Historic Palestine
An illustrated history of the Palestine, Texas area, paired with the histories of companies, families and organizations that make the region great.
An illustrated history of the Palestine, Texas area, paired with the histories of companies, families and organizations that make the region great.
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HISTORIC PALESTINE<br />
An Illustrated History<br />
by Eric Dabney<br />
Commissioned by the Museum for East Texas Culture<br />
<strong>Historic</strong>al Publishing Network<br />
A division of Lammert Incorporated<br />
San Antonio, Texas
CONTENTS<br />
3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS<br />
4 PROLOGUE<br />
5 CHAPTER I a n e w l a n d<br />
10 CHAPTER II P a l e s t i n e , Te x a s<br />
16 CHAPTER III g r o w i n g u p<br />
23 CHAPTER IV a p r o p h e t i c v o i c e<br />
27 CHAPTER V l i f e i n t h e c i t y<br />
32 CHAPTER VI a c i t y f l o u r i s h e s<br />
37 CHAPTER VII a c u l t u r a l f a b r i c<br />
50 TEXAS TIMELINE<br />
56 BIBLIOGRAPHY<br />
57 SHARING THE HERITAGE<br />
First Edition<br />
Copyright © 2011 <strong>Historic</strong>al Publishing Network<br />
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without permission in writing<br />
from the publisher. All inquiries should be addressed to <strong>Historic</strong>al Publishing Network, 11535 Galm Road, Suite 101, San Antonio, Texas, 78254. Phone (800) 749-9790.<br />
ISBN: 9781935377672<br />
Library of Congress Card Catalog Number: 2011942250<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> <strong>Palestine</strong>: An Illustrated History<br />
author: Eric Dabney<br />
cover artist: Naomi Brotherton<br />
contributing writer for sharing the heritage: Garnette Bane<br />
<strong>Historic</strong>al Publishing Network<br />
president: Ron Lammert<br />
project manager: Curtis Courtney<br />
administration: Donna M. Mata, Melissa G. Quinn<br />
book sales: Dee Steidle<br />
production: Colin Hart, Evelyn Hart, Glenda Tarazon Krouse, Omar Wright<br />
2 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS<br />
Writing a book is a community project—and in a place like <strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas, the help and support and encouragement throughout<br />
such an endeavor is truly abundant simply because the people are so kind and generous with their time and talent. Therefore, very<br />
special thanks go to Museum Director Dan Dyer; Joy and Richard Phillips; Stuart Whitaker, who painstakingly scanned every Museum<br />
photograph in this book; African-American historian and friend June McCoy; Celsey Rodgers and Bhavil Patel; Theresa Holden at the<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Public Library; and Museum archivist and friend Lizzi Langenkamp.<br />
The writings of Norris White, Bob Bowman, Beverly Odom, Louise Goff, James Smith, Bonnie Woolverton, Mike Thomason, Jack<br />
Selden, and June Welch were rich with detail, while the voluminous narratives of Mary Kate Hunter and the work of courthouse historian<br />
James Neyland and <strong>Palestine</strong> historian Carl Avera were invaluable in their telling of the history of the area and providing a clear<br />
understanding of its many nuances and personal stories. Throughout the book, many of the earliest and most descriptive quotes about<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> and its people come from the pens of both Carl Avera and Mary Kate Hunter and are noted in the text.<br />
❖<br />
Mary Kate Hunter, c. 1930. Hunter was born outside <strong>Palestine</strong> in 1866 and tirelessly “recorded, promoted and preserved” much of the <strong>Palestine</strong> and Anderson County’s first century<br />
through detailed interviews regarding its people, places and events. She was a student at the <strong>Palestine</strong> Female Academy and became an accomplished pianist. She was also a charter<br />
member of the city’s Self-Culture Club and organized <strong>Palestine</strong>’s Equal Suffrage Association. Upon her death in 1945, she left her vast collection of historical materials to the <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
Public Library, where it remains today in the Mary Kate Hunter Special Collections Room.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
A c k n o w l e d g m e n t s ✦ 3
PROLOGUE<br />
“The past is not merely prologue. It is with us still.” – Walter Edgar<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>—a city well-known both for its outstanding hospitality and abundant lush parks and<br />
forests filled with dazzling magnolias and dogwoods—is truly a place where history has found a<br />
hallowed home. It frames a great window into the American past and seems renewed in its sense of<br />
preservation by residents who have remained genuinely proud to honor the city’s deep roots, which<br />
run across generations of hearty pioneers and visionary leaders who have called this place home since<br />
the mid-nineteenth century.<br />
After it was established in 1846 by courageous families who had settled along its wild frontier,<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> grew steadily as a hub of culture, commerce and community and would serve to link the<br />
current and former towns of Anderson County, which include Cayuga, Elkhart, Frankston, Montalba,<br />
Neches, Slocum, Tucker, Long Lake, Tennessee Colony, Plentitude, Flint Hill, Mound Prairie, Bethel,<br />
Blackfoot, Brushy Creek, Fosterville, Pert, Salmon, Alderbranch, Swanson Hill, and Providence, for<br />
generations to come.<br />
Today, whether it is for a visit to discover more about the history and people of Anderson County,<br />
the museums, old buildings, descriptive plaques, historical markers and grand old cemeteries are<br />
abundant. A leisurely stroll downtown to browse among antique shops like Star of Texas and Duncan<br />
Depot, hometown bookstores like Mary’s Books, or to see the award-winning collection of paintings<br />
inside The Art Depot will eventually give way to an admiration for the historic buildings, homes and<br />
landmark churches that line the streets of the city. Whether it is to enjoy a piece of pie at the Oxbow<br />
Bakery and General Store in Old Town, grab a bite to eat at Chip’s Burger Ranch or Eilenberger’s<br />
Bakery, or just take a peaceful drive through the other-worldly beauty of Davey Dogwood Park, this<br />
is a city filled with life and history and pride of place.<br />
Could those nineteenth-century city planners, pioneering farmers, tireless laborers, hopeful businessmen,<br />
dedicated educational leaders, and so many others who helped create this city nearly two<br />
centuries ago have imagined what they were ultimately building for the future? Could they have realized<br />
that their home would one day be regarded by many as the “Gateway to East Texas” and the<br />
“Queen City of the East?” Could they sense something of the pride and honor that twenty-first-century<br />
residents would one day place upon their home and its forefathers?<br />
This is the story of such a city and its compelling history.<br />
4 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
C H A P T E R<br />
A NEW LAND<br />
I<br />
I look across the lapse of near a century to find the beginning of Fort Houston. I see nature in her<br />
wild state embellishing the earth with vines and grass and flowers. I hear the hoofbeat of<br />
heavy animals and the scurrying of wild tiny feet hurrying away before the onrush of civilization;<br />
and I hear the distant echo of the advance…the spirit of the pioneer—a spirit of fearlessness<br />
and daring, which cannot be understood by those who do not possess it.<br />
– Mrs. Walter A. Patrick, 1926<br />
With its nearly perfect geographical location as the centerpiece of historic Anderson County in<br />
hilly East Texas, the county seat of <strong>Palestine</strong> is a thriving community that has drawn travelers to its<br />
beautiful forests, serene countrysides and cultural charm since the county was founded in 1846.<br />
Celebrated local historian Mary Kate Hunter (1866-1945) wrote of the area, “[It is] one of those<br />
wooded East Texas Counties, with red hills, tall pines, giants oaks, the autumn-radiant sweetgum,<br />
and an endless variety of trees; where not even highway engineers have been able to level and destroy<br />
the beauty of the up-hill and down-hill of the winding red roads.”<br />
The Trinity and Neches rivers border the western and eastern edges of the county respectively, and<br />
feed the surrounding countryside with a variety of sandy, clay and black soils known as Fuquay-<br />
Kirvin-Darco to form an area rich with beautiful, forested swaths of pine and hardwood timbers that<br />
include the mighty post and red oaks as well as groves of pecan, walnut, hickory, elm, and ash.<br />
Flourishing pastureland composes much of the county itself, which lies in the Texas Claypan area<br />
and the East Texas Timberlands of the Southern Coastal Plains.<br />
Native Texas tribes such as Caddo, Atakapan, Karankawan, Coahuiltecan, Jumano, and Apacheans had<br />
established themselves across the region by the time European explorers encountered them in the 1500s.<br />
In his detailed research of the prehistory of East Texas and Native American tribes, historian Norris<br />
White, Jr., places the earliest inhabitants of the region, the Caddo Indians, in present-day <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
and Anderson County as early as 600 A.D., “a fully developed culture and society. They were<br />
❖<br />
In 1853, Secretary of War Jefferson<br />
Davis received a message from<br />
Lieutenant Whitting that the Trinity<br />
River, shown here in 2011, was the<br />
“deepest and had fewer obstacles than<br />
any other river in Texas.”<br />
PHOTO BY SHELLEY DABNEY.<br />
C h a p t e r I ✦ 5
❖<br />
Caddo artisans were arguably<br />
regarded as the finest pottery makers<br />
in pre-Columbian North America.<br />
Both vases date to the Middle Caddo<br />
Period (1200 A.D.-1500 A.D.) and<br />
are typical of Caddo pottery found in<br />
the Quashita River basin in<br />
southwestern Arkansas, the Caddo<br />
homeland. The vessels were donated<br />
to <strong>Palestine</strong>’s Museum for East Texas<br />
Culture from the estate of the late<br />
Jonathan Paul Hodges.<br />
PHOTO AND CAPTION COURTESY OF<br />
NORRIS WHITE.<br />
agriculturalist, skilled artisans, traders,<br />
astronomers, and mound builders.”<br />
In 1690, Spaniards established a mission in<br />
the area. Tribes including the Comanche,<br />
Kiowa, Tonkawa, Wichita, Cherokee and<br />
Kickapoo later migrated or were forced from<br />
their native lands into the state. By the late<br />
1700s and into the early 1800s, tribes including<br />
the Comanche, Kichai, Kickapoo, Waco, and<br />
Tawakonis were settling along the Trinity River<br />
near present-day <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
A variety of creeks and streams carrying<br />
modern names such as Hurricane, Lone, Brushy,<br />
Massey, Mansion, and Keechie were not only a<br />
treasure to the area’s human inhabitants, but<br />
also its abundant wildlife. This fertile land that<br />
includes present-day Anderson County had<br />
originally been granted in treaty to tribes<br />
including the Cherokees, Delawares, native<br />
Caddo, and Kickapoo by previous governments<br />
and would remain so only until 1840.<br />
Colonists officially arrived in the territory<br />
when Stephen F. Austin was allowed to begin<br />
colonization of Texas by the Mexican government<br />
in 1821. David Gouverneur Burnet (1788-1870),<br />
who would later serve as interim president of the<br />
Republic of Texas in 1836 and vice-president in<br />
1838, and was named Texas’ first Secretary of<br />
State in 1846, requested an empresario grant in<br />
which he would serve as a land agent to establish<br />
Burnet’s Colony in east Texas in 1826. Small<br />
settlements began to spring up across the area<br />
that would later become Anderson County and<br />
included Magnolia, Parker’s Bluff, Tennessee<br />
Colony, Fort Houston, and Mound Prairie.<br />
When word of the pioneering effort taking<br />
place in this wild and new frontier reached<br />
ordained minister and Illinois state senator<br />
Daniel Parker (1781-1844) and his brother<br />
James in 1832, they traveled to Texas to apply<br />
for a land grant with the Mexican government<br />
that would establish for themselves and their<br />
families and like-minded friends a new Baptist<br />
church organization.<br />
At the time, it was unlawful to organize a new<br />
Protestant church body in the territory because<br />
of the government’s longstanding Catholic<br />
heritage, and the Parkers were denied their<br />
request. Though discouraged, they were<br />
undeterred and made the arduous journey<br />
home to Illinois, where they met with a small<br />
group of family members and neighbors to<br />
establish the Pilgrim Predestinarian Regular<br />
Baptist Church on July 26, 1833.<br />
6 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
By the time of their departure in the early fall<br />
of that same year, historians record that the newly<br />
established church group may have included as<br />
many as twenty-five ox-drawn wagons on their<br />
return to settle in Texas. Notably, the large<br />
caravan was joined by Silas and Lucy Parker,<br />
whose daughter Cynthia Ann (c. 1825-c. 1871),<br />
later gave birth to the great Comanche warrior<br />
and chief, Quanah Parker (c. 1845-1911).<br />
The church and its members entered Texas<br />
and held their first church meeting in Stephen F.<br />
Austin’s Colony on January 20, 1834, under the<br />
direction of Elder Daniel Parker. They<br />
ultimately settled along San Pedro Creek in<br />
Houston County, established what historians<br />
consider one of the oldest forts in the state,<br />
Brown’s Fort, and built their first church.<br />
In 1834 Reverend Parker’s brother, John,<br />
moved with his wife, Sara, and their three sons<br />
further west to the headwaters of the Navasota<br />
River and established Fort Parker at Groesbeck<br />
in Limestone County. The fort, today a state<br />
historic site, would become well-known for a<br />
deadly raid by Native American warriors on the<br />
John Parker family, including Cynthia Parker,<br />
and other settlers at the fort in 1836. Historian<br />
Bob Bowman wrote that the legendary story<br />
remains a “slice of history almost as riveting as<br />
the Alamo” and notes that it took survivors of<br />
the massacre six days to make the 60-mile<br />
journey to safety behind the walls of the newly<br />
constructed Fort Houston in Anderson County.<br />
On July 4, 1835, Reverend Daniel Parker<br />
established a new home and branch of his original<br />
church group and held the first church service<br />
near present-day Elkhart, on a site that remains<br />
today as Pilgrim Church—considered the oldest<br />
continuous Protestant church in the state.<br />
Settlers including Williston Ewing and Joseph<br />
Jordan, himself a member of the Parker<br />
immigration to Texas and recorded as a “new<br />
member” of the Parker’s church at Claiborne<br />
Parish, Louisiana, in October 1833, developed<br />
land a few miles west of present-day <strong>Palestine</strong> in<br />
the early summer of 1835. W. L. McDonald joined<br />
Jordan in surveying a townsite at the location.<br />
A small community formed in the area, which<br />
historian Stephen Moore describes in Taming Texas<br />
as fertile land with “a magnificent spring where<br />
tradition has it that the water gushed forth from the<br />
earth,” and the town of Houston was established.<br />
At the same time, the battle for Texas<br />
independence was ablaze across the land. On<br />
November 2, 1835, Texas seceded from Mexico<br />
and Dictator Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna<br />
ordered a military offensive across the state in<br />
hopes of quashing the rebellion. However, with<br />
cries of “Remember the Alamo!” and “Remember<br />
Goliad!” still ringing across the land, Texans<br />
rallied in their legendary battle for independence<br />
at the decisive, eighteen-minute battle of San<br />
Jacinto led by General Sam Houston and the<br />
Republic of Texas was born in 1836.<br />
Small settlements could be found in what is<br />
now Anderson County by the time Fort Houston<br />
was ordered to be built by General Sam Houston<br />
(1793-1863), who served as commander-in-chief<br />
of the Texas armies, was a two-term president of<br />
the Republic of Texas and later a United States<br />
Senator. The fort was built on the public square of<br />
the growing community of Houston, a town that<br />
would flourish and endure for a time after the fort<br />
ceased to exist, to serve as a protective barrier<br />
against local Native American tribes. It consisted<br />
of a stockade built by Texas Rangers and a twentyfive-foot-square<br />
blockhouse built of heavy logs. It<br />
was used in the defense of a massive area of land<br />
along the frontier from 1836 to 1839, and was<br />
under the command of General Nathaniel, who<br />
oversaw the building of the fort.<br />
❖<br />
The heartbreaking story of the life of<br />
Cynthia Ann Parker, which first began<br />
on a raid at her family’s settlement at<br />
Fort Parker, is commemorated along an<br />
outdoor wall of history near downtown<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> that includes the stories of<br />
several of the area’s landmark events<br />
and people. The story of Parker and<br />
her family may have also inspired one<br />
of John Wayne’s most dramatic movies,<br />
The Searchers, in 1956 and was the<br />
subject of a 2006 biography, Return, by<br />
former mayor of <strong>Palestine</strong> and<br />
historian Jack Selden.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
C h a p t e r I ✦ 7
❖<br />
A log structure, the first church built<br />
by the Parker family and members of<br />
the Pilgrim Predestinarian Regular<br />
Baptist Church was completed in<br />
December 1848. Pictured is the fourth<br />
structure on the same site, erected in<br />
1949 and reconstructed in 1997. The<br />
Parker family graveyard adjoins the<br />
site and includes historic memorials to<br />
Daniel Parker and his brother James,<br />
the founder of Fort Parker. Of the<br />
location, Mary Kate Hunter wrote,<br />
“Before the creation of the county,<br />
[Fort Houston and the Pilgrim Church<br />
settlement] were the most important<br />
settlements in the territory.”<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
In the fall of 1838, General Thomas Jefferson<br />
Rusk (1803-1857), an original signer of the Texas<br />
Declaration of Independence in 1836 and later<br />
president pro tem of the United States Senate in<br />
1857, led a successful campaign against hostile<br />
Indians and Mexicans camped near present-day<br />
Frankston on the Kickapoo Battlefield, and the<br />
removal of local Native American tribes in eastern<br />
Texas was complete by 1841. Thus, the area that<br />
would ultimately become Anderson County<br />
began welcoming an increasing number of<br />
pioneer settlers from around the country.<br />
Mary Kate Hunter writes, “A stream of<br />
immigration poured into East Texas, not the<br />
rough and ready type one would expect in<br />
frontier settlements, but from the southern<br />
states came people of the highest type—<br />
descendants of some of the proudest families in<br />
8 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
America—aristocrats from the old south…a few<br />
rode through the wilderness in silver mounted<br />
carriage…others came in covered wagons.”<br />
By 1840, the Houston settlement itself would<br />
include a post office, Temperance Society,<br />
church and Sunday school programs, and the<br />
general store of future <strong>Palestine</strong> businessman<br />
Alexander Joost.<br />
On July 4, 1845, members of the Texas<br />
Congress and convention delegates met to debate<br />
annexation to the United States or independence<br />
recognized by Mexico. Annexation was approved<br />
and the historic land was celebrated as the<br />
twenty-eighth state admitted to the Union.<br />
❖<br />
Top: The original site of nearby Fort<br />
Houston is commemorated by two<br />
markers in the twenty-first century. The<br />
fort was built by the Republic of Texas<br />
in 1835-1836 to protect settlers of the<br />
town of Houston. Men from Houston<br />
established one of the first ranger units<br />
in Texas. The fort was abandoned<br />
around 1841 and the site later became<br />
part of John Reagan’s farm.<br />
PHOTO BY JULIA DABNEY.<br />
Middle: After Joseph Jordan and<br />
William McDonald donated five<br />
hundred acres for the town of Houston<br />
in 1835, the townsite included a public<br />
burying ground. Fort Houston<br />
Cemetery remains in 2011 as “the only<br />
physical evidence of the early frontier<br />
town.” The historic cemetery includes a<br />
section of graves for soldiers of the<br />
Republic of Texas, the Battle of San<br />
Jacinto, and the War of 1812, as well<br />
as the grave of the first commander of<br />
Fort Houston, General Nathaniel<br />
Smith, a close friend of Sam Houston.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
Bottom, left: A sketch of Fort Houston<br />
by Robert Howarton.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Bottom, right: This marker near<br />
Frankston commemorates the site of<br />
the Kickapoo Battlefield.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
C h a p t e r I ✦ 9
C H A P T E R<br />
I I<br />
PALESTINE, TEXAS<br />
❖<br />
The refurbished “Old Town” section of<br />
twenty-first-century <strong>Palestine</strong> includes<br />
the historic Gatewood-Shelton Gin<br />
Company, which stands at the<br />
approximate location of the 1830s<br />
trading post and gristmill established<br />
by Shelton and Fulton in the 1830s.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
“From a fort, to a log pole store in an open field, to a town of great houses and<br />
spacious lawns, is the story of <strong>Palestine</strong>.” – Carl Avera<br />
Settlers near Fort Houston and its surrounding communities soon joined their neighbors to sign<br />
a petition requesting the First Legislature of the newly formed state to establish a new county in<br />
1846. By this time, the area that included present-day Anderson County had grown to comprise<br />
Nacogdoches, Houston, and Cherokee Counties and residents soon “found that their large territory<br />
was becoming unwieldy and inconvenient for holding courts and elections.”<br />
For a brief period in the early 1840’s, the land carved from this massive territory was the Burnet<br />
Colony, recognized in several legal transactions of the time as “Burnet county,” then Nacogdoches<br />
County, and finally Houston County with Fort Houston and its townsite, Houston. However, the<br />
Supreme Court of the Republic of Texas eventually declared that “all counties organized for judicial<br />
purposes were unconstitutional, and all transactions of such illegal and void,” and a new county<br />
would have to be created under the law.<br />
After Isaac Parker introduced a bill to form a new county, on March 24, 1846, Anderson County<br />
was named in honor of Kenneth Lewis Anderson (1805-1845), who served as a Congressional<br />
member of the Republic of Texas from 1841 to 1842 and was its last vice-president, presiding over<br />
the historic meeting of the Senate in June of 1845 when annexation was approved.<br />
When Anderson County was officially founded by the state’s first Legislature, the towns of Fort Houston<br />
and Mound Prairie offered their communities as the official county seat. Prominent leaders including<br />
Micham Main, James Box and John Parker, a native of <strong>Palestine</strong>, Illinois, and himself among the handful<br />
of attendees at the first meeting of the Parker’s original church meeting in Illinois in 1833, debated the<br />
choices for the new county seat and eventually decided upon a hundred-acre tract of land that was<br />
originally part of the Samuel G. Wells Headright League and offered by entrepreneurs William Bigelow and<br />
J. R. Fulton for $500. Fulton and Bigelow were among the first to establish a log pole store and trading<br />
post in the area in the 1830s.<br />
1 0 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
Though the site would have otherwise<br />
remained “the cotton field it was of yore,” it was<br />
also suited for the new city because of the legal<br />
requirement that it be established closer to the<br />
geographic center of the county. The act creating<br />
the county had included the statement, “In no<br />
event shall the county seat of said county be<br />
located more than three miles from the center of<br />
said county.” <strong>Palestine</strong> was established as the<br />
county seat and the town of Fort Houston would<br />
miss the mark by just one-fourth of a mile.<br />
Johnston Shelton completed his survey of the<br />
townsite for <strong>Palestine</strong> on October 15, 1846.<br />
History records the names of two men, John<br />
Parker and Micham Main, either one of whom<br />
may have christened the city to honor his native<br />
home in Illinois, and <strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas, was born.<br />
Anderson County’s first county officials<br />
included Chief Justice Darius Edens, Sheriff<br />
Peyton Parker, District Clerk Alexander<br />
McClure, and County Clerk John Grigsby.<br />
Stagecoaches carrying passengers and news<br />
from Galveston left from every corner of the<br />
square and businesses quickly found a home<br />
around the square itself. There was a post office<br />
on the south block and the Hunter and Osceola<br />
Hotels were on the northeast corner.<br />
Specifications for the first county jail were<br />
completed in October 1846 and amended in<br />
November before it was completed at Market<br />
Street, southeast of the courthouse square, on<br />
February 22, 1847. It was replaced by a striking<br />
two-story limestone building with a large tower<br />
and clock donated by Colonel George Anderson<br />
Wright in 1879. The building was located on<br />
Avenue A, southwest of the courthouse square,<br />
and was used until 1931. The art deco style<br />
building was often mistaken by visitors for a<br />
hotel before it was replaced by a modern jail on<br />
Lacy Street in 1982.<br />
“Nestled snugly around the courthouse<br />
square,” (Avera) the city of <strong>Palestine</strong> quickly<br />
grew as a cultural center in the new state.<br />
❖<br />
Above: Anderson County’s second jail<br />
(1879-1931) in <strong>Palestine</strong>, c. 1900.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Below: Anderson County’s third jail<br />
(1931-1982) in <strong>Palestine</strong>, pictured<br />
here in 2011.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
C h a p t e r I I ✦ 1 1
Courthouse historian James Neyland wrote that<br />
the first session of the Anderson County court<br />
was called in downtown <strong>Palestine</strong> in July 1846<br />
“outdoors under the oak trees on the north side<br />
of the square” until the building of the first<br />
courthouse was completed in May at the north<br />
end of the east side of the square. It was later<br />
enlarged in 1848.<br />
The second courthouse, a two-story brick<br />
building constructed between 1852 and 1856,<br />
was in the middle of the square (which was<br />
actually in the shape of an octagon until 1913).<br />
It was made of native Anderson county brick<br />
from the brickmaking plant of O. C. Terrell and<br />
❖<br />
Top: Anderson County’s second<br />
courthouse, c. 1870. Historian James<br />
Neyland wrote of this courthouse, “[It]<br />
had seen not only the Civil War and<br />
Reconstruction period but also the<br />
coming of the railroad…Old Town<br />
and New Town…Avenue A…a horsedrawn<br />
streetcar…[and] a boisterous<br />
boomtown, growing from a population<br />
of about 700 into a city of thousands<br />
within a few short years.”<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Middle: The marble cornerstone of the<br />
1885 courthouse stands nearly hidden<br />
outside the courthouse steps<br />
in 2011.<br />
PHOTO BY EMILY DABNEY.<br />
Bottom: Anderson County’s<br />
third courthouse opened in 1886.<br />
COURTESY OF STUART WHITAKER.<br />
1 2 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
