Tex Watson and music lifestyle of the late 1960s. Soon Watson met some women who were in the Manson Family, and then met Charles Manson. Watson decided to join the Manson Family shortly afterwards. On August 9, 1969 as a member of the Manson Family, Watson went with Susan Atkins, Linda Kasabian, and Patricia Krenwinkel to a large estate on Cielo Drive in Hollywood, leased by movie director Roman Polanski and his wife, actress Sharon Tate. Polanski was in London, England working on a film on August 8th. At the home were Sharon Tate and her friends: hairdresser Jay Sebring, writer Wojciech
Manson Family Charles Watson soon joined the group at Spahn's ranch. Watson, a small-town Texan who had quit college and moved to California, met Manson at Dennis Wilson's house. Watson gave Wilson a ride while Wilson was hitchhiking after his car was wrecked. Spahn nicknamed Watson "Tex" because of his pronounced Texan drawl. In the first days of November 1968, Manson established the Family at alternative headquarters in Death Valley's environs, where they occupied two unused or little-used ranches, Myers and Barker. The former, to which the group had initially headed, was owned by the grandmother of a new woman (Catherine Gillies)