He investigated the 1988 shootings in Big Bend's Colorado Canyon and tried to understand the motives of the Mexican teenagers who terrorized three river rafters and killed one.
While a Texas Ranger, Jackson was instrumental in starting the career of country singer Johnny Rodriguez.
[2][3] Jackson was in several movies, namely as the character Sheriff Wes Wheeler in the 1995 motion picture The Good Old Boys with Tommy Lee Jones,[4] in the 1997 made-for-TV movie Rough Riders, and in a 1997 TV mini-series, Streets of Laredo, based on author Larry McMurtry's novel of the same title.
Jackson also served as a role model for Jeff Bridges' character Texas Ranger Marcus Hamilton in the 2016 film Hell or High Water and similarly for Nick Nolte's character Texas Ranger Jack Benteen in the 1987 film Extreme Prejudice.
Jackson was a member in the NRA Board of Directors and stated that he felt assault weapons, by which he meant fully-automatic machine guns (as clarified in a later statement), should be reserved for military and police use and that he is against high capacity magazines for those not in military or law enforcement.