Left: Weary firemen stand at the<br />
courthouse square on the morning<br />
after fire raged through Anderson<br />
County’s third courthouse in 1913.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Below: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Daily Visitor<br />
ran this headline of the destructive<br />
fire that claimed Anderson County’s<br />
third courthouse in 1913.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
cost $6,000. After it was completed, the original<br />
courthouse was sold and became a mercantile<br />
store. The enclosed yard that surrounded the<br />
courthouse was also planted with trees and<br />
grass, making it, as Judge A. J. Fowler<br />
remembered, “a place for a nice retreat on<br />
pleasant summer night for the citizens, after the<br />
labors of the day are over to meet in social<br />
intercourse, abandoning for the hour, as they<br />
should, all care of business.”<br />
By 1884, the second courthouse had<br />
deteriorated so badly that it was deemed unsafe<br />
by building inspectors and the county rented a<br />
nearby office building on the west side of the<br />
square until a third courthouse was completed<br />
in May of 1886. As demolition of the second<br />
courthouse began in 1885, the Galveston News<br />
reported the scene, “A thousand sad and<br />
pleasant memories cling about this time<br />
honored relic…and a few hours hence not a<br />
brick or shingle will be left to<br />
murmur…Farewell, revered old temple of law<br />
and learning; there be white-headed men and<br />
women, here and there, who live to dream of<br />
thy fresh and palmy days.”<br />
When the third courthouse opened in 1886,<br />
the Galveston News again reported, “It is one of<br />
the prettiest and best planned for the purpose<br />
intended and well-constructed public buildings<br />
in the state, and cost about $40,000.”<br />
Tragically, much of the third courthouse was<br />
destroyed by a fire set by two men in the early<br />
morning hours of January 6, 1913. Percy<br />
C h a p t e r I I ✦ 1 3
❖<br />
Above: The first registered license tag<br />
for an automobile in <strong>Palestine</strong> is now<br />
housed in the archives of the Museum<br />
for East Texas Culture.<br />
Right: The first registered automobile,<br />
a 1902 Oldsmobile Rambler, made its<br />
debut in <strong>Palestine</strong> in 1903. It was<br />
won in a raffle by local blacksmith<br />
Charles R. Stewart, who soon gave it<br />
to J. V. Prather, owner of the local<br />
gunsmith shop.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Below: An early depiction of<br />
Anderson County’s fourth and<br />
present courthouse.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
1 4 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
Wynne and Arthur Smalley had been charged<br />
with burglarizing a local pool hall and Smalley<br />
suggested that they should burn the<br />
incriminating paperwork that awaited them in<br />
the courthouse. Wynne hid nearby while<br />
Smalley poured oil inside the courthouse and<br />
set it ablaze. <strong>Palestine</strong>’s Daily Visitor reported on<br />
the scene, “The whole city was illuminated<br />
bright as day.”<br />
Anderson County’s present courthouse was<br />
nearly complete when it was dedicated on the<br />
historic square in <strong>Palestine</strong> on December 20,<br />
1914. A century later, the classic structure<br />
remains “shining on the hill.” By the 1980’s,<br />
need for more space in which to store the<br />
massive collection of county records that had<br />
been previously kept in the dome of the<br />
building led to the acquisition of the city’s<br />
Federal Building, which was built in 1914, to<br />
become the courthouse annex. A new<br />
courthouse annex was built on Mallard Street<br />
in 2005.<br />
❖<br />
Left: The Anderson County<br />
Courthouse, pictured here in 2011,<br />
was listed in the National Register of<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Places by the U.S.<br />
Department of the Interior in 1992.<br />
The courthouse was renovated in<br />
1986 through a grant from the Texas<br />
<strong>Historic</strong>al Commission and<br />
improvements to its grounds<br />
commenced in 1988.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
Below: Important historical markers<br />
stand vigil on the grounds around the<br />
Anderson County courthouse in 2011<br />
and include the stories of <strong>Palestine</strong>’s<br />
Confederate Salt Works, Governor<br />
Thomas Mitchell Campbell, Micham<br />
Main, the Anderson County<br />
Courthouse, and a military memorial<br />
honoring those from Anderson County<br />
who gave their lives in World War I,<br />
World War II, Korea, and Vietnam.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
C h a p t e r I I ✦ 1 5
C H A P T E R<br />
I I I<br />
GROWING UP<br />
❖<br />
Among the city’s oldest homeplaces is<br />
the Mallard home, pictured here in<br />
the 1950’s. Judge Mallard died here in<br />
1854. Originally built in 1848, it<br />
remains the oldest home in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
“In this part of East Texas almost anything that is stuck in the ground will grow; the roses, flowers, crepe<br />
myrtle trees that adorn the yards here are a show in themselves.” – Mary Kate Hunter<br />
As settlers moved into the new and exciting city, church congregations began to gather for weekly<br />
services at the temporary courthouse to hear visiting circuit riders. Historian Carl Avera writes, “In<br />
1846, since there was no established church plant, the people all worshipped together in the<br />
courthouse when the circuit rider came to town. [They] were a noble breed, fording streams, riding<br />
through Indian country and braving every danger to bring the gospel into the wilderness settlements.<br />
As there was no church bell in 1846, the worshippers were called together by the continued blasts<br />
of a cow horn.”<br />
By the early fall of 1846, Anderson County’s first tax was levied and the construction of roads<br />
began, a courtroom and jail “with an underground dungeon” were under way, and the first District<br />
court for the county met on November 9. In the following year, a post office opened. A local 1848<br />
census recorded the bustling town’s population at nearly 200 people, and J.A. Clark debuted the city’s<br />
first major newspaper, The Trinity Advocate, in September 1849.<br />
A school was established by the Masons along Rusk Road in 1850 and was followed in 1852 by<br />
the Red Brick schoolhouse, a girls’ school that flourished as it welcomed students from several nearby<br />
counties. The <strong>Palestine</strong> Female Institute, which joined another well-respected academy in the county<br />
at nearby Mound Prairie, was founded in 1858 as citizens of the city subscribed stock for its<br />
construction on land donated by Reuben A. Reeves (1821-1908), associate justice of the Texas<br />
Supreme Court and member of the state’s 1866 Constitutional Convention, and Paul and Mary<br />
Simons. The school offered courses in literature, music, art and telegraphy and was renamed<br />
1 6 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
Top, left: Among the first to build a<br />
church in <strong>Palestine</strong> was the Methodist<br />
denomination. Originally located on<br />
North Mallard Street, it was named<br />
Bascom Chapel to honor the life of the<br />
late Bishop Henry B. Bascom and<br />
welcomed all denominations to use the<br />
facility for their church services. The<br />
illustration, by Dr. Henry J. Hunter at<br />
the age of twelve in 1850, and story<br />
here are among the unpublished<br />
papers of local historian Mary<br />
Kate Hunter.<br />
COURTESY OF THE PALESTINE PUBLIC LIBRARY,<br />
SPECIAL COLLECTIONS.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Female College after a new charter<br />
was established in 1876. The college was<br />
eventually transferred to the city’s public school<br />
system in 1881.<br />
Businesses began to dominate <strong>Palestine</strong>’s<br />
public square nearly from the moment it came<br />
into existence and commerce was thriving. By<br />
1852, the Hunter House Hotel had opened to<br />
wide acclaim on the northeast corner of the<br />
square. Kentucky native Judge John Graham<br />
Gooch brought little more than his vast<br />
collection of books to <strong>Palestine</strong> and soon<br />
opened the city’s first free circulating library<br />
from his home in 1853. By 1866, twelve drygoods<br />
stores were already prospering.<br />
From the beginning, Anderson County<br />
was well-known for its several ports along<br />
the Trinity River—all having a profound<br />
impact upon not only the economy of the<br />
Top, right: Methodist missionaries first<br />
arrived in the area as circuit-riding<br />
preachers in the late 1830’s and built<br />
their first church in <strong>Palestine</strong> in 1850.<br />
Pictured here is Centenary Methodist<br />
Church, named in honor of<br />
Methodism’s 100th anniversary, which<br />
opened in 1884. The congregation<br />
later divided to form First United<br />
Methodist Church and Grace United<br />
Methodist Church.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Below: St. Phillip’s Episcopal Church,<br />
shown here in 2011, was established<br />
in 1859 and opened the congregation’s<br />
first church in 1874. It was destroyed<br />
by fire in 1982 and rebuilt in 1983.<br />
PHOTO BY JULIA DABNEY.<br />
C h a p t e r I I I ✦ 1 7
❖<br />
The First Presbyterian Church was<br />
organized in <strong>Palestine</strong> in 1849 and<br />
the Gothic-style building, shown here<br />
in 1900 and in 2011, was dedicated<br />
on Avenue A in 1888.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
area but also the growth in population<br />
as visitors traveled up and down the busy river.<br />
These famous ports of call included Bonner’s<br />
Ferry, Magnolia Ferry, and Parker’s Bluff.<br />
Paddle-wheel steamers traveling up the<br />
mighty Trinity River were often docked at<br />
Magnolia, “the little St. Louis on the Trinity,”<br />
and brought a variety of products to eager<br />
consumers throughout the county. The port was<br />
founded around 1847 as a ferrying point on the<br />
Caddo Trace and eventually became a major<br />
landing site for flatboats and steamers making<br />
their way along the river.<br />
The only stop between Dallas and Galveston,<br />
Magnolia included several hundred residents<br />
and a variety of merchants and hotels by 1863.<br />
The town’s warehouses were often “packed with<br />
up to five thousand bales of cotton” awaiting the<br />
arrival of steamboats with colorful names like<br />
Black Cloud, Lone Star, The Mustang, Captain<br />
Peacock, The Texas Ranger, Early Bird, A. S.<br />
Ruthven, The Lucy Gwin, and Belle of Texas.<br />
1 8 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
Left: The congregation of First Baptist<br />
Church was originally organized in<br />
1851 and built their first sanctuary in<br />
1853. The Avenue A (or “Nickel”)<br />
Baptist Church building, shown here<br />
in the 1920’s, was built through a<br />
nickel fundraiser and was completed<br />
in 1887. A new sanctuary on<br />
Sycamore Street replaced the church<br />
in 1912 after it was destroyed by fire.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Below: A marker along North Perry<br />
Street commemorates the site of the<br />
city’s first lending library and the<br />
establishment of the Masonic<br />
group’s <strong>Palestine</strong> Female Institute here<br />
in 1858.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Among the county’s most prolific and<br />
well-respected pioneer steamboat men, and later<br />
county commissioner and mayor of <strong>Palestine</strong>,<br />
was George Anderson Wright. In September<br />
1927, the Dallas Morning News related Wright’s<br />
historic role in the life of the ferry and the great<br />
importance the Trinity River played in the life of<br />
East Texas as a trans-river traffic way. Wright<br />
said, “As far back as I can remember [Bonner’s<br />
Ferry, Parker’s Bluff and Magnolia] were in<br />
C h a p t e r I I I ✦ 1 9
❖<br />
Top: Kolstad’s Jewelry, believed to be<br />
the first business of its kind to open<br />
west of the Mississippi and the oldest<br />
retail store in continuous operation by<br />
its founding family in the state of<br />
Texas, ultimately settled into the<br />
location pictured here at the corner of<br />
Oak and Sycamore in 1933.<br />
Norwegian born founder Soren<br />
Kolstad (1823-1918) arrived in Texas<br />
in 1852 and opened the store the<br />
following year.<br />
PHOTO BY EMILY DABNEY.<br />
Middle: Among the city’s first stores<br />
was the A. Joost Cheap Cash Store,<br />
pictured here around 1875, on the<br />
courthouse square at 601 E. Lacy.<br />
Before moving to this location near<br />
the courthouse, Alexander Joost had<br />
operated his store at Fort Houston.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Bottom: The successful effort by John<br />
Gooch to make books available for the<br />
citizens of <strong>Palestine</strong> in 1853<br />
eventually led to a city library that<br />
was later replaced by this structure in<br />
1914 with the help of the Carnegie<br />
Foundation. The <strong>Palestine</strong> Carnegie<br />
Library, noted by Mary Kate Hunter<br />
as “not outclassed in its selection of<br />
books by any public library,” was<br />
listed in the National Register of<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Places by the U.S.<br />
Department of the Interior in 1988.<br />
PHOTO BY CLAIRE DABNEY.<br />
2 0 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
Top, left: Cotton was king in East<br />
Texas and Magnolia “reigned queen of<br />
the river” (Avera) as a major port<br />
along the Trinity.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Top, right: The steamboat A. S.<br />
Ruthven was both a passenger and<br />
cargo ship that arrived on the Trinity<br />
in 1860 and was often seen in ports at<br />
Parker’s Bluff and Magnolia. It had a<br />
capacity for 900 bales of cotton and<br />
made its final journey from Galveston<br />
into Anderson County in 1872. It<br />
later sunk in the Trinity River at<br />
Parker’s Bluff. The ship’s anchor was<br />
retrieved fifty year later and now<br />
stands as a memorial at Spring Street<br />
near downtown <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
PHOTO BY RUTH MOORE.<br />
Middle: A steamer appears<br />
around a bend in the Trinity River<br />
near Magnolia in the late<br />
nineteenth century.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
existence. And that’s pretty far back, for I crossed<br />
Bonner’s Ferry first when I was 10 years old.<br />
They charged from 50 cents to $1.50 for a twohorse<br />
wagon, the price varying with the stage of<br />
the river. And at these ferries were landed boats<br />
from Galveston, bringing groceries, such as flour,<br />
salt, sugar and coffee and whiskey…Magnolia<br />
was the principal cotton shipping point…when<br />
the river was too low for boat traffic the cotton<br />
was hauled overland to Houston or Galveston<br />
with four yokes of oxen drawing each wagon. It<br />
took six weeks to make the trip.”<br />
Trains replaced riverboats as the preferred<br />
mode of transportation from the late 1870’s and<br />
into the 1880s and small port communities<br />
such as Old Magnolia soon declined throughout<br />
the state.<br />
Bottom: An historical marker is all<br />
that remains near the site of<br />
Magnolia. Historian Carl Avera wrote<br />
of the place, “The river runs swiftly<br />
and hums its quiet tune as it rushes<br />
past Magnolia to Galveston. The only<br />
thing afloat is a fallen branch of an<br />
ancient tree.”<br />
PHOTO BY JULIA DABNEY.<br />
C h a p t e r I I I ✦ 2 1
❖<br />
Top: The Colonel George Anderson<br />
Wright home was located at 900<br />
South Sycamore. Wright’s family<br />
settled at Fort Houston in 1839 before<br />
they moved to a farm at Mound<br />
Prairie and built the county’s first gin<br />
mill. Wright was born on the farm in<br />
1846 and his father, the first County<br />
Commissioner, gave him the middle<br />
name Anderson to honor the creation<br />
of the new county. Colonel Wright<br />
operated ferries across the area.<br />
When U.S. President Benjamin<br />
Harrison visited the county in 1896,<br />
Wright, with a strong resemblance to<br />
the President, spent 40 minutes as a<br />
stand-in waving to passersby from the<br />
back of the President’s train so he<br />
could have breakfast in peace.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Middle: Dr. H. H. Link came to the<br />
area in 1846 and built his family’s<br />
first home at this site around 1851.<br />
His son, Dr. Henry Link, later<br />
enlarged the Greek revival home<br />
in 1912.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Bottom: Colonel George Robert<br />
Howard moved to this Greek Revivalstyle<br />
home, built in 1848 by Judge<br />
Reuben Reeves, in 1851. The Howard<br />
House, the third oldest home in the<br />
city, was sold to the city to be used as<br />
a museum in 1964 and was listed in<br />
the National Register of <strong>Historic</strong><br />
Places by the U.S. Department of the<br />
Interior in 1993.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
2 2 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
C H A P T E R<br />
I V<br />
A PROPHETIC VOICE<br />
“The real history of <strong>Palestine</strong> and Anderson County is written on<br />
gravestones in the silent cities of the dead surrounding <strong>Palestine</strong>.” – Unknown<br />
Tennessee native John Henninger Reagan (1818-1905) obtained his law license in 1847 and was<br />
elected to the Texas House of Representatives before moving to <strong>Palestine</strong> in 1851. By this time,<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> was “improving very fast” and he opened a law practice in his home. In his published<br />
memories, John Reagan wrote of the event, “Meantime, in the summer of 1851, I had become a<br />
citizen of the town of <strong>Palestine</strong>, then the largest in our judicial district, and having the ablest lawyers.<br />
Friends advised me that I could not expect to succeed in competition with so strong a bar. My answer<br />
was that if I could not, then I ought not continue in the profession of the law.”<br />
He succeeded and was soon elected to the state’s Ninth Judicial District in 1852 and later served<br />
as a United States Congressman for the Eastern District of Texas from 1857 to 1861.<br />
When the looming clouds of Civil War began to rise across the land, Reagan resigned his seat on<br />
January 15, 1861, and attended the Secession Convention in Austin on January 30. At the time,<br />
Anderson County had “more than tripled” in size and <strong>Palestine</strong> had become one of the largest cities<br />
in East Texas. Nearly every one of the county’s voting citizens approved secession and sent John<br />
Reagan, A. T. Rainey, T. J. Word, and S. G. Stewert to the state’s Secession Convention in Austin.<br />
When the state ultimately agreed to the historic decision to secede in February of 1861, John Reagan,<br />
one of only seven Texans sent to Montgomery, Alabama, as a delegate of the new Confederate<br />
government, was named postmaster general of the Confederacy.<br />
In <strong>Palestine</strong>, men began practicing military drills outside the Masonic Hall and, by April, the<br />
county said farewell to its first group of volunteer soldiers.<br />
The first company made up entirely of the men of Anderson County was organized in <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
by Dr. John Woodward as Company G, First Texas Regiment. The regiment’s first battle occurred at<br />
❖<br />
John Reagan sits in his extensive<br />
library at home, Fort Houston, in the<br />
early twentieth century. Still in<br />
existence in 1923, a writer to the<br />
home at that time wrote of this room,<br />
“In the library where the ‘Old Roman’<br />
spent many happy hours browsing<br />
among his books, his favorite chair<br />
occupies one corner. On a little center<br />
table lie two or three of his favorite<br />
volumes…. Students of Texas and<br />
Confederate history may find in Fort<br />
Houston an unlimited wealth of<br />
material, the extent of which has<br />
never been estimated.”<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
C h a p t e r I V ✦ 2 3
❖<br />
Left: John Henninger Reagan, pictured<br />
here in 1860, first “cast his lot with<br />
the pioneers of the infant Republic” of<br />
Texas in 1839 at the age of twenty. At<br />
his eulogy at Texas Christian<br />
University on May 29, 1905, beloved<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> schools superintendent and<br />
historian Bonner Frizzell said, “But<br />
the one dearest to all Southerners and<br />
the one whose name thrills the heart<br />
of every Texan with pride was John<br />
Henninger Reagan…”<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Right: John H. Reagan, c. 1900, was<br />
unparalleled as a public servant<br />
throughout much of his life and held<br />
the offices of justice of the peace,<br />
county judge, militia colonel, district<br />
judge (in <strong>Palestine</strong> in 1852),<br />
congressman, U.S. senator, railroad<br />
commissioner, and Confederate<br />
Postmaster General. Many years<br />
later, Ernest Jones wrote, “This man,<br />
this giant, this tradition is ingrained<br />
in the rocky red foundation of<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>…perhaps his spirit here<br />
now lives and shapes the character of<br />
a city, of an area—rugged, honest,<br />
forthright, plain, God-fearing,<br />
honorable, fearless to do right by the<br />
Golden Rule.”<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Manassas, where Dr. Woodward was killed.<br />
Eventually, the First Texas Regiment was joined<br />
by other regiments and became renowned as<br />
John B. Hood’s Texas Brigade. General Robert E.<br />
Lee said of the group, “Never mind their<br />
raggedness, the enemy never sees the backs of<br />
my Texans!”<br />
During the war, <strong>Palestine</strong>’s unique terrain<br />
included a vast salt works field—the <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
Salt Dome, among the largest of its kind in the<br />
United States—which lay several miles<br />
southwest of the city. Regarded as the <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
or Confederate Salt Works, saltwater was hand<br />
pumped by a slave from wells into makeshift<br />
pipes that led to large kettles of boiling water,<br />
and then transferred to smaller kettles to<br />
evaporate the water. The leftover salt was then<br />
sacked and hauled away for distribution. The<br />
company was assigned “to produce salt for the<br />
Confederacy at a fixed price of $8 for a<br />
hundred-pound sack. Private customers from<br />
East Texas, Arkansas, and Louisiana often paid<br />
$20 for a sack.”<br />
A foundry for producing guns was built at<br />
Concord and joined a munitions factory at<br />
Plentitude as well as a large Quartermaster Depot<br />
at Mound Prairie and a supply depot at <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
In 1864, a wing of the Hunter Hotel was<br />
converted into a hospital, where Aunt Bee Small,<br />
a niece of Jefferson Davis, cared for many soldiers.<br />
In 1865, Jefferson Davis appointed Reagan to<br />
the post of Secretary of the Treasury only days<br />
before Union troops captured both men on May 25<br />
at Marietta, Georgia, and placed them in solitary<br />
confinement at Fort Warren in Boston harbor.<br />
At war’s end, the number of Anderson<br />
County men who had served would total<br />
between 900 and 1,000.<br />
During his imprisonment, Reagan determined<br />
that the people of Texas and Anderson County<br />
must “renounce immediately both secession and<br />
slavery” and wrote an open letter explaining his<br />
dramatic change in perspective at War’s end. The<br />
letter was not well-received at home in Texas<br />
and, upon his release in December, Reagan<br />
moved to his family farm, Fort Houston, at<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>. Though for a time he remained<br />
unpopular in public opinion, his views proved<br />
true and over the course of the next decade<br />
Texans once again revered him as a wise,<br />
“prophetic voice” in difficult times and honored<br />
him as “The Old Roman.”<br />
In 1874, Reagan received the Democratic<br />
nomination and served in the First<br />
Congressional District from 1875 to 1887. He<br />
served as a delegate to the Texas Constitutional<br />
Convention that framed the Constitution of<br />
1876 and was the head of the Committee on<br />
Commerce in its passage of the Interstate<br />
Commerce Act in 1887. In the same year, he<br />
2 4 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
was elected to the United States Senate and<br />
served in the role until Governor James Stephen<br />
Hogg (1851–1906), born at nearby Rusk,<br />
named him the first chairman of the influential<br />
Texas Railroad Commission. During this time,<br />
he was also instrumental in the founding of the<br />
Texas State <strong>Historic</strong>al Association in 1897.<br />
In 1903, Reagan retired and returned to<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> and his beloved Fort Houston farm to<br />
“write his memories and ponder six decades of<br />
public service.” The last surviving member of<br />
the Confederate government, John H. Reagan<br />
died of pneumonia on March 6, 1905. In a<br />
eulogy to his friend and fellow <strong>Palestine</strong> citizen,<br />
Bonner Frizzell said, “He saw the Lone Star rise<br />
from cloudy fields of carnage, take its place in<br />
the constellation of nations, and then sink<br />
beneath the horizon to rise and shine again with<br />
more radiant beauty in the firmament of Red,<br />
White, and Blue…we hand his name to history<br />
as a heritage for all future generations.”<br />
The end of the Civil War brought a time of<br />
difficult transition as the era of Reconstruction<br />
began in Anderson County. Federal troops were<br />
stationed at <strong>Palestine</strong> and the trials and<br />
tribulations of local government policy and<br />
tradition were headline news. In his Brief History<br />
of African Americans in <strong>Palestine</strong>, James Smith<br />
writes, “Before the war, even with the continual<br />
influx of new people, there had been only two<br />
distinct social classes—white citizens and black<br />
slaves—living on the same land, though not in<br />
the same houses…. After the war, blacks and<br />
whites continued to maintain their old ties.”<br />
With the formation of the railroad in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> in the 187 0s, the birth of “New Town”<br />
rendered many of the buildings around the<br />
courthouse square obsolete and they were<br />
converted to houses for poor African Americans,<br />
while other families purchased homes northeast<br />
❖<br />
Left: A “tireless promoter of public<br />
education,” Dr. Bonner Frizzell<br />
(1882-1968) was raised in Athens<br />
and graduated from Texas Christian<br />
University in 1909 before becoming<br />
the news editor of the Waco Tribune.<br />
After teaching at Texas A&M for<br />
three years, he became the principal<br />
of Rusk Elementary in <strong>Palestine</strong> in<br />
1913 and became superintendent of<br />
the <strong>Palestine</strong> Public Schools in 1919.<br />
He remained in that position until his<br />
retirement in 1950. He was the<br />
president of the <strong>Palestine</strong> Rotary<br />
Club, the Chamber of Commerce and<br />
the Y.M.C.A, and served as a full time<br />
historian with the Anderson County<br />
<strong>Historic</strong>al Commission, which he<br />
helped found.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Below: Freedmen gather at the<br />
Anderson County courthouse for their<br />
first opportunity to vote under the<br />
protection of Union soldiers in 1868.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
C h a p t e r I V ✦ 2 5
❖<br />
Though no longer standing, the John<br />
Reagan home (known as Fort<br />
Houston) is pictured here in the early<br />
1940s. The Reagan family lived in a<br />
one-story home on the farm after the<br />
Civil War and enlarged it in the<br />
