and Quarter Horses, primarily of the King Ranch AQHA registered strains. She is an avid quail hunter and resides in South Texas.
Bill Benson is a well-known chronicler of American ranching heritage. He documented the story of the famed 6666 and Triangle ranches in The Burnett Ranching Empire and the Waggoner Ranch in A Texas Legend. He has worked with Helen Kleberg Groves to archive her parents’ papers, records, and photographs. Benson, a native of Nebraska, is the former executive director of the Chisholm Trail Heritage Center in Duncan, Oklahoma, and the former director of the Texas and Southwestern Cattle Raisers Foundation and Museum in Fort Worth, Texas.