1880s. One visitor to the grand home<br />
wrote, “Arriving at the Reagan home<br />
is something of an event for anyone.”<br />
A historical marker placed here in<br />
1951 commemorates the site, where<br />
the home’s original brick sidewalk<br />
remains in 2011.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST TEXAS<br />
CULTURE. COLOR PHOTO BY JOE MOORE.<br />
of the square in “Old Town” or acquired meager<br />
homes in neighborhoods such as Yellow Basket<br />
and Tin Cup Alley.<br />
Eventually, McKnight Plaza rose to<br />
prominence near downtown <strong>Palestine</strong> as the<br />
“economic center” for African Americans in the<br />
area and included the successful Farmers and<br />
Citizens Savings Bank and other outstanding<br />
shops, businesses, restaurants and pharmacies.<br />
The plaza was the namesake of James B.<br />
McKnight, who settled in Anderson County in<br />
1848 and in 1876 and 1879 bought the land<br />
that would eventually include the plaza. Upon<br />
McKnight’s death in 1907, the property was sold<br />
to the Farmers and Citizens Savings Bank and<br />
became McKnight Plaza.<br />
James Smith continues, “The war between<br />
the states to unite the North and South and<br />
abolish slavery remains alive today through<br />
memorabilia, artifacts and living relics…. The<br />
churches, schools, and business and community<br />
leaders have come together over the last<br />
150 years in a complex weave of relationships<br />
that has constructed the colorful tapestry<br />
that is the African-American community in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> today.”<br />
By the end of the early 1870s, the city was on<br />
the cusp of great change—the railroad was<br />
nearing its borders and “the whole scene would<br />
change...<strong>Palestine</strong> would emerge the efflorescent<br />
butterfly from the cocoon” (Avera).<br />
2 6 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
C H A P T E R<br />
LIFE IN THE CITY<br />
V<br />
“Could the fastidious visitor who now rides into <strong>Palestine</strong> in the ease and<br />
luxury afforded by palace coaches, and over our streets in elegant carriages,<br />
have looked upon the place then a rough and rugged sight would have met his view…the equestrians of the<br />
day did not ride over improved streets, nor had the special comfort of pedestrians been looked after by<br />
arranging nice walks and crossings.” - Jim Mears, 1877<br />
From its beginning, the economy of <strong>Palestine</strong> had relied heavily upon the well-traveled Trinity<br />
River to establish commerce and trade in the county. Steamboats brought staples such as sugar and<br />
coffee to the area and, in exchange, loaded their decks with an abundance of East Texas timber,<br />
cotton, tobacco and other items to be shipped to parts of Texas and across the country.<br />
However, the river was not always dependable as its waters rose and fell throughout the year and<br />
often forced long, overland travel by wagon to perpetuate the flourishing agricultural trade that<br />
continued to dominate the commerce of the period.<br />
Leaders such as John H. Reagan and George Anderson Wright began to encourage the citizens of<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> to consider the necessity of the railroad and rallied support for its movement into the city.<br />
By 1870 the county recorded its population again increasing to over 9,000 and further growth proved<br />
imminent as residents, many reluctantly, welcomed the arrival of the state’s expansive International<br />
Railroad in <strong>Palestine</strong> on July 11, 1872. It would transform the city, as well as the county, in many<br />
ways and for many generations to come.<br />
❖<br />
In the late nineteenth century,<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>’s Spring Street was often<br />
referred to as the “Great White Way,”<br />
a fitting description for the numerous<br />
streetlights that seemed to turn the<br />
city’s main thoroughfare from night<br />
to day.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
C h a p t e r V ✦ 2 7
❖<br />
Above: I. &.G.N. Railroad crew,<br />
c. 1880.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Right: A <strong>Palestine</strong> locomotive and<br />
crew, c. 1900.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
At first, the “noisy, puffing engines, the flying<br />
cinders that blackened their lace panels and<br />
brought danger of fire” (Avera) seemed to<br />
threaten the cultured social world that had<br />
made its home around the courthouse square<br />
and among the grand residences that<br />
crisscrossed the area.<br />
Bypassing the city’s courthouse square and<br />
surrounding businesses, called “Old Town” or<br />
East <strong>Palestine</strong>, the railroad constructed its<br />
switching yards, offices, and trains shops west of<br />
the area. This eventually influenced the creation<br />
of a new business district, called “New Town” or<br />
West <strong>Palestine</strong>, as hotels, saloons and stores<br />
established themselves closer to the bustling<br />
tracks and depot.<br />
For nearly three years in the mid 1870’s, two<br />
mule-drawn streetcars served commuters as<br />
they made their way between the courthouse<br />
and railroad depot, or Old Town and New Town<br />
respectively. This innovative style of<br />
transportation was established by J. W. Ozment,<br />
2 8 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
R. J. Royall, J. F. Weidermeyer, M. Ash, H. J.<br />
Hunter, M. R. Royall, and W. M. Lacy who<br />
formed a corporation under the name,<br />
“<strong>Palestine</strong> Streetcar Railroad Company.” The<br />
cars were green wagons with five windows on<br />
each side with slats that could open to ventilate<br />
the car. Passengers sat along two benches on<br />
either side of the car, which was lighted with an<br />
oil lamp. In 1947 the Frankston Citizen<br />
described the demise of the innovative service in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>, “The people must have found the<br />
walk from the courthouse down the avenue very<br />
enjoyable, or else they found nickels very<br />
scarce, for after a year or two, they stopped<br />
affording it sufficient patronage to remain in<br />
business.” A short time later, the streetcars were<br />
sold to the growing city of Dallas.<br />
A vivid description of the city appeared in<br />
The Advocate in 1875, “[Avenue A] leading from<br />
the public square, where business men do<br />
congregate, to the depot, is in fine<br />
condition…This avenue is an institution. It<br />
cements and links the two hills and all other<br />
hills together, so far as relates to <strong>Palestine</strong> and<br />
its present and prospective prosperity.”<br />
James Wisdom Ozment grew up in Rusk and<br />
moved to <strong>Palestine</strong> after his service in the<br />
Confederate army. He first owned a mercantile<br />
store before opening a successful insurance and<br />
real estate business. Upon a visit to the Dallas<br />
State Fair, Ozment witnessed the use of<br />
incandescent light and determined to bring the<br />
amazing invention home to <strong>Palestine</strong>. He<br />
organized the <strong>Palestine</strong> Electric Light Company<br />
in 1875 and held a grand opening to<br />
demonstrate the use of the area’s first lightbulb<br />
at the railroad depot. Ozment made lightbulbs<br />
available to families for $1 per light per month,<br />
bulb and electric lines provided. As production<br />
increased, the electric plant, located on presentday<br />
Gooch Street, was only on for several hours<br />
after dark and then “off at bedtime.” Ozment<br />
later purchased the city’s first telephone<br />
exchange, originally established by L. C.<br />
Ketcham, and organized the <strong>Palestine</strong> Telephone<br />
Company, <strong>Palestine</strong> Waterworks, and the<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Men’s Business League.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> also became increasingly wellknown<br />
for its outstanding neighborhoods<br />
consisting of homes styled in Gothic Revival,<br />
Italianate, Queen Anne, and Victorian<br />
architecture. Many were even illuminated by<br />
“that strange innovation, electricity, [which]<br />
brightly lighted the parlours and fell upon<br />
lovely fabrics, dark woods, deep carpets, fine<br />
china and lovely objects d’art.”<br />
A large, permanent market and public<br />
hall building was built at the corner of Market<br />
Street and Avenue A in the fall of 1875;<br />
while the 150-acre <strong>Palestine</strong> Fruit Farm<br />
flourished as the area’s “peculiar adaptability of<br />
the soil and climate affords [farmers and<br />
gardeners] a rich reward.”<br />
After the International Railroad reached<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> in 1873, the line merged with the<br />
Houston and Great Northern Railroad in<br />
September 1874 to form the International<br />
and Great Northern Railroad (I. & G.N.)<br />
and “marked a booming railway era for the<br />
❖<br />
Above: An 1872 photograph captures<br />
the “crowded business block” that was<br />
well-established along the south block<br />
of the courthouse square.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Below: Street signs mark “Old Town”<br />
in 2011. Located on Crawford Street<br />
near the courthouse square, turn of the<br />
century buildings are being restored<br />
and include shops, restaurants and a<br />
park. In the early 1900s the tin barn<br />
west of the creek was the Illuminary<br />
Barn for the City of <strong>Palestine</strong>, which<br />
held equipment for the lighting of the<br />
city’s gas street lamps.<br />
PHOTO BY JOE MOORE.<br />
C h a p t e r V ✦ 2 9
entire county, but especially for the city of<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>.” I. & G.N.’s general offices, shops and<br />
yards were moved to <strong>Palestine</strong> in between 1874<br />
and 1875.<br />
The railroad built a large hospital for its<br />
employees and a unique “Immigrants Home” to<br />
entice settlers to stay in the large home until<br />
they were able to find a permanent place to live.<br />
Early historians Allen and Mears wrote that the<br />
surge in population was due in part to “terminus”<br />
people, many of whom terminated their<br />
wanderings by locating in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
❖<br />
Top: New Town” <strong>Palestine</strong> along<br />
Spring Street in 1874, note the trolley<br />
tracks that connected the depot in<br />
“New Town” to the courthouse in “Old<br />
Town”. A one-way trip on the<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Street Railroad Company’s<br />
trolley cost 5 cents.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Middle: The Anderson County<br />
Immigration Society was established<br />
in 1876 and The International and<br />
Great Northern Railroad built an<br />
“Immigrants Home” on North<br />
Sycamore in 1877.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Bottom: <strong>Historic</strong>ally known as the<br />
Pennybacker-Campbell-Wommack<br />
House, this home was among the<br />
famous “Silk Stocking Road”<br />
residences on South Sycamore and<br />
was built in 1890. It was the family<br />
home of Mrs. Percy Pennybacker<br />
(1861-1938), a noted teacher and<br />
author of a widely-used school<br />
textbook of state history. She was also<br />
the first Texas President of the<br />
General Federation of Women’s Clubs.<br />
It was purchased in 1900 by<br />
Thomas Campbell, lawyer, banker,<br />
and Texas governor.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
3 0 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
Top, left: Governor Thomas Mitchell<br />
Campbell, pictured here circa 1900,<br />
returned to <strong>Palestine</strong> after his tenure<br />
as governor and remained active in<br />
Democratic politics. He was<br />
unsuccessful in a bid for the U.S.<br />
Senate in 1916, and continued his<br />
private law practice in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
The permanence of the railroad in the now<br />
flourishing city of <strong>Palestine</strong> was also responsible<br />
for bringing several legendary Texas leaders to<br />
the city. When the International & Great<br />
Northern Railroad began defaulting on its debts<br />
in the late 1880s, attorney Thomas Mitchell<br />
Campbell (1856-1923) and a native of the<br />
nearby city of Rusk, was appointed by the court<br />
as the company’s receiver and brought his family<br />
to settle in <strong>Palestine</strong>, where he remained as<br />
general manager of the railroad. Upon his<br />
resignation from the railroad in 1897, Campbell<br />
opened a private law practice in the city and<br />
began a political career that would eventually<br />
result in serving as the governor of Texas from<br />
1907 to 1911.<br />
While serving as governor, Campbell was<br />
instrumental in sustaining the longevity of the<br />
Texas State Railroad system, originally organized<br />
in 1894, especially in its existence across<br />
Anderson County. The historic railway first<br />
began as a short rail line built by inmates of the<br />
Texas State Penitentiary at nearby Rusk in<br />
Cherokee County in the late 1800s.<br />
Only months after taking office, Governor<br />
Campbell requested that the legislature approve<br />
operating the local industrial railroad system<br />
near Rusk as a common carrier and extending<br />
the line into <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
The new line was again constructed by<br />
prisoners of the state prison system and went<br />
into service in <strong>Palestine</strong> on April 15, 1909, and<br />
connected with the International-Great<br />
Northern as well St. Louis Southwestern<br />
Railway of Texas and the Texas and New<br />
Orleans Railroad Company at Rusk. The<br />
company’s general business offices were moved<br />
to <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
After the faltering line was transferred to the<br />
Texas Parks and Wildlife Department in 1972,<br />
enthusiasts petitioned the agency and ultimately<br />
won approval for the creation of the Texas State<br />
Railroad State <strong>Historic</strong>al Park. The<br />
park’s two passenger trains and steam<br />
locomotives began operating out of Rusk and<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> in 1977 and the park, now owned by<br />
the American Heritage Railways, remains a<br />
landmark tourist experience for twenty-first<br />
century visitors today.<br />
Top, right: The entrance to the Texas<br />
State Railroad Park near <strong>Palestine</strong> in<br />
2011. The rail line operated<br />
intermittently between <strong>Palestine</strong> and<br />
Rusk from 1909 to 1969 and was<br />
transferred to the Texas Parks and<br />
Wildlife Department in 1972.<br />
Originally built by prison laborers as<br />
a plant facility at the prison in Rusk,<br />
the tracks were restored by inmates of<br />
the Texas Department of Corrections<br />
and new depots and parks were built<br />
at both towns in the 1970’s. Vintage<br />
steam locomotives and rail cars were<br />
purchased and the Park remains one<br />
of the most popular tourist attractions<br />
in Texas. The site was named a<br />
historical landmark by the Texas<br />
<strong>Historic</strong>al Commission in 1997.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
Below: One of the historic trains of the<br />
Texas State Railroad.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
C h a p t e r V ✦ 3 1
C H A P T E R<br />
V I<br />
A CITY FLOURISHES<br />
❖<br />
The Dilley family, synonymous with<br />
the prominent leadership of early day<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>, built this building in 1882.<br />
The first occupant of the building may<br />
have been a shoe store, but from 1890<br />
to 1894 it housed the city’s post office<br />
and later a music store. The building,<br />
as it stood at the corner of Main and<br />
Queen Streets in 1970, was part of an<br />
expansive effort in the renovation of<br />
downtown and is now the<br />
headquarters of the city’s Chamber<br />
of Commerce, shown on the right<br />
in 2011.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
“For quiet, pastoral beauty, the scenery of the environs of<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> is not surpassed in Texas.” - Mary Kate Hunter<br />
It was a new age in <strong>Palestine</strong> and Anderson County and an 1880 census revealed the population<br />
of the city at over 4,000 and the county at over 17,000. The railroad quickly became the city’s major<br />
employer and hundreds of new families began working in its shops and on its passenger and cargo<br />
carriers. The city established a public school system, the first bank, Robinson and Bonner, Bankers<br />
and Dealers in Exchange, opened in 1881, waterworks were constructed between 1881 and 1882, a<br />
telephone system was introduced in 1882, and a gas plant opened in 1884.<br />
The <strong>Palestine</strong> Advocate described the city in 1883, “The denizens of older states are apt to<br />
think Texas is too new and crude to boast of much in the way of handsome residences; but a stroll<br />
around <strong>Palestine</strong> and a glance through some of the dwellings of the city will soon convince them of<br />
their mistake.”<br />
The city now included a number of general stores, hardware stores, drugstores, two bookstores,<br />
three jewelry stores, fruit stores, farm implement stores, four brickyards, a real estate office, a grist<br />
mill and cotton gin, a mattress factory, bakeries, dairies, insurance agencies, lawyers, doctors,<br />
mechanics, churches of nearly every denomination, a female college, several schools, a newspaper,<br />
and numerous fraternal organizations.<br />
Among the state’s oldest fire departments remaining in the twenty-first century, the <strong>Palestine</strong> Fire<br />
Department was originally recognized by the city as the <strong>Palestine</strong> Hose Company on June 1, 1876.<br />
Volunteers were equipped with a few axes and lanterns and used hand-pulled carts and hand-operated<br />
pumps as they drew water from local wells and other water sources. After water mains were laid, the<br />
first horse-drawn fire engine began racing courageous firefighters to destinations across the city. In<br />
April of 1900, <strong>Palestine</strong>’s three fire departments were consolidated into the <strong>Palestine</strong> Fire Department.<br />
In the fall of 1881 the buildings of the <strong>Palestine</strong> Female Institute, which had existed from 1858<br />
to 1859, on Avenue A were transferred to the newly created <strong>Palestine</strong> Public School System. In 1888,<br />
Central High School was built to replace the former Institute buildings and served as the high school<br />
until 1916.<br />
On July 2, 1915, overcrowding and curriculum needs required the building of a high school that<br />
would be located in the newly created Reagan Park on Micheaux Avenue. <strong>Palestine</strong> Mayor George<br />
Anderson Wright chose architects Marshall Sanguinet and Carl Staats to design the complex and construction<br />
began late in 1915.<br />
3 2 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
Top: <strong>Palestine</strong>’s original Hope Hook<br />
and Ladder Company at its founding<br />
in the early 1880s.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Middle: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Firehouse<br />
around 1900.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Bottom: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Fire<br />
Department, shown here in 2011<br />
near the courthouse square, includes<br />
the original bell from the city’s 1895<br />
fire station.<br />
The new <strong>Palestine</strong> High School was<br />
dedicated on July 20, 1916, and students<br />
celebrated its modern conveniences. The school<br />
included a library, several classrooms, a<br />
gymnasium with a spectator’s gallery; an<br />
auditorium/study hall that included over 500<br />
opera chairs, a stage and balcony; a full<br />
“domestic science” department with a sewing<br />
room, kitchen and cafeteria; and a manual<br />
training department that had been equipped<br />
under the supervision of the Mechanical<br />
Engineer of the I. & G.N. Railroad. The first<br />
class of thirty-eight students to occupy the<br />
building graduated on May 27, 1917.<br />
For the next 22 years, the “school on the<br />
hillside” would graduate over 2,000 students. Its<br />
C h a p t e r V I ✦ 3 3
❖<br />
The Dilley Rifles came to prominence<br />
in <strong>Palestine</strong> in the 1880s and were a<br />
crack drill team led by Captain<br />
Warner Williams that remained in<br />
high demand for events in East Texas.<br />
The photo at the top of the page,<br />
taken around 1890, includes the<br />
Moroccan-inspired theater, the<br />
Temple Opera House in the<br />
background at left.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
final class of 118 graduating students walked<br />
across the stage in 1939, when the high school<br />
was moved to the Davy Crockett site on Avenue A.<br />
The building at Reagan Park then became the<br />
home of <strong>Palestine</strong>’s junior high students in 1939<br />
and was later named John H. Reagan Junior High<br />
School in 1955. When <strong>Palestine</strong>’s current high<br />
school opened in 1966, junior high students<br />
3 4 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
were moved to the Davy Crockett buildings and<br />
the Reagan building became the home of the<br />
city’s elementary students. After Southside<br />
Elementary School was built in 1976, the historic<br />
building at Reagan Park became the home of the<br />
Museum for East Texas Culture in 1982.<br />
Today, <strong>Palestine</strong>’s Independent School<br />
District includes nearly 3,500 students at<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> High School, <strong>Palestine</strong> Middle School,<br />
A. M. Story Elementary, Southside Primary, and<br />
Northside Early Childhood Center. The western<br />
side of <strong>Palestine</strong> is served by the Westwood<br />
Independent School District, formed in 1960.<br />
With nearly 1,700 students today, the district<br />
includes Westwood High School, Westwood<br />
Junior High, Westwood Elementary, and<br />
Westwood Primary School.<br />
The city also includes the extension<br />
campuses of The University of Texas at Tyler,<br />
which offers courses in nursing, business,<br />
education, health, kinesiology and history, and<br />
Trinity Valley Community College (TVCC-<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>), with courses in a variety of<br />
vocational-technical programs as well as courses<br />
in continuing education and adult education.<br />
❖<br />
Top, left: Sacred Heart Church,<br />
successor to the 1874 Church of St.<br />
Joseph, is at Oak and Queen Streets in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>. The International and<br />
Great Northern Railway gave the<br />
church this site for construction of its<br />
first building, which was destroyed by<br />
fire in 1890. Construction on the<br />
handmade brick building that remains<br />
today was begun later that year by<br />
architect Nicolas J. Clayton of<br />
Galveston. The historic church was<br />
recorded as a Texas <strong>Historic</strong><br />
Landmark in 1964 and its<br />
congregation remains active in the<br />
twenty-first century.<br />
PHOTO BY PAIGE KEITHLY.<br />
Top, right: The interior of Sacred<br />
Heart Church.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Left: Among the first industries in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> was the George Dilley Iron<br />
Foundry at 600 May Street. It was<br />
formed in 1873 to supply iron and<br />
brass castings to the railroad.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
C h a p t e r V I ✦ 3 5
❖<br />
Top: A passenger car stands ready for<br />
business outside the depot at<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Middle: The grand, Victorian-style<br />
depot at <strong>Palestine</strong> was built in 1891<br />
and razed in 1956.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Bottom: Four Pines School, shown<br />
here in the 1920s, was first<br />
established in a converted tobacco<br />
barn in 1911 and replaced by a threeroom<br />
frame schoolhouse in 1918. By<br />
1946, enrollment reached sixty-seven.<br />
The Pleasant Grove and Woodhouse<br />
School Districts had merged with the<br />
school by 1959 to form the Tucker<br />
Common School District. It was<br />
renamed Westwood in 1976 and<br />
Westwood Elementary remains at the<br />
same site of the original Four Pines<br />
School today.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
3 6 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
C H A P T E R<br />
V I I<br />
A CULTURAL FABRIC<br />
“History is not about places and events, as important as though may be.<br />
It is about the people who made that history.” - Bob Burke<br />
The Museum for East Texas Culture is at home in the historic building of the former <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
High School. A Tudor-Gothic style building of fine brickwork and high arches surrounded by tall<br />
trees and standing at the highest point of the city’s famed Reagan Park at Micheaux Avenue, its rooms<br />
once rang with the sounds of busy high school (1916-1938), junior high (1939-1965) and<br />
elementary (1966-1976) students, and generations of dedicated teachers and faculty members.<br />
Renovated and debuting before the public as “the keeper of our history” in 1982, today the rooms<br />
and hallways of this grand building are inhabited by the very history that many of those students and<br />
teachers lived while growing up in <strong>Palestine</strong> and Anderson County.<br />
There are displays of the area’s heroes ranging from John H. Reagan and Thomas Campbell<br />
to the courageous firemen, policemen, and other public servants of the area. Artifacts from<br />
ancient civilizations to full exhibits of an early day classroom or the world of the railroad and<br />
its important impact upon the city and East Texas, and archives overflowing with the words and<br />
legends and photographs that encompass nearly two centuries of East Texas life can be studied to the<br />
finest detail.<br />
When the museum’s Black History room opened in the fall of 2003, its exhibits represented a year<br />
of dedicated work by many individuals as well as a lifetime of collecting photographs, newspaper<br />
articles and unique artifacts by generations of African-American families in the city. June Singletary<br />
McCoy was joined by Bobbye Russell Myers, Mildred Thompson Smith, Helen S. Hooper, Rose D.<br />
Jackson, Charlene H. Hutchinson, and Ella Mae Smith in compiling the massive amount of<br />
information that began to overflow as citizens heard of the Museum’s efforts to honor the African-<br />
American community and many of its most prominent leaders and important historical landmarks.<br />
The people, places, and events captured within the room, and in the following pages and<br />
photographs compiled by June McCoy, are a stirring fabric that together reveals the depth and<br />
breadth of a culture upon the city.<br />
❖<br />
The Museum for East Texas Culture<br />
at Reagan Park in <strong>Palestine</strong>, 2011.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
C h a p t e r V I I ✦ 3 7
H I S T O R I C A L<br />
M A R K E R S<br />
Many of <strong>Palestine</strong> and Anderson County’s<br />
most important African-American landmarks<br />
have been commemorated with official Texas<br />
historical markers. They include the stories of<br />
Paul Rutledge, Sr., Alonzo Marion Story, Mt.<br />
Vernon A.M.E. Church (also listed on the<br />
National Register of <strong>Historic</strong> Places in 2002),<br />
Green Bay School, Green Bay A.M.E. Church,<br />
Northeast Texas Christian Theological and<br />
Industrial College, Antioch Baptist Church,<br />
Magnolia Brotherhood Cemetery, Swanson<br />
Cemetery, Pilgrim Rest Baptist Church,<br />
McKnight Plaza, Lincoln High School, Frederick<br />
Douglass Elementary School, and Nathaniel A.<br />
Banks Elementary School.<br />
E D U C A T I O N<br />
Prior to the integration of schools in 1967,<br />
African-American schools in <strong>Palestine</strong> included<br />
Lincoln High School, A. M. Story High School,<br />
Frederick Douglass Elementary School, N. A.<br />
Banks Elementary School, Booker T.<br />
Washington Elementary School, and Fourth<br />
Ward School.<br />
There were many other elementary schools<br />
located in the rural communities of Anderson<br />
County. Students from those schools attended<br />
high school in <strong>Palestine</strong> or at Green Bay High<br />
School in Tucker. Other high schools in<br />
Anderson County included Massey Lake High<br />
School at Tennessee Colony, Henry High School<br />
at Elkhart, G. W. Carver High School in<br />
Frankston, Clemons High School at Neches,<br />
and Flint Hill High School.<br />
Many students in these schools competed in<br />
University Interscholastic League contests in<br />
debate, essay writing, picture memory, vocal<br />
and piano solos, quartet singing, poetry<br />
recitation, and track and field events. They<br />
won awards on the state level at Prairie View A.<br />
& M. University, while the Green Bay High<br />
School boys basketball team won the 1955 State<br />
Championship.<br />
The teachers and principals of these schools<br />
were graduates of historically black colleges and<br />
held teaching certificates. They devoted their<br />
time, talents and resources to develop the<br />
“whole child” academically, socially, physically,<br />
and morally.<br />
During the years of “separate but equal”<br />
schools, teachers worked with hand-medown<br />
textbooks, limited curriculum and<br />
inadequate funding for supplies and teaching<br />
materials. For many years, Lincoln High<br />
School’s football team wore used uniforms that<br />
had been passed on to them from <strong>Palestine</strong> High<br />
School, while the first uniforms worn by<br />
Lincoln High School’s band were purchased<br />
through the generous support raised by mothers<br />
of the band students.<br />
Teachers often spent their own money to<br />
purchase teaching aids and were creative in<br />
improvising ways to train students and prepare<br />
them for college and the world of work. They<br />
were also active in the lives of the parents,<br />
❖<br />
Lincoln School.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
3 8 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
Left: The 1912 faculty of the first<br />
Lincoln High School, <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
Normal, included (first row) Professor<br />
Clarence F. Carr, Principal, and<br />
Professor J. A. B. Strain; (second row)<br />
unknown, Lenora Robinson,<br />
unknown; (third row) Alma Z.<br />
Johnson Stein, unknown; (fourth<br />
row) unknown.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
students, and communities in which they<br />
served. At Green Bay School, Laurelia Singletary<br />
served as the homemaking teacher and W. L.<br />
Singletary was the vocational agriculture<br />
teacher. They held adult workshops year-round<br />
that offered training in gardening, farming, food<br />
preservation, clothing construction, furniture<br />
refinishing, home renovation, cattle raising,<br />
butchering, barn building, carpentry, farm<br />
equipment repair, and other courses to<br />
implement wholesome family life and improve<br />
living conditions.<br />
In every school, teachers across the<br />
curriculum often combined their efforts to<br />
provide learning experiences for the common<br />
goal of shaping the lives of young people across<br />
Anderson County to become well-rounded<br />
individuals and contributing citizens.<br />
Lincoln High School opened in 1891 at the<br />
Mission Church on San Jacinto between<br />
Dorrance and South Jackson Streets and<br />
provided higher grades for elementary students<br />
being taught at St. Paul Church on Texas Avenue<br />
and at the Old Town School in the eastern<br />
section of <strong>Palestine</strong>. In 1895 the school was<br />
relocated on the corner of Swantz and McClellan<br />
Streets. The building was destroyed by fire in<br />
1922 and classes were held in several nearby<br />
churches until a new six-room brick building<br />
opened at the same site in January of 1923.<br />
Alonzo Marion (A. M.) Story followed Reverend<br />
H. T. Wise as the school’s principal in 1925.<br />
Story increased the school’s enrollment, secured<br />
a broad range of courses and encouraged<br />
students to seek a college education.<br />
By 1934, two more classrooms were needed,<br />
so land was purchased by The Grand United<br />
Order of Odd Fellows. The Civic Improvement<br />
League of Colored Citizens also offered $1,000<br />
for an auditorium-gymnasium and construction<br />
began in 1938.<br />
A. M. Story retired in 1949 and the school<br />
board approved construction of a new high<br />
Below: Professor A. M. Story served<br />
at Lincoln High School from 1925 to<br />
1949. A. M. Story High School,<br />
named in his honor in 1953, was<br />
destroyed by a tornado in 1987 and<br />
later rebuilt at a new location as an<br />
elementary school.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
C h a p t e r V I I ✦ 3 9
❖<br />
Right: Green Bay High School was<br />
founded in 1899 by a group of<br />
African-American men who formed a<br />
board of trustees and organized a<br />
school for local African-American<br />
children. The school met in Green<br />
Bay’s Methodist Church until a<br />
building was erected in the early<br />
1900s at this site. Children from<br />
across the area attended the school<br />
until desegregation came to Anderson<br />
County in 1966. The site became a<br />
Texas <strong>Historic</strong>al Commission<br />
landmark in 1986.<br />
PHOTO BY SHELLEY DABNEY.<br />
Below: The Regular Fellows Club,<br />
shown here prior to 1933 (front row,<br />
left to right) Eddie Frank Green,<br />
Leland Tillis, Fred Tillis, Radie<br />
Coleman, Edmond Anderson and<br />
“Buster Thompson.” (standing, left to<br />
right) J.W. Smith, Edward McCoy,<br />
David Moseley, Fred Daniels, Edward<br />
Hamilton, Lloyd Howard, Oliver<br />
Moseley, Francis McClellan and<br />
Lee Sapp.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
school that was named in his honor and opened<br />
in 1953. Lincoln High school became Lincoln<br />
Junior High School serving grades five through<br />
eight. When the school expanded to include<br />
grades two through eight, a four-room frame<br />
building was added.<br />
By 1965, grades seven and eight were moved<br />
to the A. M. Story High School campus in a section<br />
of the building known as Washington<br />
School. A new Washington school on Hamlett<br />
and Douglas Streets was ready for occupancy<br />
and W. L. Manning, who had followed A. M.<br />
Story as principal in 1949, transferred to the<br />
new school as its principal.<br />
With the coming of school integration in<br />
1970, Lincoln closed. The building was occupied<br />
by the Anderson County Community<br />
Council and was demolished after a fire partially<br />
destroyed the building in 1999.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> High Schools graduated many outstanding<br />
individuals who would earn Ph.D.<br />
degrees from around the country and include A.<br />
M. Story High School graduates Alene Hollie<br />
Hamilton, Darlene Ruffin Alexander, Rochelle<br />
Johnson Baty, Frank L. Joe, Anna M. Madison,<br />
and Sharon Gross Ray; <strong>Palestine</strong> High School<br />
graduates Harold L. Aubrey, Peaches Henry,<br />
Debra D. Murray, Carolyn Jamerson Nobles,<br />
Terrence Lee Reese, Isaac Williams, Jr.; Massey<br />
Lake High School graduate Annie Harrison<br />
Edwards; Lincoln High School graduates St.<br />
John Williamson, Jr., Kenneth E. Henry, and<br />
Charles E. Henry; Green Bay High School graduate<br />
Theodore Ingram; and Neches High School<br />
graduate Gwendolyn Caldwell Morrison.<br />
Their degrees were in education, mathematical/statistical<br />
computing, counseling, psychology,<br />
religion, industrial education, analytical<br />
chemistry, home economics, cellular and molecular<br />
biology, physics, child development, and<br />
health service management.<br />
The <strong>Palestine</strong> Independent School District<br />
has included board of education members Dr. J.<br />
Don Jackson, Sr., Dorothy R. Robinson, Dr.<br />
Inman White, Mae Frances White, Doris<br />
Garrett, Namon Latson, Freta Myers Parkes, and<br />
Dyna Tutt.<br />
4 0 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
Top, left: This marker,<br />
commemorating the life and public<br />
service of Major General John F.<br />
Phillips, stands at the <strong>Palestine</strong> park<br />
dedicated in his honor in 1995.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
Top, right: Lieutenant Colonel Russell<br />
L. Hooper, Jr.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
Below: Mrs. Ella Mae Smith, one<br />
of several <strong>Palestine</strong> women in<br />
the military.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
C I V I C , S O C I A L A N D<br />
F R A T E R N A L O R G A N I Z A T I O N S<br />
Among the outstanding service organizations<br />
of the county, African Americans founded the<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Branch of the National Association for<br />
the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP),<br />
The Negro Business and Professional Women’s<br />
Club Inc. (NB&PW), Anderson County Civic<br />
League (later named the Anderson County<br />
Community Council Inc.), Henry-Smith<br />
Families Multi-Cultural Education Center<br />
“People Helping People,” Masonic Lodge–W. R.<br />
Roberts Consistory of 32 Degree Masons, Hearts<br />
of Love Court #16 of the Grand Court Order of<br />
Calanthe, and the Regular Fellows Club.<br />
air medals, the Purple Heart and induction into<br />
the Infantry Hall of Fame in 1984. Upon his<br />
retirement in 1975, he became an army chaplain<br />
and in 2005 published his autobiography, My<br />
Journey to Betterment.<br />
Major Paul L. Rutledge, Jr., the son of educators<br />
Johnnie C. and Paul L. Rutledge, Sr., was<br />
born in <strong>Palestine</strong> and became a star basketball<br />
player before graduating from Green Bay High<br />
School in 1955. Major Rutledge entered the<br />
M I L I T A R Y<br />
S E R V I C E<br />
The valedictorian of Lincoln High School’s<br />
graduating class in 1940, United States Army<br />
Brigadier General George M. Shuffer, Jr., was the<br />
first African-American general from Anderson<br />
County and the son of Johnny D’Ella and George<br />
M. Shuffer, Sr., owners of a dry goods store in<br />
McKnight Plaza. Throughout his 35 years of<br />
service to the country, Brigadier General Shuffer<br />
served in the office of the Secretary of Defense at<br />
the Pentagon and received 31 citations and decorations<br />
including the Distinguished Service<br />
Medal, three silver stars, four bronze stars, five<br />
C h a p t e r V I I ✦ 4 1
❖<br />
Left: Joyce W. Singletary Crocheron<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
Right: Dollie L. Beard Washington.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
United States Army as a 2nd Lieutenant in 1960<br />
and served in the Korean War and was the first<br />
African-American Company Commander of<br />
Integrated Units.<br />
Major General John F. Phillips, the son of<br />
Sadie L. and O.L. Phillips, began his distinguished<br />
military career after graduating from<br />
Clemons High School in Neches. Serving as a<br />
pilot, navigator and instructor pilot, he retired<br />
from service to the United States Air Force after<br />
thirty years. The City of <strong>Palestine</strong> recognized<br />
his accomplishments and service to the country<br />
by establishing the Major General John H.<br />
Phillips Monument and Park on Mills Street at<br />
Spring Street.<br />
Lieutenant Colonel Russell L. Hooper Jr., the<br />
son of Helen and Russell L. Hooper, graduated<br />
from <strong>Palestine</strong> High School in 1982 and<br />
received the Bronze Star, Meritorious Service<br />
Medal, the Army Achievement Medal, the Army<br />
Commendations Medal, and the National<br />
Defense Service Medal.<br />
Lieutenant Colonel Clark Lowe graduated<br />
from Lincoln High School and was awarded the<br />
Purple Heart and Bronze Star.<br />
The city’s Purple Heart veterans are Vernon<br />
Denmon, Theldon Lumpkin, and Jesse W. Hudson.<br />
Hudson originally left Lincoln High School to enlist<br />
in the United States Army and served from 1949<br />
until 1953. He later returned home to graduate<br />
from Lincoln and retired in 1989 as the Assistant<br />
Principal of <strong>Palestine</strong> High School.<br />
Sergeant Ella Mae Henry Smith joined the<br />
Women’s Army Corps (WAC) of the United<br />
States Army and trained as a dietetic specialist<br />
and was honorably discharged before attending<br />
Texas College and later retiring as a Home<br />
Economics teacher. She and her family founded<br />
Henry-Smith Families Multi-Cultural Center.<br />
Joyce W. Singletary Crocheron, the daughter<br />
of W. L. and Laurelia M. Singletary, graduated<br />
from Green Bay High School in 1957 and<br />
entered into active service in the Army Nurse<br />
Corps as Second Lieutenant in 1961 after graduating<br />
from Dillard University. She was promoted<br />
to First Lieutenant in 1963 and served at the<br />
43rd Surgical Hospital in Korea before returning<br />
to Washington D.C. to join the staff of Walter<br />
Reed Army Medical Center in 1964.<br />
Captain Lucille Lacy Tyler graduated from<br />
Lincoln High School and became a nurse before<br />
enlisting in the United States Army in 1943.<br />
Dollie L. Beard spent two years, four months,<br />
and four days in the Women’s Army Corps<br />
4 2 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
(WAC), where she received the American Theater<br />
Campaign Medal, the Wood Conduct Medal, and<br />
the WAAC Service Ribbon. She received her<br />
Honorable Discharge in December 1945.<br />
A R T I S T S , A U T H O R S<br />
I N V E N T O R S<br />
&<br />
The creative community of individuals who<br />
have called the city their home include renowned<br />
artists such as Alma Pennell Gunter, Rusty Davis,<br />
and Laretha Skinner. Authors include Lenice<br />
Watkins; Dorothy Redus Robinson; Sadie L.<br />
Phillips; Anita Smith; Rubye Browne Melton;<br />
Norris White; Theresa Smith-Browne; Reverend<br />
J. F. Wade; Deborah Smith Pegues; Bobbye<br />
Russell Myers; Verniece Scales; and Brigadier<br />
General George Mason Shuffer, Jr.; and historical<br />
narratives such as African American Roots:<br />
Traveling the Boundaries of Anderson County,<br />
Profiles of Faith: A History of Black Churches of<br />
Anderson County, and A History of the Education of<br />
Black People of Anderson County, Texas.<br />
Inventor Christopher L. Rutledge, the son of<br />
Jacqueline and Paul L. Rutledge, Jr., graduated<br />
from Westwood High School in 1984. He earned<br />
a bachelor’s degree from Prairie View A&M<br />
University in 1988 and received his master’s<br />
degree in electrical engineering from the<br />
University of Michigan in 1989. While employed<br />
by AT&T, Christopher has been awarded<br />
thirteen patents, all of which contribute to the<br />
technological success of the company.<br />
The Willie Myers Park was named in his honor<br />
and is located on Dorrance Street.<br />
Educator M. L. Cary, Sr., was the principal of<br />
Green Bay High School in the Tucker School<br />
District in Anderson County and was a<br />
community leader in <strong>Palestine</strong>, serving as<br />
President and Chairman of the Executive Board<br />
of the Anderson County Civic League. The M. L.<br />
Cary Railroad Overpass was named in his honor<br />
in February 1980.<br />
In 1952, Hugh Russell helped build a<br />
retaining wall near the Anderson County<br />
courthouse. In his youth, he helped construct a<br />
wall at the city cemetery as part of a<br />
government-funded work program and was the<br />
❖<br />
Willie Myers and the park dedicated<br />
in his honor.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
M E D I C I N E<br />
African-American physicians have included<br />
Drs. F. F. McClellan; W. R. Roberts, J. H. Dodd;<br />
R. E. Holland; H. D. Patton; H. W. Voorhees; J.<br />
Don Jackson, Sr.; J. Don Jackson, Jr.; Michael<br />
Williams; Patrick Titus; Jessie Sloan Hicks;<br />
Tarsha Brown; André Thomas; and Davida<br />
Wardell. Dentists include Drs. H. V. Hurd,<br />
Matthew Williamson, Peyton E. Medlock, H. D.<br />
Patton, and Troy W. Simmons.<br />
C I T Y<br />
H O N O R E E S<br />
Willie Myers retired as a chef on the historic<br />
Missouri-Pacific Railroad before serving as a<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> City councilman from 1977 to 1989.<br />
C h a p t e r V I I ✦ 4 3
first person to introduce St. Augustine grass in<br />
the <strong>Palestine</strong> area. He voluntarily maintained<br />
the Memorial Cemetery and served on the City<br />
of <strong>Palestine</strong> Cemetery Board. In Memorial<br />
Cemetery, Russell Road is named in his honor.<br />
E L E C T E D<br />
O F F I C I A L S<br />
❖<br />
Above: M. L. Cary, Sr.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
Below: Hugh Russell, the retaining<br />
wall he helped build at North Church<br />
and Poplar Streets, and Memorial<br />
Cemetery’s Russell Road.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
In 1973, Rodney Howard, Frank J. Robinson<br />
and Timothy S. Smith brought a class<br />
action suit against the Anderson County<br />
Commissioner’s Court to protest the<br />
gerrymandering of precinct lines, which diluted<br />
black voting strength. The case was won at the<br />
Fifth Circuit and in Federal Court in 1974. The<br />
three men filed a second lawsuit in 1976 and<br />
were successful in creating single-member<br />
districts for <strong>Palestine</strong> City Council elections. As<br />
a result, the first African Americans were elected<br />
to county and city office.<br />
City of <strong>Palestine</strong> councilmembers have<br />
included W. C. Lee; Roosevelt Linicomn, Sr.,<br />
Willie Myers; Arthur Sherrod; Edward McCoy,<br />
Jr.; Jimmie L. Cummings, Sr.; James Simpson,<br />
Eddie Holland; Betty Nickerson; Patricia Davis;<br />
Vernon Denmon, Jr.; and Vickey Chivers. In<br />
October 1996, Sheyi Ipaye became the first<br />
African American appointed as the city manager<br />
of <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
Precinct 2 Constables have included<br />
Herman Bell, André Ingram, and Fannie<br />
Hutchison, the only black female constable and<br />
sheriff’s deputy, and the first black female jailer<br />
in Anderson County.<br />
Precinct 2 Commissioners have included<br />
Reginald O. Browne, Sr.; Rodney Howard;<br />
Arthur Sherrod; Darrell Emanuel; and Rashad<br />
Q. Mims, I.<br />
Precinct 2 Justices of the Peace have included<br />
O’Neal Hunt, Versalean Logans, and Carl Davis.<br />
The first elected African-American treasurer<br />
of Anderson County was Sharon Cook Peterson,<br />
4 4 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
while Daphne Session Castleberry became the<br />
first African-American assistant district attorney<br />
of Anderson County in 2000.<br />
C H U R C H<br />
L I F E<br />
The community of African-American<br />
believers is wide and historic in <strong>Palestine</strong> and<br />
throughout Anderson County. Churches have<br />
long “provided a critical vehicle for education<br />
and organized political action” throughout the<br />
county, and, in <strong>Palestine</strong>, the city’s two oldest<br />
churches, Mt. Vernon African Methodist<br />
Episcopal (A.M.E.) and Antioch Baptist Church,<br />
are no exception.<br />
Mount Vernon A.M.E. at 913 Calhoun is the<br />
third oldest A.M.E. in Texas, with its first<br />
congregation meeting in homes from 1856 to<br />
1873. After John H. Reagan donated land on<br />
Mulberry and Birch Streets to the congregations<br />
of both Mount Vernon and Antioch Baptist “in<br />
order to worship God and educate their<br />
children,” each group alternated their worship<br />
services on Sundays at “Union Church.” Mt.<br />
Vernon eventually purchased the land at<br />
Calhoun Street in 1878. The original building<br />
was replaced in 1921 and remains today as an<br />
official Texas <strong>Historic</strong> Landmark.<br />
Antioch Missionary Baptist Church at 907<br />
East Murchison was organized in 1856 and land<br />
was purchased through the campaign of the<br />
Ladies Aide Society. The church was remodeled<br />
in 1921 and burned in 1962. It was rebuilt and<br />
remains near the original site today.<br />
A T H L E T E S<br />
Ivory Lee Brown graduated from <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
High School in 1987. He transferred to the<br />
University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff from Tyler<br />
Junior College and, as a running back, was the<br />
number one rusher in the NAIA and voted Most<br />
Valuable Player in 1990. The Phoenix Cardinals<br />
drafted him in 1991. He played with that team<br />
and the San Antonio Riders of the World<br />
Football League and ended his career with the<br />
Minnesota Vikings in 1994.<br />
Bonita Brown Jackson, Ivory’s sister and the<br />
mother of football great Adrian Peterson,<br />
graduated from Westwood High School in 1988<br />
after dominating the Girls 3A Track and Field<br />
Finals in 1982 and 1983. She won four gold<br />
❖<br />
On March 3, 1975, citizens presented<br />
a petition to the Anderson County<br />
Commissioner’s Court concerning the<br />
realignment of precinct boundaries<br />
and the placement of voting boxes.<br />
Pictured in the front row are (from left<br />
to right) Frank J. Robinson, Reverend<br />
T. L. Dilworth, Reverend J. F. Wade,<br />
Timothy S. Smith, and W. C. Lee.<br />
Second row (from left to right):<br />
Rodney A. Howard, Sr., Ester Clewis,<br />
Gloria Bass, and Willie Wallace.<br />
Third row (from left to right) Dorothy<br />
R. Robinson, Louise Jackson, Golden<br />
Overshown, Geneva Collier, Etra M.<br />
Simmons, Phyllis Diggs, Rose D.<br />
Jackson, and Willie Myers. E. E.<br />
Brown is standing in the very back on<br />
the righthand side.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
C h a p t e r V I I ✦ 4 5
athletic scholarship to play for the Sooners at<br />
the University of Oklahoma in Norman, where<br />
he finished second in the vote for the Heisman<br />
Trophy. After his junior year at OU, Adrian<br />
joined the Minnesota Vikings in 2007.<br />
Keith L. Crawford graduated from Westwood<br />
High School in 1989 and signed with the New<br />
York Giants in 1993. From 1994 to 1995 he<br />
played for the Green Bay Packers and signed<br />
with the St. Louis Rams from 1996 to 1997.<br />
Keith participated in training camp with the<br />
Kansas City Chiefs in 1998 and returned to the<br />
Packers playing field in 1999. He joined the<br />
Memphis Maniacs of the Xtreme Football<br />
League in 2000 and was inducted into his alma<br />
mater’s Howard Payne University Hall of Fame<br />
in 2004.<br />
Mark Rutledge graduated from Westwood<br />
High School in 1980 and continued an<br />
outstanding basketball career at Prairie View A.<br />
& M. University. He graduated with a degree in<br />
mechanical engineering in 1985 and later<br />
played with the Jameson International<br />
Basketball Team in Dublin, Ireland. Today, he<br />
owns the largest African-American mechanical<br />
contracting company in Texas.<br />
Hernandez “Hunkie” Cooper was a<br />
quarterback and an All-American player at<br />
Westwood High School, where he graduated in<br />
1987. While playing quarterback at Navarro<br />
❖<br />
Above: Bonita Brown Jackson in<br />
action at the girls track and field<br />
championships at the University of<br />
Texas’ Memorial Stadium, May 1983<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY; PHOTO BY JIM<br />
TROTMAN, PALESTINE HERALD-PRESS.<br />
Right: A graduate of <strong>Palestine</strong> High<br />
School, Adrian “All Day” Peterson<br />
garnered fame as a player for the<br />
University of Oklahoma Sooners and<br />
later joined the Minnesota Vikings,<br />
where he was named NFL Rookie of<br />
the Year in 2007.<br />
COURTESY OF THE BOB BURKE COLLECTION.<br />
medals and set a new state record, winning the<br />
long jump, the triple jump, the 200-meter dash<br />
and shattering her own state record in the 100-<br />
meter dash. She ended her four-year track<br />
career at Westwood with a total of seven<br />
gold medals, one silver medal and 104 points<br />
in three state meets. She also represented<br />
the United States in the Junior Olympics in<br />
Seoul, Korea, in 1982, where she won the<br />
bronze medal as a member of the four-hundredmeter<br />
relay team. The city of <strong>Palestine</strong> and<br />
Mayor Jack Selden proclaimed a “Bonita Brown<br />
Day” in her honor on June 11, 1983.<br />
Adrian D. Peterson graduated from <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
High School in 2004 after participating in football,<br />
basketball, track and field. He received an<br />
4 6 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
College in Corsicana, the team won the 1989<br />
NJCAA National Football Championship. He<br />
earned a degree in criminal justice from the<br />
University of Nevada at Las Vegas in 1991 and<br />
joined the Arizona Rattlers in 1993. During<br />
his rookie year with the Rattlers, he won the<br />
Arena Football League’s MVP award. In 1997<br />
he earned Ironman honors and set the record<br />
for touchdown returns in 2000. By 2002, he<br />
had scored 1,000 points in his career and<br />
was named the League’s All-Time Leader in<br />
kickoff returns in 2003. Cooper was also the<br />
fifth man in pro football history to hit a 20,000<br />
career all-purpose yard mark. In 2005 he<br />
celebrated a twelve-year career as a receiverlinebacker<br />
with the Arizona Rattlers and the<br />
Arena Football League and his #14 jersey was<br />
retired. Today, Cooper is a high school football<br />
coach in Las Vegas.<br />
Sandra Cummings Glover, the daughter of<br />
T. A. and Eunice Cummings, graduated from<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> High School in 1987 where she<br />
lettered in basketball and track. She earned a<br />
degree in elementary education from the<br />
University of Houston in 1988 and was on the<br />
Women’s Track and Field All-American Team in<br />
1991. She won qualifying heats in 2000 and<br />
2003 for the United States Olympic Team<br />
competing in the 400-meter hurdles and won<br />
Olympic track and field trials in the Women’s<br />
400-meter hurdles at Sydney, Australia. She<br />
placed third in the finals at the USA Outdoor<br />
Track and Field Championships in California. In<br />
2002, the City of Houston honored her with<br />
“Sandra Glover Day.”<br />
Portia Hill Hatten graduated from <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
High School in 1986 and played basketball for<br />
Trinity Valley Community College, where she<br />
received the John Naismith Award for Best<br />
Junior College Women’s Player in America.<br />
She later attended Stephen F. Austin University<br />
and won many awards before being named<br />
Kodak All-American Team, honoring the ten<br />
best players in America. After college, Portia<br />
played in the Italian and French leagues<br />
throughout Europe and was inducted in the<br />
SFA Sports Hall of Fame in 1991. The City of<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> held a “Portia Hill Day” in honor of<br />
her achievements.<br />
Guy Brown graduated from <strong>Palestine</strong> High<br />
School, where he played running back, in 1973.<br />
At the University of Houston, he played<br />
defensive end and was a linebacker for the<br />
Dallas Cowboys. He retired from professional<br />
sports in 1983.<br />
M C K N I G H T<br />
P L A Z A<br />
In 1876, two businessmen, J. B. McKnight<br />
and J. H. Mead, erected a building on the corner<br />
❖<br />
Left: Keith Crawford.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
Below: Hernandez “Hunkie” Cooper.<br />
COURTESY OF JUNE MCCOY.<br />
C h a p t e r V I I ✦ 4 7
❖<br />
McKnight Plaza in 1900.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
of Avenue A and East Spring Street in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
When McKnight died in 1907, the property was<br />
sold to the Farmers and Citizens Savings Bank<br />
and gave rise to a setting for entrepreneurial<br />
enterprise of African-American men and<br />
women, as well as a social center downtown for<br />
the African-American community. The bank,<br />
principally organized by farmer and community<br />
leader Henry L. Price, remained in existence<br />
from 1906 to 1926 and is the only African-<br />
American bank created in <strong>Palestine</strong> and one of<br />
only a few in Texas.<br />
McKnight Plaza, commonly known as “the<br />
Square,” housed over eighteen businesses including<br />
the barbershops of John Hunter, who opened his<br />
shop in 1912 and became the oldest tenant of the<br />
Plaza, Willard Barrett and Ben and Sam Carson; the<br />
cafes of Easter Barrett and John Tatum; Dr. and<br />
Mrs. Dodd’s Drug Store; J. B. Blake’s Cab Company;<br />
Updack Funeral Home; Missouri-Pacific Colored<br />
Booster Club; the notary office of Captain H. G.<br />
Neely; Shuffer’s Dry Goods Store; Mrs. W. R.<br />
Roberts’ Hat Shop; the medical offices of Dr. H. D.<br />
Patton and Dr. R. E. Holland; dentists Dr. H. D.<br />
Mitchell and Dr. Payton Madlock; Edward McCoy,<br />
Sr.’s, East Texas Burial Association; and Farmers<br />
and Citizens Savings Bank.<br />
Businessman Caesar Augustus Dial was born<br />
in 1861 and graduated from Prairie View State<br />
College in 1886 before becoming a teacher,<br />
farmer, and fraternal leader. He was an assistant<br />
cashier and sat on the Board of Directors of the<br />
Farmers and Citizens Savings Bank. Each of his<br />
ten children owned stock in the bank.<br />
Reverend E.M. Griggs worked at the Deaf,<br />
Dumb, Blind and Orphans School in Austin,<br />
Texas, and earned his Bachelor of Theology<br />
degree from Bishop College in Marshall in the<br />
late 1890s. During his tenure in <strong>Palestine</strong>,<br />
Griggs pastored West Union Baptist Church and<br />
was secretary of the National Baptist<br />
Convention, moderator of Zion Hill Missionary<br />
Baptist Association, and President of Farmers<br />
and Citizens Savings Bank.<br />
Anderson county native St. John Williamson,<br />
Sr., LLB, was a 1906 graduate of Howard<br />
University School of Law in Washington, D.C.,<br />
and practiced in state, federal, and civil courts<br />
where he helped farmers who had deeds to land<br />
throughout the county. When oil was<br />
discovered in the Neches area, oil companies<br />
required further proof of ownership such as<br />
titles. Williamson worked in the fields with<br />
owners and surveyors and often typed the<br />
complete Abstract of Title for his clients. He was<br />
the attorney for Farmers and Citizens Savings<br />
Bank and owned 102 shares of its stock at the<br />
time of his death in 1923.<br />
4 8 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
Throughout its existence, McKnight Plaza<br />
served as a shopping mecca for blacks. On<br />
weekends, it was a gathering place for residents<br />
from the surrounding rural communities who<br />
came to town on horses and wagons. They<br />
shopped for dry goods, hats, fresh produce from<br />
local farms, or enjoyed a haircut and an ice<br />
cream cone. Meals were served at local cafes that<br />
were often open until midnight.<br />
The Missouri-Pacific Booster Club was<br />
the scene for dances and other major<br />
social events in the city and the streets<br />
surrounding the square were abuzz with people<br />
sharing news about their particular community<br />
and family.<br />
In November 1945, razing of the sixtynine-year-old<br />
McKnight Plaza was begun.<br />
The four-unit landmark was being vacated by<br />
its all-black tenants, many of whom planned<br />
to establish businesses elsewhere…and an era<br />
not experienced in other East Texas towns came<br />
to an end.<br />
❖<br />
McKnight Plaza in 1930.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
C h a p t e r V I I ✦ 4 9
TEXAS TIMELINE<br />
“History is a fabric – a shining damask in which is woven the lives of people.” – Carl Avera<br />
• Around 600 A.D.: Caddo Indians settle in<br />
the area of present-day <strong>Palestine</strong> and<br />
Anderson County.<br />
• May 22, 1690: Spain establishes its presence<br />
in a mission erected at an Indian village near<br />
present-day <strong>Palestine</strong>. The caravan includes<br />
several priests, over 100 soldiers, 20 mules,<br />
and gifts.<br />
• 1736: France and Spain claim their boundaries<br />
between the Louisiana territory and<br />
New Spain.<br />
• 1775-1783: The American Revolutionary War<br />
• 1803: The Louisiana Purchase is made by the<br />
United States; present-day Texas remains a<br />
part of New Spain.<br />
• 1804: U.S. President Thomas Jefferson<br />
decides that the boundary of the Louisiana<br />
Purchase extends to the Rio Grande.<br />
• 1810-1821: Mexican War of Independence<br />
from Spain.<br />
• 1821: Mexican government authorizes<br />
Stephen F. Austin to begin colonization of the<br />
Texas territory.<br />
• December 22, 1826: David Burnet authorized<br />
to establish a new colony in East Texas<br />
for three hundred families.<br />
• Around 1834: Martin Lacy buys land for salt<br />
works near <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1835-1836: Texas Revolution to gain independence<br />
from Mexico.<br />
• 1835: Fort Houston, built mainly by settlers<br />
in the area, opens on the public square of the<br />
town of Houston.<br />
• 1836: The stockade at Fort Houston is built<br />
by Texas Rangers.<br />
• March 2, 1836: The Texas Declaration of<br />
Independence is signed.<br />
• April 21, 1836: Texas wins a decisive battle<br />
for its freedom from Mexico at the Battle of<br />
San Jacinto.<br />
• September 5, 1836: The Republic of Texas<br />
chooses its first elected officials.<br />
• September 1836: Texas votes in favor of annexation<br />
to the United States, but the request<br />
is denied.<br />
• 1837: The Republic of Texas is officially<br />
recognized by the United States and several<br />
other countries.<br />
• November 1839: The First Congress of Texas<br />
meets in Austin.<br />
• December 1841: The town of Houston (also<br />
known as Fort Houston) becomes the seat of<br />
justice in the area.<br />
• Around 1843: Citizens of northern Houston<br />
County are granted a “county for judicial<br />
purposes” and it is named Burnett. A<br />
short time later, its organization is deemed<br />
unconstitutional.<br />
• February 18, 1845: The United States<br />
Congress passes a resolution offering statehood<br />
to Texas.<br />
• July 4, 1845: Texas Congress and convention<br />
delegates meet to choose between annexation<br />
to the United States or independence recognized<br />
by Mexico. Annexation is approved.<br />
• December 29, 1845: Texas celebrates its legal<br />
entry into the Union.<br />
• 1846: George Anderson Wright, celebrated<br />
Confederate soldier and political leader, is<br />
the first child born in Anderson County.<br />
• March 24, 1846: The first legislature of<br />
the state of Texas passes an act creating<br />
Anderson County.<br />
• July 13, 1846: Anderson County holds its<br />
first election in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• August 1846: The first sale of lots in <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
begins and range in price from $50 to $100<br />
around the public square.<br />
• October 15, 1846: Johnston Shelton completes<br />
his survey of the town of <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• November 1846: The first session of Anderson<br />
County’s District Court is held in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1846-1848: Mexican War ensues over the<br />
boundaries of westward expansion.<br />
• 1847: The ferry at Magnolia Crossing<br />
receives the first license to operate in<br />
Anderson County.<br />
• February 2, 1848: Mexican War officially<br />
ends with the signing of the Treaty of<br />
Guadalupe Hidalgo. Texas is annexed to the<br />
5 0 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
United States and the boundary of the Rio<br />
Grande is established.<br />
• March 14, 1848: <strong>Palestine</strong> is officially incorporated<br />
by the state of Texas.<br />
• 1850: The first newspaper, The Trinity<br />
Advocate, is published in <strong>Palestine</strong>. The first<br />
census is taken in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1851: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Advocate begins publication.<br />
John Henninger Reagan comes to <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• August 30, 1852: Congress authorizes the<br />
first survey of the Trinity River.<br />
• 1853: John Graham Gooch opens the city’s<br />
first lending library.<br />
• 1854: Anderson County Chief Judge A. G.<br />
Cantly ensures passage of an order providing<br />
the courthouse yard with “shade trees and<br />
grass plots.”<br />
• September 24, 1860: John Reagan purchases<br />
660 acres of land that includes Fort Houston.<br />
He will not occupy the home included on the<br />
land until after the Civil War.<br />
• 1861-1865: The American Civil War<br />
• 1866: Mary Kate Hunter, famous for her collection<br />
of firsthand accounts of life in Anderson<br />
County, is born near Brushy Creek. Her father<br />
had come to Fort Houston with his family in<br />
1839 when he was just six months old.<br />
• July 1872: Christopher Columbus Rogers<br />
(1850-1887), a favorite of the Texas Sherriff’s<br />
Association and the second cousin of U.S.<br />
President Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865), works<br />
for the Trinity Advocate before he is appointed as<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>’s city marshall on this date.<br />
• 1874: Brushy Creek Arbor is built.<br />
• September 27, 1879: James Quisenberry is<br />
killed by City Marshall Chris Rogers in a<br />
gunfight on the courthouse square.<br />
• September 6, 1881: <strong>Palestine</strong> celebrates the<br />
opening of its public school system.<br />
• 1882: <strong>Palestine</strong>’s first telephone exchange,<br />
Southwestern Telegraph and Telephone<br />
Company, is established.<br />
• 1883: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Hebrew Association is<br />
founded.<br />
• 1884: The I. & G.N. Railroad builds a hospital<br />
for its employees on South Magnolia<br />
Street. Land is purchased for the creation of<br />
the Anderson County Poor Farm, which<br />
included a cotton gin and canning operations,<br />
housing for residents and a jail building on<br />
FM 322. A small cemetery and the jail are the<br />
only things that remain on the site today.<br />
• 1886: James Wisdom Ozment, introduced to<br />
incandescent light at the Dallas State Fair,<br />
opens <strong>Palestine</strong> Electric Light Company,<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>’s first light plant.<br />
• November 1890: Famed evangelist Sam<br />
Jones brings the Temperance Movement to<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> and a fistfight ensues between Jones<br />
and <strong>Palestine</strong> Mayor and opponent J. J. Word<br />
at the railroad depot.<br />
• 1891: The county’s first African-American<br />
school, Lincoln, opens as a mission school.<br />
• 1893: The homes along South Sycamore<br />
Street, Silk Stocking Row, are recognized as<br />
“the most fashionable avenue in <strong>Palestine</strong>.”<br />
• November 15, 1893: The Texas State<br />
Railroad begins construction on the line<br />
between <strong>Palestine</strong> and Rusk.<br />
• 1896: U.S. President Benjamin Harrison visits<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1897: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Daily Press begins<br />
publication.<br />
• 1898: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Daily Visitor begins<br />
publication.<br />
• August 22, 1899: The new <strong>Palestine</strong> City<br />
Hall celebrates its grand opening.<br />
• Around 1900: <strong>Palestine</strong>’s Salt and Coal<br />
Company is formed.<br />
• 1901: St. Mary’s Academy is established at<br />
❖<br />
Top: John Graham Gooch.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Above: Marshall Christopher<br />
Columbus Rogers.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Bottom, left: <strong>Palestine</strong> in the 1880s.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Bottom, right: The Jewish Synagogue,<br />
Temple Beth Israel, opened in January<br />
of 1901 and was located at the corner<br />
of South Magnolia and Dallas Streets.<br />
It was purchased by The Full<br />
Gospel Tabernacle in 1950 and<br />
razed in 1964.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
T i m e l i n e ✦ 5 1
❖<br />
Above: <strong>Palestine</strong> Mayor J. J. Word.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Top, right: Among Silk Stocking Row’s<br />
most exquisite Victorian homes was<br />
the George Wright home at 900 South<br />
Sycamore. It was built in 1883 at a<br />
cost of $64,000 and included an<br />
entire block enclosed by a wroughtiron<br />
fence, and a third floor ballroom.<br />
It was torn down in the 1940s and<br />
Memorial Hospital was built on<br />
the site.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Bottom, left: In 1899, <strong>Palestine</strong> City<br />
Hall was built at the corner of Oak<br />
and Magnolia Streets and replaced the<br />
original city hall on Avenue A. Future<br />
Texas Governor Thomas Mitchell<br />
Campbell delivered the opening<br />
address. The building was razed<br />
in 1940.<br />
COURTESY OF STUART WHITAKER.<br />
Lacy and North Jackson Streets in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1902: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Daily Herald begins publication.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>’s first road is paved.<br />
• 1903: <strong>Palestine</strong> welcomes a great exposition<br />
and carnival that introduces the automobile<br />
to the area. George Stewart wins a raffle at the<br />
event to become the city’s first owner of a car.<br />
• 1904: The county’s last legal hanging occurs.<br />
• 1906: Members of <strong>Palestine</strong>’s African-<br />
American community found Farmers &<br />
Citizens Bank<br />
• 1907: Five cars are officially registered in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>. By 1910 there would be fifty-one.<br />
• November 2, 1909: Born in <strong>Palestine</strong> on this<br />
day, Fred Lowery (1909-1984) garnered fame<br />
on radio, on stage, and in film as “The Blind<br />
Whistler” and whistled the theme song in the<br />
1954 John Wayne film The High and the Mighty.<br />
• 1910: <strong>Palestine</strong> passes an ordinance stating,<br />
“Streets of <strong>Palestine</strong> cannot be used for driving<br />
through of loose stock.”<br />
• July 6, 1911: On this day in <strong>Palestine</strong> the<br />
John H. Reagan monument, created by famed<br />
Italian sculptor Pompeo Coppini and cast in<br />
Rome, Italy, is unveiled at Reagan Park at<br />
Park Avenue and Crockett Road and includes<br />
a figure at the foot of the statue to represent<br />
the “Lost Cause of the Confederacy.” Thirteen<br />
stars on the figure’s helmet honor the states of<br />
the Confederacy.<br />
• 1912: <strong>Palestine</strong> Electric Light Company is<br />
sold to the Texas Power and Light Company.<br />
The Post Office and Federal Building is constructed<br />
in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1913: Bonner Frizzell accepts a position as<br />
principal of Rusk Grade School in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
He will remain a “tireless promoter” of public<br />
education until his death in 1968.<br />
• 1915: The railroad shops of the I. & G.N. are<br />
electrified, signifying the first time electricity<br />
is used for power in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• March 20, 1915: Owned by the <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
Hotel Company, the five-story, fireproof,<br />
$100,000 Redlands Hotel opens to great fanfare<br />
in downtown <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1916: The East Texas League’s <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
Athletics team opens its first season. They<br />
will later join the Lone Star League as the<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Pals and continue until 1940.<br />
Bottom, right: St. Mary’s Academy on<br />
North Tennessee Avenue in <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
is considered one of the oldest private<br />
schools in Texas. The Sisters of Mercy<br />
began teaching in a frame house on<br />
this site in 1882. The academy closed<br />
for a brief period in 1948, reopened in<br />
1954, and closed permanently in<br />
1966. It was demolished in 1993 to<br />
make way for new buildings for the<br />
Sacred Heart Parish.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
5 2 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
• 1925: William “Bill” Bridges (1925-2003) is<br />
born in <strong>Palestine</strong> and later becomes a famous<br />
photographer for Life Magazine, Saturday<br />
Evening Post, and others. Bridges authors The<br />
Great American Chili Book in 1981 and retires to<br />
the Turner family home in <strong>Palestine</strong> in 1990.<br />
• 1926: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Daily Press begins<br />
publication.<br />
• 1927: The Fort Houston chapter of the<br />
Daughters of the Republic of Texas is founded.<br />
• September 3, 1927: Texas Governor Dan<br />
Moody and other dignitaries including Col.<br />
George Anderson Wright join 15,000 onlookers<br />
as the first Trinity River Bridge opens. To<br />
commemorate the landmark event in<br />
Anderson County, M. P. and Leota Edmondson<br />
of <strong>Palestine</strong> are married on the bridge during<br />
the celebration.<br />
• 1929: <strong>Palestine</strong> resident and major league<br />
pitcher Jack “Iron Man” Coombs (1882-1957)<br />
is named the head baseball coach at Duke<br />
University. Known by fans as “Colby Jack,”<br />
Coombs first visited <strong>Palestine</strong> during spring<br />
training in 1907, where he met his wife. The<br />
couple married in 1910 and maintained a<br />
home in the city for the rest of their lives.<br />
• June 13, 1929: Anderson County Herald and<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Daily Herald merge.<br />
• 1931: Estelle Massey Riddle Osborne, a resident<br />
of <strong>Palestine</strong>, becomes the first African-<br />
American nurse to earn a master’s degree in<br />
nursing at Columbia University and later is<br />
the first African-American nurse elected to the<br />
board of the American Nurses Association.<br />
• 1932: One hundred people, including Bonner<br />
Frizzell and Jeff Davis Reagan, John’s son,<br />
attend a tree planting ceremony at the site of<br />
the Fort Houston home of John H. Reagan.<br />
• March 1934: Cayuga oilfield discovered.<br />
• 1935: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Times-News begins<br />
publication.<br />
• 1936: KNET, East Texas’ oldest radio station,<br />
debuts in <strong>Palestine</strong>. In 2011, the station will<br />
celebrate its 75th anniversary on the air.<br />
• 1937: Beloved coach Robert “Bob” Knight<br />
(1909-1989) begins his thirty-seven-year<br />
career in the <strong>Palestine</strong> School System.<br />
• 1938: The annual Texas Dogwood Trails<br />
Celebration begins.<br />
• 1939: The last class of the original <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
High School building graduates.<br />
• 1942: The <strong>Palestine</strong> Herald Press begins<br />
publication.<br />
• 1943: Country singer Gene Watson is born in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>. By 2011, he will garner 23 top ten<br />
singles and six number one hits.<br />
• January 25, 1943: Tobe Hooper, acclaimed<br />
filmmaker of such works as Texas Chainsaw<br />
Massacre and Poltergeist, was born on this day<br />
❖<br />
Top: A parade along Spring Street in<br />
downtown <strong>Palestine</strong>, 1909.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Middle: In 1911, the original location<br />
for the monument to John H. Reagan,<br />
shown here a century later in 2011,<br />
was planned for either the<br />
intersection of Sycamore and Avenue<br />
A or at the site of the Temple Opera<br />
House at Avenue A and Houston<br />
Street. After the committee in charge<br />
of the project was unable to raise<br />
funds, the Royall family sold a tract<br />
of land to the city for a park and its<br />
proceeds were given to the committee<br />
with the stipulation that the statue be<br />
placed in the new park.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
Bottom: <strong>Palestine</strong>’s Post Office and<br />
Federal Building, shown here in 2011,<br />
was built at 101 East Oak in 1912.<br />
Originally purchased from St. Phillips’<br />
Episcopal Church for a new post office<br />
in the city in 1907, construction was<br />
completed in 1913. The property was<br />
later transferred to Anderson County<br />
for historic preservation in 1990 and is<br />
listed in the National Register of<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Places.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
T i m e l i n e ✦ 5 3
❖<br />
Top, left: <strong>Palestine</strong>’s historic Redlands<br />
Hotel, now The Redlands <strong>Historic</strong> Inn,<br />
in 2011. Opened in 1915, the hotel<br />
later served as the home office of the<br />
I. & G.N. Railroad and then the<br />
Missouri Pacific Lines after 1919. The<br />
St. Louis Browns baseball team lived<br />
in the hotel during spring training in<br />
the city in 1916 and 1917. From<br />
1956 to 1975, the building remained<br />
empty and construction of shops,<br />
offices and a restaurant began its<br />
resurrection in 1976. In 1982, the<br />
building was registered on the<br />
National Register of <strong>Historic</strong> Places<br />
and today includes extended stay<br />
apartments, overnight suites, a<br />
restaurant, shops and offices, and<br />
apartments.<br />
PHOTO BY ERIC DABNEY.<br />
Top, right: The Anderson County<br />
Courthouse towers over the <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
High School Marching Band at a<br />
parade in <strong>Palestine</strong> in the 1930s.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Below: The entrance to the city’s<br />
celebrated Davey Dogwood Park,<br />
which includes over five and a half<br />
miles of paved roads that wind<br />
through the lush vegetation and<br />
towering trees of the area. At the top<br />
of Manley Mountain, guests will enjoy<br />
the inspiring views and numerous<br />
picnic locations.<br />
PHOTO BY SHELLEY DABNEY.<br />
in Austin. In the 1950s, he lived in <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
with his family, who ran a local hotel.<br />
• February 1944: <strong>Palestine</strong> oilman M. A. Davey<br />
purchases and deeds a tract of land to<br />
Anderson County that will become Davey<br />
Dogwood Park.<br />
• 1946: <strong>Palestine</strong>’s centennial event is dedicated<br />
to the memory of Mary Kate Hunter.<br />
• January 24, 1947: Born on this day in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>, “Super Bill” Bradley joined the<br />
Philadelphia Eagles for nine seasons in 1969.<br />
A former <strong>Palestine</strong> Wildcat player and Texas<br />
Longhorn star, he was considered “the most<br />
colorful ball player in Eagleland.”<br />
• 1953: African-American school, A. M. Story,<br />
opens in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1954: The first female is selected to serve on<br />
an Anderson County jury.<br />
• August 23, 1955: <strong>Palestine</strong>’s historic YMCA<br />
building is destroyed by fire. A new building<br />
will be dedicated in 1957.<br />
• 1956: Carolyn Douglin becomes the first<br />
Miss Anderson County. Jerry Hall, a 1952<br />
graduate of <strong>Palestine</strong> High School, is drafted<br />
by the Detroit Lions.<br />
• 1957: <strong>Palestine</strong> converts to direct dialing for<br />
telephone service.<br />
• 1957: Jimmy Smith becomes the first recipient<br />
of the <strong>Palestine</strong> Herald Press Sports Award.<br />
• 1959: The city’s first drive-thru bank debuts<br />
at First National Bank. Don Stewart, a 1955<br />
graduate of <strong>Palestine</strong> High School, is drafted<br />
by the Baltimore Colts.<br />
• 1961: Tennessee Colony is named the<br />
Outstanding Community in Texas.<br />
• 1962: Richard Farris, a 1958 graduate of<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> High School, is drafted by the Los<br />
Angeles Rams.<br />
• September 1962: The Temple Opera House<br />
is razed.<br />
• 1964: <strong>Palestine</strong> High School wins AAA State<br />
Championship in football.<br />
• 1965: <strong>Palestine</strong>’s first major discount store,<br />
Gibson’s, opens.<br />
• May 1966: St. Mary’s Academy closes in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1967: The new <strong>Palestine</strong> High School is dedicated<br />
by Speaker of the House and later<br />
Lieutenant Governor of Texas Ben Barnes.<br />
• December 31, 1969: The Texas and New<br />
Orleans Railroad Company (T&NO) makes<br />
its last freight run along the Texas State<br />
Railroad line between <strong>Palestine</strong> and Rusk.<br />
• September 15, 1970: The Missouri Pacific<br />
Hospital, formerly I. & G.N. Hospital, closes<br />
in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• December 4, 1970: Accomplished aviator<br />
and aeronautical engineer Benjamin “Benny”<br />
Odell Howard, born in <strong>Palestine</strong> in 1904,<br />
dies on this day.<br />
• 1972: One of the city’s most popular clothing<br />
stores, Maffitt’s Man Shop, closes after fifty years.<br />
• 1972: Barbara McKinney becomes the first<br />
female to win a city election in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• October 1, 1974: <strong>Palestine</strong> is converted to<br />
direct long distance dialing.<br />
• July 4, 1975: The “Bicentennial Bandstand” is<br />
dedicated at <strong>Palestine</strong>’s Reagan Park.<br />
• 1976: The Alcoa Aluminum Plant opens. It is<br />
no longer operational today.<br />
5 4 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
• 1977: The Texas State Railroad makes its first<br />
regular tourist runs along the historic 25.5-<br />
mile line between <strong>Palestine</strong> and Rusk.<br />
• 1978: The traffic lights are removed in downtown<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• 1979: Guy Brown III, a 1973 graduate of<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> High School, plays in Super Bowl<br />
XII for the Dallas Cowboys.<br />
• 1980: The new Westwood High School and<br />
Westwood Primary School open.<br />
• March 21, 1985: NFL star of the<br />
Minnesota Vikings Adrian Lewis Peterson is<br />
born in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• November 15, 1987: A tornado races across<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> and destroys A. M. Story School.<br />
• 1989: <strong>Palestine</strong> High School graduate and<br />
future Texas Senator and Agriculture<br />
Commissioner Todd Staples, begins life in<br />
public office when he is elected to the<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> City Council. In 1995 he will be<br />
elected state representative and serve three<br />
terms in the Texas House before being elected<br />
state senator in 2000. His public service continues<br />
today as Agriculture Commissioner<br />
when, following his first election in 2006, he<br />
was re-elected to a second term in 2010.<br />
• December 1999: Local artist Ancel E. Nunn<br />
(born in 1928), whose work is widely exhibited,<br />
dies in his <strong>Palestine</strong> home and studio.<br />
• February 2000: Stuntman Robbie Knievel<br />
successfully jumps his motorcycle over an<br />
oncoming train at the Texas State Railroad’s<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Park location. The event draws an<br />
estimated ten thousand onlookers and is<br />
broadcast nationwide on Fox.<br />
• April 2002: Osjetea Briggs (born in 1917), a<br />
well-renowned artist, writer, photographer,<br />
and author of Walk in My Moccasins, dies.<br />
• February 2003: <strong>Palestine</strong> is one of the East Texas<br />
towns over which much of the debris from the<br />
NASA Space Shuttle Columbia disaster falls.<br />
• 2005: A new courthouse annex opens on<br />
Mallard Street in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
• May 2006: Singer-songwriter and music producer<br />
T. Bone Burnett releases his album,<br />
True False Identity, which includes the song<br />
“<strong>Palestine</strong> Texas.” He performs the song live<br />
on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.<br />
• June 3, 2006: During the Heritage Flight<br />
Festival, sponsored by the Museum for East<br />
Texas Culture, John Ninomiya flies his helium<br />
cluster balloon as part of the “States of<br />
Enlightenment” project.<br />
• August 2008: <strong>Palestine</strong> becomes the seventeenth<br />
community in Texas to be named a<br />
GO TEXAN Certified Retirement Community<br />
• March 2011: The tenth annual <strong>Palestine</strong> Old<br />
Time Music and Dulcimer Festival is held at the<br />
Museum for East Texas Culture. In the same<br />
month, The <strong>Palestine</strong> Public Library opens in<br />
the <strong>Palestine</strong> Mall. The library originally outgrew<br />
the historic Carnegie Library building and<br />
was moved to the old Alamo School in 1986.<br />
After the roof of the library collapsed at the site<br />
in 2009, it was moved to the mall.<br />
❖<br />
Top, left: The city’s YMCA building<br />
was built in 1903. It burned in 1955.<br />
The building included a dormitory,<br />
gymnasium, indoor swimming pool,<br />
and bowling lanes.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
Top, right: A memorial to those lost in<br />
the Space Shuttle disasters of 1986<br />
and 2003 rests outside the <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
Police Department at North John and<br />
West Debard Streets, 2011.<br />
PHOTO BY SHELLEY DABNEY)<br />
Below: Balloonist John Ninomiya flies<br />
his helium cluster balloon during the<br />
Heritage Flight Festival at the<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Municipal Airport in 2006.<br />
T i m e l i n e ✦ 5 5
BIBLIOGRAPHY<br />
Anderson County History Forum, DVD Series. <strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas: <strong>Palestine</strong> Public Library, 2006, 2007, 2008.<br />
Anderson County Genealogical Society. The Tracings, journal of the society/various volumes. accessed at www.usgwarchives.net, 2011.<br />
Copyright by East Texas Genealogical Society.<br />
Avera, Carl L. Wind Swept Land. San Antonio: The Naylor Company, 1964.<br />
Barton, Marjorie. Leaning on a Legacy: The WPA. Oklahoma City: Oklahoma Heritage Association, 2008.<br />
Bowman, Bob. The East Texas Sunday Drive Book. Lufkin: Best of East Texas Publishers, 1991.<br />
Capps, Benjamin. The Great Chiefs. Chicago: Time-Life Books Inc., 1975.<br />
East Texas Genealogical Society, Anderson County History, accessed at www.etgs.org/txandeson/history and www.usgwarchives.net, 2011.<br />
Freeman, Douglas Southall. R. E. Lee: A Biography. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1946.<br />
From Steamboats to Space Craft: Between the Neches and the Trinity. Anderson County <strong>Historic</strong>al Survey Committee, 1971.<br />
Frizzell, Bonner. Some Early History of <strong>Palestine</strong>, accessed at www.inetwork-plus.com/palestine/palestine_tx_history, 2011.<br />
Gerland, Jonathan. Steam in the Pines: A History of the Texas State Railroad. Nacogdoches: East Texas <strong>Historic</strong>al Association, 2004.<br />
Handbook of Texas Online, accessed at www.tshaonline.org, 2011.<br />
Hohes, Pauline Buck. Centennial History of Anderson County. San Antonio: The Naylor Company, 1936.<br />
Hunter, Mary Kate. Unpublished Notes. Special Collections: <strong>Palestine</strong> Public Library. <strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas.<br />
Jones, Earnest. The Old Roman Watches Over Town, accessed at www.inetwork-plus.com/palestine<br />
Mears, Jim, et al. A History of <strong>Palestine</strong>, 1877. East Texas Genealogical Society, accessed at www.usgwarchives.net, 2011.<br />
Moore, Stephen L. Taming Texas: Captain William T. Sadler’s Lone Star Service. Austin: State House Press, 2000.<br />
Neyland, James. The Anderson County Courthouse: A History. <strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas: Empress Books, 1992.<br />
Odom, Beverly, & Goff, Louise, et al. Images of America: Anderson County. Arcadia Publishing, 2010.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Firsts. <strong>Palestine</strong> High School, accessed at www.palestinehigh.com/pal-firsts, 2011.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Herald-Press, 1971 – 2011.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> <strong>Historic</strong>al Preservation Commission. Northside <strong>Historic</strong>al Driving Tour.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> <strong>Historic</strong>al Preservation Commission. South Side <strong>Historic</strong>al Driving Tour, 1992.<br />
Pictorial History of <strong>Palestine</strong> and Anderson County, Texas. Fort Worth: Landmark Publishing, Inc., 1999.<br />
Proctor, Ben. Not Without Honor: The Life of John H. Reagan. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1962.<br />
Reagan, John H. Memoirs, with Special Reference to Secession and the Civil War. Reprinted from the original 1906 edition by Aurora,<br />
Colorado: Bibliographical Center for Research, 2010.<br />
Selden, Jack K. Return: The Parker Story. <strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas: Clacton Press, 2006<br />
Welch, June Rayfield. People and Places in the Texas Past. Dallas: Yellow Rose Press, 1974.<br />
Women in Texas History. A Project of The Ruthe Winegarten Memorial Foundation for Texas Women’s History, accessed at<br />
www.womenintexashistory.org, 2011.<br />
5 6 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
An aerial view of <strong>Palestine</strong> in<br />
the 1950s.<br />
COURTESY OF THE MUSEUM FOR EAST<br />
TEXAS CULTURE.<br />
SHARING THE HERITAGE<br />
H i s t o r i c p r o f i l e s o f b u s i n e s s e s , o r g a n i z a t i o n s , a n d<br />
f a m i l i e s t h a t h a v e c o n t r i b u t e d t o t h e d e v e l o p m e n t a n d<br />
e c o n o m i c b a s e o f P a l e s t i n e<br />
Bailey & Foster Funeral Home, Inc. ...................................................5 8<br />
East Texas National Bank.................................................................6 2<br />
Law Offices of Charles W. Nichols, PC ...............................................6 6<br />
Magnum Drilling Services, Inc. .........................................................6 8<br />
Eilenberger’s Premium Baked Gifts ....................................................7 0<br />
Holiday Inn Express-<strong>Palestine</strong> ..........................................................7 2<br />
City of <strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas ...................................................................7 4<br />
A. Hugh Summers, Attorney at Law ...................................................7 6<br />
Law Offices of Dick Swift .................................................................7 8<br />
The Redlands <strong>Historic</strong> Inn ................................................................8 0<br />
The Museum for East Texas Culture ...................................................8 1<br />
McCoy Funeral Home ......................................................................8 2<br />
New Dimensions Salon .....................................................................8 3<br />
Sweet Dreams Winery, LLC ...............................................................8 4<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Independent School District .................................................8 5<br />
Trinity Valley Community College–<strong>Palestine</strong> ........................................8 6<br />
L&P Paint & Body Shop, Inc. ...........................................................8 7<br />
Cars of <strong>Palestine</strong> ............................................................................8 7<br />
SPECIAL<br />
THANKS TO<br />
Roberts Custom Painting<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 5 7
BAILEY &<br />
FOSTER<br />
FUNERAL<br />
HOME, INC.<br />
❖<br />
Above: The stately Frank Hufsmith<br />
family home at 207 South Magnolia,<br />
where the Hassell & Foster Funeral<br />
Home was located in 1947.<br />
Right: G. G. “Gus” Hassell.<br />
Since the beginning of civilization, the<br />
custom of caring for the deceased, honoring a<br />
life passed, and supporting those who<br />
mourn has been important to humanity.<br />
Burial rituals were truly for the living,<br />
allowing those left behind an opportunity<br />
to grieve, accept the loss, and find<br />
closure. Michael D. Foster, owner of Bailey &<br />
Foster Funeral Home in <strong>Palestine</strong>, continues the<br />
family tradition.<br />
In fact, Bailey & Foster Funeral Home traces<br />
its four generation family history back to 1932,<br />
when G. G. “Gus” Hassell came to <strong>Palestine</strong> to<br />
enter into the partnership of South-Hassell<br />
Funeral Home. It remained South-Hassell until<br />
1938, when Hassell’s son-in-law, L. E. Foster<br />
became a partner in the firm and the name was<br />
changed to Hassell & Foster Funeral Home.<br />
(Hassell & Foster opened a funeral home in<br />
Athens in 1943. L. E.’s brother, Joe, managed<br />
the business until it was closed due to his<br />
declining health.)<br />
“Those were amazing days I understand,”<br />
Michael says, “when funeral homes, ours<br />
included, sold life insurance and ran a twentyfour<br />
hour ambulance service free of charge.”<br />
In February 1948 the Fosters opened the<br />
Grapeland facility at West Chestnut Street;<br />
5 8 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
later moving to a new location in 2009 on<br />
Highway 287 bypass. The newest location<br />
features full chapel seating with all-modern<br />
electronic video playing capabilities. This<br />
feature allows Bailey & Foster to display family<br />
photographs and other memorabilia, and to<br />
make a video about the loved one’s life. Those<br />
paying their respects can view the video at the<br />
service; and the family has the cherished DVD<br />
to take home with them.<br />
L. E. Foster’s son, David, joined the firm<br />
in 1966, working alongside his father. In 1985,<br />
Thomas W. Bailey, who was the third generation<br />
owner of Bailey Funeral Home, merged<br />
with Hassell & Foster to become Bailey &<br />
Foster Funeral Home. Michael came on board<br />
❖<br />
Above: (From left to right) H. G.<br />
“Cotton” Jeffus, Rose Nemer, David E.<br />
Foster, L. E. Foster, G. G. “Gus”<br />
Hassell, Riley G. Wilkerson, Harry E.<br />
Clark, and James T. Petty.<br />
Left: Wade Streetman and<br />
L. E. Foster.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 5 9
❖<br />
Left: Thomas W. Bailey.<br />
Right: David E. Foster.<br />
with the firm in 1994, becoming actively<br />
involved in the business. Six years later, he<br />
became the sole owner of Bailey & Foster<br />
Funeral Home and nearby Roselawn Park<br />
Cemetery. Bailey & Foster has been at its<br />
present location for sixty-three years. During<br />
this time, a chapel was added at Grapeland<br />
and Roselawn Park perpetual care cemetery<br />
was developed.<br />
It is important to Michael that the<br />
personalized service begun earlier by his<br />
ancestors continues. He has expanded<br />
the business to keep up-to-date with<br />
modern day traditions, still honoring the<br />
wishes of the deceased and respecting the<br />
desires of families.<br />
Bailey & Foster has always taken pride<br />
in providing families with many options to<br />
honor their loved ones. With so many<br />
choices available, its staff can customize a<br />
fitting tribute to reflect the life and passions<br />
of each individual. Today, funeral and<br />
memorial services can be as varied as the<br />
individual they represent.<br />
A full service funeral home, Bailey & Foster<br />
today features a chapel, selection room of<br />
caskets and garments, three state rooms for<br />
visitation, and perpetual care cemetery. If<br />
cremation is desired, the funeral home will<br />
provide that service. The staff takes the time<br />
necessary with each family it serves to “get to<br />
know” their loved one in order to better plan a<br />
fitting tribute, and design or pick out a flat<br />
bronze grave marker.<br />
No matter how a family chooses to remember<br />
their loved one, there are many things to<br />
consider in planning a service. Michael says that<br />
it is important to explain the choices such as<br />
6 0 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
visitation—whether there is visitation or not?<br />
Will there be a viewing? Or memorial service?<br />
Maybe the family, for whatever reason, only<br />
wants a graveside service. Whatever the<br />
family’s wishes, Bailey & Foster will work<br />
with the family to lend the right touch in a<br />
caring manner.<br />
Other options may include a chapel service.<br />
It may be that the family requests the service be<br />
held in the deceased’s member church. The<br />
family may decide on a public committal or a<br />
private one. There may be special gatherings,<br />
such as a wake followed by a reception.<br />
Residents of <strong>Palestine</strong> may select a cemetery or<br />
memorial garden of their choice as a final resting<br />
place. Or, they may take advantage of Bailey &<br />
Foster’s Roselawn Park perpetual care cemetery,<br />
which provides yearround maintenance of<br />
grounds, markers and burial sites.<br />
If cremation is desired (as opposed to burial),<br />
Bailey & Foster will see that the procedure is<br />
carried out with dignity. Families, then, may<br />
select an urn for storing the cremains or another<br />
means of distribution, such as scattering or<br />
burial. In any case, the funeral home provides<br />
one-on-one detail to make the tribute and final<br />
decisions as dignified as possible.<br />
Bailey & Foster’s compassionate nature during<br />
difficult times speaks volumes about the quality of<br />
services the funeral home has provided families in<br />
the <strong>Palestine</strong> area for over four generations. “That<br />
caring, personalized touch has contributed greatly<br />
to our reputation as a trusted neighbor and friend.<br />
It is also responsible for our longevity in the<br />
funeral home industry,” concludes Michael.<br />
❖<br />
Above: Michael Foster.<br />
Below: Bailey & Foster Funeral<br />
Home’s current location, 2010.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 6 1
EAST TEXAS<br />
NATIONAL<br />
BANK<br />
East Texas National Bank, like many other<br />
full service financial institutions of today, traces<br />
its development to community investors and<br />
enthusiastic area supporters who realized the<br />
need for such a facility in the early 1900s.<br />
The Campbell State Bank was founded<br />
February 11, 1911, with the help of former<br />
Texas Governor T. M. Campbell, J. E. Angly,<br />
T. M. Campbell, Jr., and forty-three other<br />
investors. They invested their money,<br />
(a combined $100,000) along with their<br />
business expertise, to launch the bank. Not<br />
only was the bank their idea, but they had<br />
the support of the entire community to<br />
expand as need dictated.<br />
P. W. Ezell was the first president of<br />
Campbell State Bank, although he was not<br />
active in the day-to-day operations. He<br />
died in 1914, and Governor Campbell<br />
was elected to replace him. By the<br />
time Campbell assumed leadership, the<br />
nation was already in the throes of an<br />
economic depression.<br />
It was easily understood why Anderson<br />
County was hard hit with economic woes.<br />
It was primarily dependent on corn and<br />
cotton as cash crops. In fact, the area was<br />
so depressed that cotton sold for ten cents<br />
per pound, and two year-old yearlings<br />
were only bringing eight dollars a head.<br />
Within ten years after opening, the<br />
bank’s capital totaled $150,000; and it<br />
merged with Guaranty State Bank. In 1924,<br />
it was chartered as a national bank under<br />
the name it bears today—East Texas<br />
National Bank (ETNB).<br />
When T. M. Campbell, Jr., joined the<br />
army as a commissioned officer in 1917,<br />
Governor Campbell sold his shares of stock<br />
to Angly and his associates.<br />
Immediately Angly was selected to<br />
succeed him, eventually seeing the bank<br />
through The Great Depression, until his<br />
retirement in 1946. He continued as<br />
chairman of the board, however, until<br />
his death in 1953. During his tenure,<br />
he displayed exemplary leadership,<br />
expanding the bank into one of areawide<br />
services. According to company<br />
archives, he “did more to promote the<br />
bank’s growth and development than<br />
anyone had previously…” Upon his retirement<br />
and subsequent death, N. C. Woolverton, Sr.,<br />
succeeded him.<br />
With the merger and increasing population<br />
(due largely to job growth and influx of people<br />
in <strong>Palestine</strong> because of the International Great<br />
Northern Railroad) capital increased to more<br />
than $900,000 with assets totaling $11 million<br />
by the mid-1960s.<br />
Because of financial growth, the first bank<br />
was replaced by a new building in 1966 at<br />
6 2 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
207 West Spring Street in downtown <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
A building committee comprised of the board<br />
of directors, included John D. Saunders,<br />
Henry S. Davenport, Jr., W. Lamar Hamilton,<br />
R. L. Kenderdine, Jr., M. M. Rogers, and<br />
Howard T. Winkler.<br />
ETNB has had the following presidents<br />
since 1911: P.W. Ezell (1911-1914), Governor<br />
T. M. Campbell (1914-1917), J. E. Angly<br />
(1924-1946), Woolverton (1946-1967), John<br />
Saunders (1967-1975), Cad E. Williams<br />
(1975-1983), Joe Crutcher (1983-2007), Jerry<br />
L. Nowlin (2007-2011), and Cliff Bomer<br />
(2011-present).<br />
Through their leadership and dedication<br />
to the community, ETNB continued to grow<br />
in Anderson County through the years. To add<br />
to that growth, branches were purchased in<br />
Mexia (1992) and Huntsville (1996). Today,<br />
ETNB boasts over $130 million in assets with<br />
an additional $65 million managed by its<br />
trust department.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 6 3
Paralleling the early days, ETNB is a<br />
conservative institution that continues to<br />
provide quality banking service to its<br />
customers. Those services have expanded<br />
over the years to include commercial and<br />
consumer loans, real estate loans, business<br />
and personal deposit services, trust services<br />
and online banking.<br />
Bomer says, “The East Texas National Bank<br />
and its employees continue to assist businesses<br />
and individuals with their financial needs—just<br />
as it did in 1911.<br />
“Our mission is, ‘To be the premier bank in<br />
the communities we serve by building longterm<br />
customer relationships and providing<br />
superior customer service.’”<br />
6 4 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 6 5
LAW OFFICES OF CHARLES W. NICHOLS, PC<br />
Charles W. Nichols grew up with a family<br />
tradition of hard work and the pursuit of<br />
excellence. As a young man, that tradition<br />
served him well. He graduated among the top<br />
ten of his class at <strong>Palestine</strong> High School and<br />
lettered as a four-year varsity football team<br />
captain. Subsequently, he graduated Magna<br />
Cum Laude from Texas A&M University and<br />
decided to pursue a career in law.<br />
Nichols worked with the Harris County<br />
Sheriff’s Department as a bailiff in the civil<br />
courts division while attending night classes at<br />
the University of Houston Law School. There,<br />
he developed his passion for trial work.<br />
Working with the best trial lawyers in the<br />
state, Nichols learned the true meaning of<br />
Proverbs 31:18; “Speak up for those who cannot<br />
speak for themselves, speak for the rights of all<br />
who are destitute.” When he graduated law<br />
school in 1979, he knew his calling was where<br />
he grew up.<br />
Opening his practice in 1980, Nichols<br />
became associated with some of the great trial<br />
lawyers with whom he had become acquainted,<br />
and tried many injured railroad workers’<br />
cases. Two years later, with his mother, Helen,<br />
he bought the building at 617 East Lacy Street<br />
directly across from the historic Anderson<br />
County Courthouse.<br />
During a career of more than thirty years,<br />
Nichols, individually, and in association with<br />
co-counsel, secured jury verdicts and<br />
settlements for clients for substantial amounts.<br />
He expanded his practice into every aspect of<br />
personal injury and civil trial law including<br />
automobile and eighteen-wheeler accidents,<br />
product liability cases, professional negligence,<br />
aviation accidents, serious personal injury,<br />
wrongful death, and class actions, all with the<br />
same exceptional results for his clients.<br />
Nichols became board certified in Personal<br />
Injury Trial Law in 1992 and in Civil Trial<br />
Law in 1993 by the Texas Board of Legal<br />
Specialization. Throughout his career, he<br />
has drawn upon his father, Dr. Charles E.<br />
Nichols’ credo: “What matters most to people<br />
are results.”<br />
Nichols is licensed to practice before the<br />
United States Supreme Court and the United<br />
States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, and<br />
has an active practice in many of the Texas State<br />
and Federal district courts. His practice extends<br />
throughout the United States, utilizing local<br />
counsel and pro hac vice admissions. The Law<br />
Offices of Charles W. Nichols, PC, is a friendly<br />
and accessible local law firm that obtains big<br />
city results for its clients.<br />
Nichols continues to serve the community as<br />
a lay minister, lay reader, and vestry member<br />
of his church, and as past president and<br />
board member of the <strong>Palestine</strong> YMCA, where he<br />
coached his sons’ baseball and basketball<br />
programs for twelve years.<br />
6 6 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
Nichols Professional Building, with its<br />
distinctive blue awnings, is located on the north<br />
side of the Square. The building sits on lots<br />
six and seven of the eight original blocks as<br />
recorded in the town plat on September 28,<br />
1848. Originally, the site was occupied by the<br />
Osceola Hotel at Perry and Poplar Streets, where<br />
General Sam Houston enjoyed whittling and<br />
holding forth about the glories of the Republic<br />
of Texas.<br />
Successive structures at the site housed law<br />
offices, a dry goods store, and in the 1870s,<br />
the International Saloon, site of an infamous<br />
shootout. After 1885, with the exception of<br />
the decade from 1910–1920, the lots lay vacant<br />
until the late 1940s, when the current structure<br />
was erected as a grocery store. The building<br />
served a variety of retail businesses until 1982,<br />
when it was remodeled into the current office<br />
suites. Nichols also maintains his “trial ready”<br />
room at his residence in the landmark red brick<br />
Nichols family home place. The Nichols law<br />
offices are fully computerized; utilizing online<br />
libraries, e-filing of court documents, digital<br />
document production and searching, and e-mail<br />
communications, making it possible to operate<br />
paperless. Nevertheless, personal attention and<br />
client results are Nichols’ uncompromising<br />
standard. Nichols can be found on the Internet<br />
at www.texas-trial-lawyer-nichols.net.<br />
❖<br />
Above: The red brick landmark<br />
Nichols family home.<br />
Below: Nichols Professional Building.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 6 7
MAGNUM<br />
DRILLING<br />
SERVICES, INC.<br />
Barry Bryant knows firsthand, the meaning of<br />
Plato’s famous quotation: “Necessity is the mother<br />
of invention.”<br />
In 1995, Bryant had an epiphany for a<br />
process that would speed the drilling process,<br />
and changed careers to form a business to do<br />
just that.<br />
Holding a management position with Baker<br />
Hughes, he decided to leave corporate America<br />
behind and take his idea to market. He founded<br />
Magnum Drilling Services, Inc., in the Rocky<br />
Mountain area, doing directional drilling<br />
from the back of his pick-up truck. It was<br />
not long until he opened an office in Minden,<br />
Louisiana, and began providing downhole<br />
mud motors to increase the speed and bit<br />
power of the gas and oil drilling applications.<br />
Not long after that, Magnum became the first<br />
company to introduce mud motors to the East<br />
Texas oilpatch.<br />
On September 11, 2001, Bryant was meeting<br />
with his brother-in-law and sister, Ben and Jo<br />
Ellan Walley in Minden, Louisiana, to offer Ben a<br />
position with Magnum as the growth had made it<br />
necessary to bring in some management in East<br />
Texas. After careful thought Ben accepted the job<br />
of operations manager for Magnum and Ben and<br />
Jo Ellan moved to Lake <strong>Palestine</strong> from the coast<br />
of Alabama. Ben had an engineering background<br />
as well as management but the oil industry was<br />
completely new to him. Several months later after<br />
getting settled in their new home Jo Ellan began<br />
working for Magnum also, as its comptroller,<br />
coming from a long background in accounting<br />
and comptroller positions.<br />
In 2003, Magnum manufactured its first mud<br />
motor in its shop on Route 645, just outside of<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>. It now has its motor manufacturing<br />
facility in Conroe, Texas, and maintains an<br />
entire fleet of motors.<br />
❖<br />
Where it began.<br />
Bryant’s expertise and innovative techniques<br />
have continued to grow the company for the<br />
past fifteen years, making it a single source<br />
solution for cost-effective drilling. Today,<br />
Magnum offers oilpatch rentals, including<br />
downhill motors and Magnadrift, as well as<br />
consulting services in the United States and<br />
Central America.<br />
In July 2001, when there was opportunity for<br />
the Teledrift service in East Texas, Magnum<br />
purchased the East Texas and North Louisiana<br />
distributorship. Magnum became well-known<br />
for its twenty-four hour service and the Teledrift<br />
distributorship in the coming years.<br />
In early 2009 when the oil industry took<br />
a downturn, Magnum was at the forefront<br />
of developing its own survey tool, the<br />
“Magnadrift,” which currently has a patent<br />
pending. Magnadrift is designed to speed<br />
drilling by providing almost instantaneous<br />
surface recording of hole deviations without<br />
making round trips or running wire lines. The<br />
unit, operated by rig personnel, is a user<br />
friendly device measuring well-bore angle in<br />
one-half degree or one-degree increments and<br />
relaying the information to an electronic<br />
recording device on the drill floor via telemetry.<br />
Magnadrift can be used for a survey at many<br />
6 8 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
times during the drilling process, even between<br />
pipe connections.<br />
Magnum’s drilling consultants have years<br />
of experience and knowledge of downhole<br />
drilling, providing competitive pricing in<br />
Colorado, Louisiana, New Mexico, Oklahoma,<br />
Texas, Wyoming, and Mississippi. Magnum<br />
consultants are currently teaching Belize Natural<br />
Energy of Belize in Central America how to<br />
drill and produce its own gas and oil wells.<br />
Magnum boasts a long list of long-time<br />
customers. Among them are oilpatch operators<br />
like EnCana Oil & Gas (USA) Inc., Chevron<br />
USA, Inc, Exxon Mobil, Goodrich Petroleum<br />
Corporation of Louisiana, and Chesapeake<br />
Operating, Inc.<br />
Jo Ellan proudly says<br />
that her brother, Barry, “Was<br />
key in getting eighteen<br />
month old Baby Jessica out<br />
of a well in Midland in<br />
October 1987.” Jessica had<br />
fallen into an abandoned<br />
well and was there for fiftynine<br />
hours before her<br />
rescue as the world watched<br />
on television.<br />
As time permits, Ben<br />
and Jo Ellan remain<br />
involved in community<br />
activities. Magnum is also<br />
very supportive with<br />
monetary contributions<br />
for good causes within the<br />
community and world.<br />
St Jude Hospital has<br />
a wing partially built<br />
by Magnum and Barry.<br />
Jo Ellan is active<br />
in Harvey Woman’s<br />
Club and is currently<br />
serving as treasurer.<br />
Ben and Jo Ellan<br />
are members of<br />
First United Methodist<br />
Church of <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
The rolling hills and<br />
the beauty of East<br />
Texas have enticed Ben<br />
and Jo Ellan to make<br />
this their final home<br />
on earth and they plan to support and be<br />
involved in community projects in <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
whenever they can.<br />
Magnum is located at 5423 West Oak<br />
Street in <strong>Palestine</strong>, and maintains offices in<br />
Conroe and Midland, Texas; Minden,<br />
Louisiana; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; and<br />
Sheridan, Wyoming. The company continues<br />
its dedication to drilling operations and<br />
providing cost-effective service to the oil and<br />
gas industry. The <strong>Palestine</strong> office is the<br />
accounting headquarters for all of Barry’s<br />
companies, which include a fishing lodge in<br />
British Columbia, a sporting goods store,<br />
and others.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 6 9
EILENBERGER’S<br />
PREMIUM<br />
BAKED GIFTS<br />
❖<br />
Top, left: F. H. Eilenberger.<br />
Top, right: This early 1900s<br />
photograph shows one of F. H.<br />
Eilenberger’s employees ready to<br />
deliver bread by horse-drawn wagon.<br />
By the 1930s, the business had a fleet<br />
of fifteen to twenty delivery trucks.<br />
Opposite, top: The Eilenberger bake<br />
shop/plant.<br />
Opposite, bottom: Eilenberger<br />
Bakery’s world famous fruit cake<br />
with tin.<br />
The contributions of German immigrant,<br />
Frederick Herman (F. H.) Eilenberger (1878-<br />
1959) made the rich history of <strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas,<br />
even sweeter in the East Texas Community.<br />
The Eilenbergers left their native homeland<br />
in Leipzig, Germany in 1881, bringing with<br />
them, two things: Family memories and<br />
treasured recipes for fruitcake.<br />
The family, including four-year-old F. H.<br />
Eilenberger, set sail to pursue a dream of life<br />
in the United States, settling in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
Seventeen years later, after working in bakeries<br />
in Fort Worth and Galveston, he founded the<br />
world-famous bakery bearing the family name.<br />
American Home Bakery, the original<br />
establishment, burned in 1915; however, F. H.<br />
continued to operate at a temporary site until he<br />
rebuilt at 512 North John Street three years later.<br />
He delivered bread by horse drawn wagons until<br />
1920; and the business eventually evolved into<br />
a wholesale operation with a fleet of fifteen to<br />
twenty trucks during the 1930s and 1940s.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> proved to be an excellent location<br />
because it was the county seat of Anderson<br />
County and a major stopping point for the<br />
International and Great Northern Railroad.<br />
In 1949, F. H. sold the business to his sons,<br />
Fred and Herman, and his son-in-law, Claude<br />
Westerman. Realizing that man could not live on<br />
bread alone, the bakery began producing a<br />
variety of other baked goods, including fruitcake,<br />
using the family recipe brought from Germany,<br />
which proved to be a successful venture.<br />
Eilenberger’s switched its primary product<br />
from bread to fruitcakes in 1968 because of<br />
increasing pressure from automated competitors.<br />
In 1978, Tom Broyles, a fifth-generation<br />
Texan and the great-grandson of Texas Governor<br />
Thomas Mitchell Campbell, saved the bakery<br />
from closure. Tom owned it until 1993; and<br />
from 1993-1995, he managed it for Silverado<br />
Foods of Tulsa, Oklahoma. During Tom’s tenure<br />
in 1980, the Texas Pecan Cake and the World<br />
Famous Fruitcake earned Monde International<br />
Gold Medal Awards at the World Food Selection<br />
in Brussels.<br />
Centennial Foods of Atlanta, Georgia bought<br />
the bakery in 1997, but closed the doors five<br />
years later. That’s when local residents Terresa<br />
and Stephen Smith became the owners and<br />
operators of the bakery in 2000. Terresa was<br />
dedicated to continuing the bakery’s resilient<br />
history and breathed new life into it. She was<br />
well on her way to making the bakery a success<br />
when she became ill and passed away in<br />
2008. Upon her passing, Southern Fulfillment<br />
Services (SFS), LLC, acquired the 111-year-old<br />
Eilenberger Bakery in October 2009.<br />
7 0 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
SFS, headquartered out of Vero Beach,<br />
Florida, already owns national catalogers Hale<br />
Groves and Pittman & Davis, two established<br />
brands offering citrus, specialty fruit and<br />
gourmet food gift selections.<br />
The bakery produces thousands of fruit and<br />
nut cakes during the holiday season; and,<br />
during the weeks prior to Christmas, ships up to<br />
5,000-7,000 cakes a day.<br />
To support Eilenberger’s strategic marketing<br />
efforts, it maintains a continuously updated website<br />
at www.eilenbergerbakey.com, distributes as<br />
many as 300,000 catalogs, and advertises in<br />
magazines and newspapers around the country.<br />
Sarah Pryor, current general manager and<br />
spokesperson, states that much of the business<br />
comes from word-of-mouth. Local residents purchase<br />
an assortment of baked goods from the<br />
display cases, or pre-order for special occasions<br />
throughout the year. In addition, patrons may<br />
savor a variety of made-to-order sandwiches<br />
served on Eilenberger’s gourmet breads.<br />
Eilenberger’s Bakery is the oldest bakery<br />
in Texas, still operating at the same location,<br />
and continually is named “Best Bakery” by<br />
local residents.<br />
Because of its reputation for baked goods,<br />
travelers have been known to make side trips to<br />
the historic <strong>Palestine</strong> landmark for tours of the<br />
bakery during the springtime while enjoying the<br />
annual Dogwood Trail Festivities.<br />
Pryor says that she is proud of the<br />
Eilenberger heritage and knows that it is the<br />
customer today that ensures the success of<br />
Eilenberger’s Bakery tomorrow.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 7 1
HOLIDAY INN<br />
EXPRESS-<br />
PALESTINE<br />
While the Holiday Inn brand has long been<br />
the benchmark by which other hotels are<br />
measured, it is Holiday Inn Express–<strong>Palestine</strong><br />
that continually wins kudos for its facility.<br />
Patel, a longtime hotelier, guides the direction<br />
of the ultramodern and tastefully decorated<br />
establishment. He believes that Holiday Inn<br />
Express-<strong>Palestine</strong>’s success can be attributed<br />
to the personal attention to every guest whether<br />
they are vacationers, business travelers, or local<br />
townspeople attending a meeting. He takes<br />
pride in hotel and guest satisfaction, making it<br />
the number one priority. To do that, he relies on<br />
continuous in-service training for all employees<br />
to ascertain that all guests are treated<br />
courteously and efficiently from the time they<br />
enter the parking lot to the time they walk out<br />
the front door.<br />
In fact, the sixty-two guest room hotel, nestled<br />
in the Pineywoods of East Texas, has been<br />
named by the <strong>Palestine</strong> Herald-Press as the<br />
Best Hotel in the area. Voting on that honor<br />
were guests and residents alike. If that was not<br />
enough, Holiday Inn Express-<strong>Palestine</strong> received<br />
the “Six Continents Hotels 2000 Newcomer<br />
of the Year” award—just a year after opening<br />
its doors. As a 2009 re-launch hotel, the<br />
hotel achieved the number one status for<br />
quality excellence and guest satisfaction. The<br />
Intercontinental Hotels Group (parent company)<br />
also tapped it with its highest rating—<br />
“Excellent Quality Performer—for two consecutive<br />
years and the 2010 Best Renovation Award!”<br />
The list of accolades is endless: The East Texas<br />
Tourism Association selected it as its Fam<br />
Tour award for first place, “Best Property on<br />
the East Texas Motorcoach Fam Tour.” These<br />
honors, according to General Manager Jim Patel,<br />
“reflects the hotel’s continuing efforts to provide<br />
local, regional, and national business and leisure<br />
clients with the finest mid-scale luxury hotel in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas.”<br />
The hotel’s impressive guest rooms feature a<br />
thirty-two-inch flat screen television, microwave,<br />
refrigerator, iron, ironing board, coffee maker,<br />
two dual-line speakerphones with voice mail and<br />
data ports, and a comfortable work desk with<br />
ergonomic leather chair. In fact, the business<br />
guest will welcome the special business center<br />
featuring with everything one needs to continue<br />
“business as usual” when away from home. The<br />
hotel is committed to extraordinary guest service,<br />
assuring safety and satisfaction.<br />
7 2 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
Rooms have premium quality mattresses to<br />
assure a peaceful night’s sleep. Double queen<br />
rooms are spacious for vacationing families and<br />
family reunions. These double queen rooms are<br />
attractive and comfortable and feature all the<br />
standard amenities for which the Holiday Inn<br />
Express-<strong>Palestine</strong> is noted. Handicap rooms are<br />
available upon request.<br />
After a long drive or a tiring airport layover,<br />
guests may pamper themselves in one of the<br />
hotel’s luxury Jacuzzi suites or the five-person<br />
infrared sauna. A luxurious king suite is<br />
complete with pillow-top mattress, contributing<br />
to the welcome slumber of weary travelers.<br />
Exercise enthusiasts may enjoy a workout in<br />
the hotel’s fitness center featuring state-of-theart<br />
exercise equipment, a luxurious soak in a hot<br />
tub, or an invigorating swim in the outdoor<br />
pool. Guests are invited to make the shift<br />
from day to night with “Unwind”—a Holiday<br />
Inn Express-<strong>Palestine</strong> evening ritual. It is the<br />
time to relax after an active day or gear up for an<br />
energized evening.<br />
Visitors to <strong>Palestine</strong> will find the historical<br />
Texas town inviting. The hotel is located at 1030<br />
East <strong>Palestine</strong> Avenue (Highway 79 East), just<br />
minutes away from a vast array of attractions.<br />
The city is the birthplace of over twenty famous<br />
Texans who molded the state through education,<br />
religion and industry. It is dotted with Victorian<br />
homes, historic landmarks, nature, recreation,<br />
and entertainment attractions, including the<br />
Texas State Railroad, Davey Dogwood Park, and<br />
Museum for East Texas Culture, Howard House<br />
Museum, and the National Scientific Balloon<br />
Facility. Shopping venues include antique shops<br />
and restaurants of all ethnicities. Seasonal events<br />
are the Hot Pepper Festival, Rough Rider<br />
Reenactment Camps, river canoe races, and the<br />
nationally acclaimed Dogwood Trails Festival.<br />
There is a lot to do and see in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
In 2010, the world’s best-known hotel chain<br />
celebrated its fifty-eighth anniversary.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 7 3
❖<br />
CITY OF<br />
PALESTINE,<br />
TEXAS<br />
Top: The dedication of the<br />
Rotary Clock.<br />
Bottom: The entrance to Willow Creek<br />
Business Park.<br />
Continuing the city’s long-held tradition of<br />
forward thinking and entrepreneurship, the city<br />
of <strong>Palestine</strong>, today, is experiencing a surge of<br />
economic energy and growth.<br />
The city of <strong>Palestine</strong> has a municipal form of<br />
government dedicated to equality, justice, and<br />
the well-being of its people. Its focus is on<br />
public safety, code enforcement, and maintenance<br />
of its infrastructure and master plan.<br />
It goes to great lengths to make the city a<br />
great place to grow—both businesses and residents.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> is a Main Street City, Certified<br />
Retirement Community, Preserve America<br />
Community, and Certified Local Government.<br />
Along with Mayor Bob Herrington, the sixmember<br />
council includes Adam Harding,<br />
Vernon Denman, Jr., Vickey L. Chives, James H.<br />
Yelverton, Andrea Baird, and Steve Presley.<br />
A portion of sales tax revenue is earmarked<br />
for the <strong>Palestine</strong> Economic Development<br />
Corporation (EDC) to fund growth and<br />
expansion of existing businesses. In addition,<br />
the city provides incentives for large residential<br />
and commercial development, as well as new<br />
industry. Maintaining updated infrastructure is<br />
one way the city is ready to welcome new<br />
growth. EDC’s vision is to help <strong>Palestine</strong> be a<br />
growing, healthy community with a diversified<br />
economic base to enhance the quality of life.<br />
Its mission is to provide the leadership and<br />
resources to successfully compete for jobs and<br />
enhance community wealth.<br />
Within the six-county, 50-mile radius of<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>, the total labor force exceeds 100,000;<br />
and the unemployment rate in Anderson<br />
County alone, is a low 5.7 percent. The median<br />
household income within a thirty-mile radius<br />
is $37,410; and combined property tax rate in<br />
the areas of city of <strong>Palestine</strong>, Anderson County,<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> ISD, Westwood ISD, and Trinity Valley<br />
Community College are $2.47.438/$100.<br />
Not relying on its rich history, but to draw<br />
upon that history to further today’s growth,<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>, as a Main Street City, is seeing many<br />
properties in its extensive historic districts<br />
renovated and restored to their Victorian glory.<br />
Many of those structures are now occupied by<br />
boutiques and other unique businesses that<br />
attract tourists.<br />
When a State of Texas budget shortfall<br />
threatened to close the 120-plus-year-old Texas<br />
State Railroad in 2006, innovative, critical<br />
thinkers in <strong>Palestine</strong> suggested the development<br />
of the Texas State Railroad Authority, headed<br />
by representatives of the city of <strong>Palestine</strong> and<br />
the city of Rusk (both terminal cities for the<br />
railroad), to manage the railroad and place it<br />
under private operation, to increase riders, and<br />
expand tourist traffic.<br />
Rail was one of the earliest forms of<br />
transport, but today, I-45 and I-20 are within<br />
fifty-five miles of <strong>Palestine</strong>, making it an ideal<br />
location for business and industry that must<br />
engage in transporting goods to and from the<br />
area. It is also served by commercial air service<br />
at Pounds Field in nearby Tyler. Connections<br />
from Pounds Field to Dallas-Fort Worth (DFW)<br />
International Airport, 120 miles away, make it<br />
ideal for travel anywhere.<br />
7 4 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
❖<br />
Before and after: The rehabilitation of<br />
Main Street in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> pride is evident in many<br />
areas of the city. Within the past<br />
year, three additional hotel chains<br />
have opened properties. Wal-Mart has<br />
invested in two distribution centers<br />
and a superstore, attracting customers<br />
from a multi-county market area.<br />
Lowe’s, Applebee’s, Office Depot, and<br />
other national retailers have seen growth<br />
opportunities in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
Serving more than 100,000 people in<br />
Anderson and surrounding counties,<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Regional Medical Center<br />
and <strong>Palestine</strong> Regional Rehabilitation<br />
Hospital provide facilities with 150<br />
beds, and highly skilled staffs of<br />
healthcare professionals. Additionally,<br />
two more modern medical centers<br />
opened in 2009-2010.<br />
Along with Trinity Valley Community<br />
College, the opening of a new campus<br />
for University of Texas at Tyler, <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
Campus; a branch of Texas State<br />
Technical College, and the beginning<br />
of an early college-high school program at<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Regional Educational Partnership<br />
(PREP) Center, <strong>Palestine</strong> is established as a<br />
regional education center that sees students<br />
from pre-K through baccalaureate and some<br />
master’s programs.<br />
The City of <strong>Palestine</strong>, <strong>Palestine</strong> Economic<br />
Development Corporation, and <strong>Palestine</strong> Area<br />
Chamber of Commerce work together to<br />
increase awareness of the natural beauty,<br />
high quality of life, and vibrant, economic<br />
opportunities that are <strong>Palestine</strong>, Texas.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 7 5
A. HUGH SUMMERS, ATTORNEY AT LAW<br />
As a youth, Alfred Hughes “Hugh” Summers<br />
admired his uncle, Alfred Holt Summers, so<br />
much that he modeled his own career after him.<br />
His uncle was involved in an airplane<br />
accident in the Marines and became a<br />
quadriplegic. Being confined to a wheelchair<br />
prompted him to study law at the University of<br />
Texas School of Law. He opened a law practice<br />
at 115 West Spring Street in 1953, and Hugh<br />
joined him twenty years later. Hugh frequently<br />
accompanied his uncle to the courthouse,<br />
helping carry him up the steps when he was<br />
doing research or had a court date.<br />
“Law, then, was nothing like it is today,”<br />
says Hugh. “When I was in high school, I did<br />
research helping Uncle Alfred. It was during<br />
that time that he bought his first Xerox copy<br />
machine, only the second one in <strong>Palestine</strong>. Prior<br />
to that, we used carbon paper. Divorce decrees<br />
were two legal-size pages long, not the twenty<br />
plus letter-size today.”<br />
Alfred bought his first Mag Card word<br />
processor whereby one magnetic card stored<br />
one page of typing. Later, that was replaced by<br />
an IBM System Six word processor costing<br />
about $22,000. “Even then,” he adds, “it could<br />
not process statistical information.”<br />
Eventually, Alfred bought a red, batterypowered<br />
cart enabling him to drive his wheel<br />
chair from home to office.<br />
The Clifford Huffsmiths, Hugh’s maternal<br />
great grandparents, came to <strong>Palestine</strong> with the<br />
railroad in the 1800s, and lived in the house<br />
where Bailey and Foster Funeral Home is<br />
located today. His paternal great grandparents<br />
moved from Tennessee to the house Hugh<br />
and his wife, Ahnise, live in, built in 1896 by<br />
F. C. Bailey. Hugh’s father, F. Bailey Summers;<br />
mother, Christine Hughes Summers; grandparents,<br />
Elbert Joseph Summers and Bessie Bailey<br />
Summers, also lived in the house.<br />
Hugh earned a Bachelor’s degree in physics<br />
from Austin College in Sherman, Texas, started<br />
law school and served as a radar maintenance<br />
and communications officer in the Air Force.<br />
He completed his Juris Doctor degree at the<br />
University of Houston Bates College of Law.<br />
Hugh joined his uncle’s practice in 1973.<br />
A year later, they moved to 111 West Spring<br />
Street, the office where Hugh continues to<br />
practice. Alfred passed away in 1991 after a law<br />
career spanning thirty-eight years. His wife was<br />
Estill Gilliam Summers.<br />
Hugh and Ahnise, met while attending<br />
Austin College. They married while he was in<br />
law school, and had two sons, Alan, who resides<br />
in Houston, and Ric, who passed away of cancer<br />
while living in Beaumont with his wife Kim<br />
Hudgins Summers, now of Richmond, Texas.<br />
Like many young attorneys in <strong>Palestine</strong>,<br />
Hugh took on clients with all types of legal<br />
issues including real estate, criminal, family law,<br />
estates, probate, and commercial matters.<br />
The Summers family has always been community-oriented.<br />
In addition to managing his<br />
rental properties, Hugh has served on many<br />
city boards, most recently as chairman of the<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Landmarks Commission. He works<br />
with the Boy Scouts having served as cubmaster,<br />
scoutmaster, district chairman, district<br />
7 6 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
commissioner, roundtable commissioner, council<br />
activities chairman, and chair of merit badge<br />
subjects at the Boy Scout National jamborees<br />
since 1985. He was chairman of the cinematography<br />
merit badge group at the 2010 100th<br />
Anniversary National Boy Scout Jamboree at<br />
Fort A. P. Hill, Virginia.<br />
He is active in Rotary International, where<br />
he served as president of the <strong>Palestine</strong> Rotary<br />
Club in 1999-2000, district governor in 2003-04,<br />
as well as on various committees, zone and<br />
district positions. Ahnise is also involved in<br />
many civic activities.<br />
Hugh helps Scouts and Rotary youth make<br />
cardboard boats and cars for riding, pumping<br />
the hand gang car on abandoned railroad<br />
tracks; shoots photographs and videos around<br />
town and from his plane; works with youth at<br />
his observatory; and enlightens them about the<br />
solar panels on his office building.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 7 7
LAW OFFICES OF<br />
DICK SWIFT<br />
❖<br />
Clockwise, starting from top:<br />
Trial lawyers, Ernest Swift and Dick<br />
Swift (right).<br />
Dick with Speaker of the House<br />
“Gib” Lewis.<br />
State Representative Swift<br />
debating legislation.<br />
Judge E. V. Swift (1885-1949).<br />
Over a century ago, E. V. Swift graduated<br />
from the University of Tennessee School of Law<br />
and became a practicing attorney in <strong>Palestine</strong>,<br />
setting a precedent for his heirs. E. V. was<br />
county judge when the County Courthouse was<br />
dedicated in 1914. He was only twenty-nine.<br />
Following in his footsteps, his son Richard<br />
“Ernest” Swift and grandson Richard “Dick”<br />
Swift made law their vocations.<br />
Dick completed<br />
his education<br />
(The University<br />
of Texas at Austin<br />
and South Texas<br />
College of Law),<br />
in 1978, was<br />
admitted to the<br />
Bar, and began<br />
practicing law<br />
with his father.<br />
He practices before all state<br />
Courts, the U. S. Court of<br />
Appeals, Fifth Circuit; and<br />
several Federal District<br />
Courts. In 1990, he became<br />
board certified in personal<br />
injury trial law by the Texas<br />
Board of Legal Specialization.<br />
In 1980, the practice<br />
became Swift, Swift &<br />
Lawrence, and they renovated<br />
and moved into the former<br />
Kelly Grocery Store<br />
located at 105 East Main<br />
Street. Eventually, the firm<br />
was comprised strictly of father and son, and<br />
was known again as Swift & Swift for more<br />
than twenty years. The two men shared an<br />
unrelenting commitment to excellence in every<br />
aspect of the practice of law and together laid<br />
the foundation for a legacy of excellence that<br />
persists to this day.<br />
Swift & Swift quickly became known in East<br />
Texas as a formidable opponent, with many<br />
record setting verdicts and<br />
settlements. Then, as today,<br />
the firm takes on large<br />
corporations including the<br />
railroads, General Motors,<br />
Walmart, Chrysler, and big<br />
insurance companies on<br />
behalf of local residents<br />
and businesses.<br />
The partnership was dissolved<br />
as Ernest contemplated<br />
retirement and The Law<br />
Offices of Dick Swift was<br />
born. Dick remodeled and<br />
7 8 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
elocated his offices to part of the old Coca Cola<br />
Bottling Plant at 1222 North Link Street in<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> where he remains today.<br />
In 2001 former District Attorney Jeff<br />
Herrington became a partner in the firm and<br />
it was renamed Swift & Herrington. Although<br />
their partnership was dissolved in 2007, they<br />
still continue to work together on complicated<br />
civil litigation.<br />
Today, Dick specializes in civil litigation<br />
with special emphasis on personal injury trial<br />
law. For the past thirty-one years, he has<br />
been involved in hundreds of jury trials,<br />
appeared before many Texas Appellate Courts,<br />
Federal Appellate Courts, and the Texas<br />
Supreme Court.<br />
Dick has been active in civic and community<br />
service and professional associations and<br />
held many prestigious positions in the community.<br />
He is a member of the Anderson County<br />
Bar Association, State Bar of Texas, Texas Trial<br />
Lawyers Association (serving as Director in<br />
1987); Southern Trial Lawyers Association;<br />
American Association for Justice; and the<br />
Million Dollar Advocates Forum.<br />
Swift’s family tradition of community leadership<br />
and involvement began early, He was<br />
elected County Attorney and later elected to<br />
represent District 11 in the Texas State House<br />
of Representatives from 1988-1991. He and<br />
wife, Susan, were both National Delegates to<br />
the Democratic Convention in 1996, where<br />
they served as McNeil-Lehrer Hour Internet<br />
reporters. They have both been elected Chair of<br />
the County Democratic Party.<br />
A former deacon at First Christian Church,<br />
Dick and his father, Ernest, taught the<br />
“Judge E. V. Swift Men’s Bible Study” class. This<br />
class was founded by and presided over by<br />
Judge Swift.<br />
During his tenure as a board member for the<br />
Memorial Hospital Foundation, a new state-ofthe-art<br />
hospital was built in 1996.<br />
Dick was the founding president of the<br />
Trinity Basin Conservation Foundation (TBCF),<br />
whose mission is to improve the quality of life,<br />
economic sustainability and ecological integrity<br />
of the Trinity River Basin.<br />
An avid outdoorsman, Dick serves as a duck<br />
guide at The Big Woods on the Trinity, and<br />
enjoys working with his Labrador retrievers.<br />
Excellence, honesty, value, hard work and<br />
personal service were the cornerstones of the<br />
Swift legacy that began in 1914, and they<br />
continue to be the principles that guide the<br />
Law Offices of Dick Swift today.<br />
❖<br />
Above: Swift at work in his library.<br />
Below: Dick with one of his<br />
Labrador retrievers.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 7 9
THE REDLANDS<br />
HISTORIC INN<br />
In the early twentieth<br />
century, <strong>Palestine</strong>’s citizens<br />
realized the importance of<br />
providing lodging for people<br />
passing or visiting the city<br />
on the International & Great<br />
Northern (I&GN).<br />
It was 1914 when original<br />
stockholders rushed to build<br />
the brown brick building. Its<br />
unique design featured a<br />
metal cornice at the roof line,<br />
while stone trimmed the windows.<br />
Considered one of the<br />
most modern constructions of<br />
its era, and built to withstand the challenges of<br />
time, its walls are made of concrete, masonry<br />
blocks, sheetrock, and metal studs—evident in<br />
the structure today.<br />
Oxen delivered sand for the concrete from<br />
the Trinity River thirty miles away. Built at the<br />
same time as the County Court House, it shared<br />
Italian artisans who installed hexagon tile to<br />
both buildings.<br />
The hotel remained profitable until<br />
WWI. From 1919-1955, it was leased as the<br />
General Offices for I&GN, (later the Missouri<br />
Pacific Railroad).<br />
The once-thriving hotel and restaurant<br />
complete its three-thousand-square-foot<br />
ballroom and handsome hardwood floors sat<br />
vacant until 1976. It was no longer sufficient for<br />
a booming railroad with thousands of miles of<br />
tracks. That is when Norman Mollard, Jr., his<br />
wife Jean, and Robert Laughlin, had a vision.<br />
Their dream was to remodel it, and<br />
eventually, transform it into a revenuegenerating,<br />
multi-use structure. They were up<br />
to the challenge, but knew it would be a longterm<br />
project.<br />
They breathed new life into the brick landmark,<br />
developing both, residential<br />
and commercial spaces while maintaining<br />
the façade and many of the<br />
interior appointments. The stained<br />
glass atrium window was constructed<br />
from fragments, which<br />
were intact in 1977 when they<br />
bought the building. The original<br />
interior “U” design was maintained<br />
to allow residents to have windows.<br />
It was listed on the National<br />
Register of <strong>Historic</strong> Places in<br />
the 1980s, and today, features<br />
residential apartments, extended<br />
stay suites, offices, restaurants<br />
and shops.<br />
It remains a tribute to the way<br />
of life in <strong>Palestine</strong> and shows<br />
what can be done, once again, by<br />
innovative residents.<br />
The Redlands is located at 400<br />
North Queen Street in <strong>Palestine</strong> and<br />
at www.redlandshistoricinn.com.<br />
8 0 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
In the early 1900s, voters in <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
passed a school bond issue for a new high<br />
school and the site in the newly formed<br />
Reagan Park fronting Micheaux Avenue<br />
was chosen for the school. Architects Sanguinet<br />
and Staats designed the building. It is<br />
Tudor-Gothic Style with elaborate brick<br />
work. The building is two storied with a<br />
raised basement. There were originally eight<br />
lecture rooms, a library, a gymnasium,<br />
laboratories, and an auditorium. A principal and<br />
ten teachers were the first faculty. The school<br />
opened in 1916 and the first graduation class<br />
was 1917. The high school became the<br />
junior high in 1939. In 1955 the school was<br />
named for John H. Reagan and served as an<br />
elementary school from 1966 until 1976 when<br />
it was closed.<br />
The building was to be demolished because<br />
of its condition but was saved by a group<br />
of dedicated citizens who did not want to<br />
lose such a historical part of the city.<br />
Generations had gone to school there. There<br />
was much nostalgia associated with it. There<br />
was also something impressive about it—even<br />
in its decaying state. It was truly a landmark,<br />
sitting proudly up on the hill in the park.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> would not be the same without it.<br />
The building was renovated and turned into<br />
the Museum, which opened its doors in 1982<br />
for the first weekend of the<br />
Dogwood Trails.<br />
The marvelous old <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
High School is now the<br />
depository for the historical<br />
treasures of <strong>Palestine</strong> and<br />
Anderson County. It is indeed<br />
“The Keeper of our History.”<br />
The historical auditorium<br />
is available for weddings,<br />
wedding receptions, class<br />
reunions and other functions.<br />
It is complete with a stage,<br />
balcony and original hardwood<br />
flooring. Annual events in<br />
the auditorium include the<br />
Old Time Music & Dulcimer<br />
Festival held the last weekend<br />
of March during the Dogwood<br />
Trails, Anderson County<br />
<strong>Historic</strong>al Commission’s annual<br />
THE MUSEUM FOR EAST TEXAS CULTURE<br />
History Forum in May and the Dulcimer<br />
Christmas Concert in December.<br />
For additional information at the Museum<br />
for East Texas Culture, please visit<br />
www.museumpalestine.com.<br />
❖<br />
Left: The Museum for East Texas<br />
Culture is listed on the National<br />
Register of <strong>Historic</strong> Places.<br />
Below: Tour of the Museum by local<br />
school children.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 8 1
MCCOY<br />
FUNERAL HOME<br />
McCoy Funeral Home began in 1936 when<br />
Edward McCoy, Sr., and his brother, Hansel,<br />
established the business in a converted threebedroom<br />
house at 315 Grove Street.<br />
Edward worked at the Davis Funeral Home,<br />
whetting his appetite for what would become<br />
his career and the development of a familyowned<br />
business.<br />
He attended Landig Mortuary School in<br />
Houston, and was licensed as a funeral director.<br />
Hansel left the business and Georgia McCoy<br />
became her husband’s business partner. She<br />
also studied at Landig, and was licensed as a<br />
funeral director.<br />
Funerals have changed since the 1930s.<br />
Wakes were held at the deceased’s home where<br />
mourners sat all night. Services were held on<br />
the front porch or the chapel inside, with<br />
chairs, a velvet background, and wooden casket<br />
racks. Georgia often made burial dresses.<br />
Graves were dug with picks and shovels.<br />
Later, a tent, mechanical lowering device,<br />
grass carpet and chairs were purchased. Death<br />
calls came to the home of Andrew and<br />
Mattie McCoy who delivered the messages<br />
because the funeral home had no telephone.<br />
Advertising was hand stenciled and nailed on<br />
trees in rural areas.<br />
Today, a professional grave service is engaged;<br />
and, advertising includes a billboard, brochures,<br />
and calendars featuring African-American history<br />
and art.<br />
In 1982, Edward, Jr., assumed management.<br />
He holds a B. S. degree from Prairie View<br />
A&M University and graduated from<br />
Commonwealth School of Mortuary Science. As<br />
an embalmer–funeral director, he initiated a<br />
prepaid funeral program approved by the Texas<br />
Banking Commission.<br />
Upon the death of his father in 1991,<br />
Edward, Jr., launched his dream to provide a<br />
more modern, well-equipped facility. Renovations<br />
of a building were completed in 1997. Edward’s<br />
wife, June, became office manager after retiring<br />
from teaching.<br />
Georgia retired in 2006; and, grandson<br />
David McCoy, a Prairie View graduate who<br />
studied at Commonwealth, is a funeral director,<br />
representing the third generation.<br />
The McCoy philosophy is to provide professional<br />
service at affordable prices with dignity,<br />
compassion, and personal attention to detail.<br />
8 2 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
While the sign on the bright, red-striped<br />
awning reads, New Dimensions Salon, there is<br />
much to see upon entering.<br />
Barbara McKinney, husband, Bill, and sons<br />
Carey, John and Howard, operate the familyowned<br />
business. Even her sister, Shirley, and<br />
brother-in-law Randy Reeves, helped design<br />
and construct the full-service beauty salon that<br />
opened Valentine’s Day, 2006.<br />
New Dimensions features nine styling stations,<br />
manicure-pedicure room, and a boutique and<br />
permanent cosmetics studio operated by<br />
cosmetics technician Stephanie Sheridan. The<br />
stations are manned by Barbara’s granddaughter,<br />
Amanda Hollingsworth, Mary Ann Bentley,<br />
Jennifer Mangham, Denise Brewster, Martha<br />
Guitz, Sandi Calloway, Catherine Camplain,<br />
Pearl Ferrari and Jennifer Wilson.<br />
Barbara has dedicated more than thirty years<br />
to cosmetology, serving as an instructor at<br />
Trinity Valley Community College, and owning<br />
two previous salons. She retired from the college<br />
after thirteen years, but has remained active in<br />
professional cosmetology organizations, serving<br />
as president of Local Affiliate Number 71, Texas<br />
Hairdressers and Cosmetologist Association for<br />
sixteen years.<br />
While teaching, she was a member of Texas<br />
Junior College Teacher’s Association and<br />
chairman of the cosmetology section for two<br />
years. She was also a member of Texas Post<br />
Secondary Cosmetology Educators.<br />
She remains active in her profession, and<br />
continues to find time to be involved in local<br />
civic affairs and her church, Memory Lane<br />
Missionary Baptist. When her children were<br />
in school, she was a strong supporter of<br />
Westwood School activities, including Parent<br />
Teachers Association (PTA), Athletic and Band<br />
Booster Clubs.<br />
Perhaps her greatest achievements, though, in<br />
addition to advancing the field of cosmetology,<br />
is her election as the first woman to <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
City Council, and being named Mayor Pro Tem<br />
part of her term.<br />
Barbara’s enthusiasm continues to impact the<br />
careers of others, and she is committed to<br />
cleanliness, especially around the stylists’ work<br />
stations. Her sister, Thelma Mosely, maintains a<br />
sanitary environment essential to good business,<br />
growth, and satisfied clients. New Dimensions is<br />
located at 1299 South Loop 256 in <strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
NEW<br />
DIMENSIONS<br />
SALON<br />
❖<br />
Above: Instructor/Operator, Barbara<br />
McKinney, owner of New<br />
Dimensions Salon.<br />
Below: Beauty is about the<br />
satisfied client.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 8 3
SWEET DREAMS<br />
WINERY, LLC<br />
There is nothing quite like entertaining<br />
guests or toasting a special occasion with a<br />
glass of fine wine! No one knows that better<br />
than the Pells—Mike and Sandra.<br />
They launched Sweet Dreams Winery, LLC,<br />
in 2006 using local, East Texas grapes and fruits<br />
to produce drinking wines. Prior to starting<br />
the winery, they made wine at home to share<br />
with friends, and found it difficult to keep their<br />
wine cellar stocked. “It disappeared almost as<br />
quickly as we could produce it,” says Mike.<br />
In 2005, they realized there was only one<br />
thing to do: Abandon their Christmas tree<br />
farm, plant grape arbors, and build the first<br />
winery in Anderson County. A year later,<br />
they were enjoying the sweet taste of success.<br />
While Mike is busy making wine, Sandra<br />
is busy preserving fruit—some 12,000 pounds<br />
each year—from which the wine is made.<br />
Harvesting the fruit and freezing it for later,<br />
when the fruit is pressed into wine, begins<br />
with local farmers in the spring and lasts<br />
well into fall. Blackberries are harvested in<br />
May and June, peaches and blueberries are<br />
picked through July, followed by mustang<br />
and muscadine grapes in July and August.<br />
East Texas hard pears are harvested last—in<br />
September. “People even gather the wild<br />
mustang grapes for us from alongside the<br />
roads,” says Mike.<br />
Mike and Sandra work the front end of the<br />
winery along with daughters, Mandy and<br />
Alyson. As need dictated, they expanded to<br />
three employees, and use<br />
other workers as needed,<br />
for Saturday concerts and<br />
wine tastings.<br />
Located about twelve<br />
miles north of <strong>Palestine</strong>,<br />
the winery is already<br />
reaping rewards for their<br />
efforts. The measure of<br />
success is a number of<br />
awards, including sixteen<br />
bronze, silver and gold<br />
medals, among them from<br />
the Finger Lakes Region<br />
Wine Competition where<br />
their Bumble Bee Kiss<br />
beat out a 100-year-old<br />
French wine. In fact, one<br />
gold medal was awarded in The Winemaker<br />
magazine competition.<br />
Currently, their wines have been placed<br />
in one grocery store and two liquor stores.<br />
They are also available in Tyler at KE<br />
Cellars, and in Montgomery, Texas at the<br />
Rancher’s Daughter. People from as far away as<br />
Europe visit the winery on Saturdays from<br />
11 am to 8 pm, except in January and February,<br />
when the winery is open 11 am to 6 pm.<br />
Plans are on the drawing board to build a<br />
warehouse with built-in cooler and additional<br />
stainless tanks.<br />
The Pells agree: There is nothing quite like<br />
sitting on the porch with a glass of wine or<br />
a nice, cold winearita, relaxing with special<br />
people. “You can listen to story-telling, hear the<br />
coyotes howling, bobwhites calling, and owls<br />
hooting,” adds Mike. “Our customers say they<br />
love the comfortable atmosphere we’ve created<br />
as much as we do.”<br />
Sweet Dreams offers two types of sandwiches<br />
to accompany guests’ wine, peach bellinis,<br />
and a delectable cranberry-based drink, the<br />
cosmorita, which is less sweet than a regular<br />
winearita. Sweet Dreams also provides space<br />
for birthday parties, showers and wedding<br />
rehearsals, as well as tours of the grounds,<br />
vineyard and fermenting room. It also holds a<br />
summer concert series, which is open to the<br />
public and wine connoisseurs alike. Check its<br />
web page, www.sweetdreamswinery.com, for<br />
times and dates.<br />
8 4 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
The lamp of education in <strong>Palestine</strong> has shone<br />
brightly for nearly one-and-a-quarter centuries.<br />
Not only has it brightened the careers of<br />
thousands of students, but it is positioned to<br />
prepare future generations for their vocations.<br />
On September 7, 1887, a group of citizens<br />
met to organize a school for their children<br />
and grandchildren. Known as the Public Free<br />
Schools of the City of <strong>Palestine</strong>, it later became<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Public Schools and, today, is known as<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> Independent School District (PISD).<br />
number of students varying each year,<br />
enrollment (Pre-K through grade twelve) is<br />
approximately 3,300.<br />
During the summer of 2010, the school<br />
board’s administrative offices were relocated<br />
from 1600 South Loop 256 to the remodeled<br />
Sam Houston School at 1000 East Lamar. Schools<br />
within that district include Washington Early<br />
Childhood Center, Northside Primary, Southside<br />
Elementary, Story Intermediate, <strong>Palestine</strong> Middle<br />
School, and <strong>Palestine</strong> High School.<br />
PALESTINE<br />
INDEPENDENT<br />
SCHOOL<br />
DISTRICT<br />
Eighteen school superintendents were<br />
founders or played major roles in the<br />
advancement of education in the Anderson<br />
County community. Serving on the first school<br />
board were N. R. Royall, C. A. Sterne, A. W.<br />
Gregg, G. M. Dilley, N. J. Link, F. J. Pells, and<br />
W. M. Lacy. The first superintendent earned $35<br />
per month, and many of the superintendents<br />
also taught classes for a half-day. The board of<br />
trustees recommended that schools be closed<br />
from January 12, 1891-January 26, 1891 for<br />
inspecting and repairing the furnace system.<br />
Two years after its founding, enrollment<br />
had grown to 586 students. Today, with the<br />
Also in 2010, a $64,000,000 bond<br />
referendum was passed to assure that schools<br />
are updated, and turf is laid on the high school<br />
football field.<br />
A budget of $24,984,085 was passed for<br />
the FY 2009-2010, and includes salaries for<br />
251 teachers and 510 staff personnel.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> ISD is led by superintendent Dr.<br />
Thomas Wallis, a former Mabank High School<br />
principal. Chosen by the board of trustees,<br />
he began serving as superintendent in 2008.<br />
Additional information is available on<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> area schools on the Internet at<br />
www.palestineschools.org.<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 8 5
TRINITY VALLEY<br />
COMMUNITY<br />
COLLEGE–<br />
PALESTINE<br />
❖<br />
Above: The campus of Trinity Valley<br />
Community College–<strong>Palestine</strong> is<br />
located three miles south of the city on<br />
State Highway 19. More than fifteen<br />
hundred students from the area attend<br />
classes at the campus each semester.<br />
Below: After a campus remodel in<br />
summer 2010, students can now<br />
study in one of TVCC–<strong>Palestine</strong>’s new<br />
science labs.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong> leaders realize the positive impact<br />
that Trinity Valley Community College–<strong>Palestine</strong><br />
(TVCC) has on residents and businesses. The<br />
college helps provide a skilled workforce for the<br />
area and aids industry promotion.<br />
The institution, founded as Henderson<br />
County Junior College in 1945, provides quality<br />
academic, workforce, and community service<br />
programs designed to meet the needs of both<br />
traditional-age students and working adults.<br />
Class began in Athens during the fall of 1946.<br />
In the 1960s the college expanded to meet<br />
demands in the areas<br />
around Athens, including<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>. Courses were<br />
first offered in <strong>Palestine</strong><br />
in the Episcopal Church<br />
and at public schools.<br />
In 1972, college<br />
benefactor K. A. Anderson<br />
donated a building (now<br />
demolished) on Gooch<br />
Street as a permanent<br />
home for TVCC–<strong>Palestine</strong>.<br />
In 1986, as the<br />
college continued to<br />
expand, the institution’s name was changed<br />
from County Junior College to Trinity<br />
Valley Community College. During that<br />
decade, campuses were established in Terrell<br />
and Kaufman.<br />
The current location of TVCC–<strong>Palestine</strong> was<br />
established in 1975. A $1-million legislative<br />
grant paved the way for a new facility three<br />
miles north on State Highway 19. In 1975 the<br />
first classes were held in the newly named<br />
K. A. Anderson Building. The structure was<br />
constructed on ninety acres, donated by Vernon<br />
Calhoun, where the campus remains today.<br />
The first director of the TVCC–<strong>Palestine</strong><br />
campus was James Horton. Nell Hassel<br />
succeeded him, followed by Ike Williams. Since<br />
1987 the campus has been overseen by Provost<br />
Charlie Akin.<br />
The <strong>Palestine</strong> campus is comprised of the<br />
K. A. Anderson Educational Building (1975),<br />
the Vernon Calhoun Technical Building (1983),<br />
the Electronic Commerce Resource Center<br />
(1993), and a maintenance building (2009). The<br />
Anderson building was remodeled in 2010. The<br />
facility now boasts updated classrooms and new<br />
science lab space. Enrollment is approximately<br />
twelve hundred students per semester, with more<br />
growth expected in the future.<br />
TVCC offers associate’s degrees and certificate<br />
programs in more than seventy disciplines. The<br />
college offers vocational training in the fields of<br />
nursing, cosmetology, computer science,<br />
criminal justice, business and office technology,<br />
fire science, legal assistant, and paramedic.<br />
Additional information is available at<br />
www.tvcc.edu.<br />
8 6 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
There is nothing quite as exhilarating as<br />
driving a new car out of the showroom.<br />
That feeling can be quickly diminished,<br />
though, when the car is the victim of a<br />
hailstorm, fender-bender—or worse.<br />
<strong>Palestine</strong>’s L&P Paint & Body Shop, strives to<br />
return damaged vehicles to their original beauty<br />
using the latest technology in the collision<br />
repair industry.<br />
The company, located at 1203 West Oak<br />
Street, was co-founded in 1986 by Benjamin O.<br />
Pinson, Sr., and his uncle, Theldon Lumpkin,<br />
Sr., to provide professional auto body collision,<br />
painting, and restorative services. The business<br />
was incorporated in October 2004.<br />
Although Lumpkin retired in 2002, the<br />
business remains family owned, with Benjamin<br />
as president/CEO; brother Bruce Pinson, Sr.,<br />
an I-CAR certified collision repair analyst;<br />
and Theldon Lumpkin, Jr., an I-CAR certified<br />
paint technician.<br />
All L&P Paint & Body Shop specialists are<br />
dedicated to providing quality services to the<br />
community and surrounding areas.<br />
L&P PAINT &<br />
BODY SHOP,<br />
INC.<br />
The eyes of Texas are upon them!<br />
“They” are special interest automobiles<br />
owned by <strong>Palestine</strong>’s classic car enthusiasts. The<br />
owners are members of Cars of <strong>Palestine</strong>, a nonprofit,<br />
family-oriented organization dedicated<br />
to the preservation, restoration and showing of<br />
vintage vehicles.<br />
Now, in its twenty-fifth year, the organization<br />
was started May 8, 1986, with twentyseven<br />
people attending. Members’ mission is<br />
to operate and maintain an organization to<br />
encourage and promote the admiration and<br />
ownership, care and maintenance,<br />
with safe and courteous<br />
operation of members’<br />
special interest autos.<br />
Cars of <strong>Palestine</strong> participates<br />
in local parades, travels to other<br />
communities for parades and<br />
shows, hosts other car clubs<br />
in the state, and lends<br />
assistance to member and nonmembers<br />
in finding parts and,<br />
often, that “special auto” from<br />
someone’s memory.<br />
Members are community-oriented and give<br />
back to their community through scholarships<br />
to local high school seniors, collecting food and<br />
toys during the holidays, and assisting with<br />
Relay for Life activities as well as the Crisis<br />
Center of Anderson/Cherokee Counties and<br />
other local agencies<br />
The group holds a Peoples’ Choice Car show<br />
annually, which has grown into a display of<br />
nearly 300 cars. It is held the opening weekend<br />
of the Dogwood Trails Festival. For additional<br />
information, visit www.carsofpalestine.com.<br />
CARS OF<br />
PALESTINE<br />
S h a r i n g t h e H e r i t a g e ✦ 8 7
For more information about the following publications or about publishing your own book, please call<br />
<strong>Historic</strong>al Publishing Network at 800-749-9790 or visit www.hpnbooks.com.<br />
Albemarle & Charlottesville:<br />
An Illustrated History of the First 150 Years<br />
Black Gold: The Story of Texas Oil & Gas<br />
Ector County, Texas: 125 Years of History<br />
Garland: A Contemporary History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Abilene: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Alamance County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Albuquerque: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Amarillo: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Anchorage: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Austin: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Baldwin County: A Bicentennial History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Baton Rouge: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Beaufort County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Beaumont: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Bexar County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Birmingham: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Brazoria County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Brownsville: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Charlotte:<br />
An Illustrated History of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Chautauqua County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Cheyenne: A History of the Magic City<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Clayton County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Columbus: A Bicentennial History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Comal County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Corpus Christi: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> DeKalb County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Denton County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Edmond: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> El Paso: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Erie County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Fayette County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Fairbanks: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Gainesville & Hall County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Gregg County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Hampton Roads: Where America Began<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Hancock County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Henry County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Hood County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Houston: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Hunt County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Illinois: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Kern County:<br />
An Illustrated History of Bakersfield and Kern County<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Lafayette:<br />
An Illustrated History of Lafayette & Lafayette Parish<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Laredo:<br />
An Illustrated History of Laredo & Webb County<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Lee County: The Story of Fort Myers & Lee County<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Louisiana: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Mansfield: A Bicentennial History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Midland: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Mobile:<br />
An Illustrated History of the Mobile Bay Region<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Montgomery County:<br />
An Illustrated History of Montgomery County, Texas<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Ocala: The Story of Ocala & Marion County<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Oklahoma: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Oklahoma County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Omaha:<br />
An Illustrated History of Omaha and Douglas County<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Orange County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Osceola County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Ouachita Parish: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Paris and Lamar County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Pasadena: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Passaic County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Pennsylvania An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Philadelphia: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Prescott:<br />
An Illustrated History of Prescott & Yavapai County<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Richardson: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Rio Grande Valley: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Rogers County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Santa Barbara: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Scottsdale: A Life from the Land<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Shelby County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Shreveport-Bossier:<br />
An Illustrated History of Shreveport & Bossier City<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> South Carolina: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Smith County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Temple: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Texarkana: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Texas: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Victoria: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Tulsa: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Wake County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Warren County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Williamson County: An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> Wilmington & The Lower Cape Fear:<br />
An Illustrated History<br />
<strong>Historic</strong> York County: An Illustrated History<br />
Iron, Wood & Water: An Illustrated History of Lake Oswego<br />
Jefferson Parish: Rich Heritage, Promising Future<br />
Miami’s <strong>Historic</strong> Neighborhoods: A History of Community<br />
Midland: Window to the West<br />
The New Frontier:<br />
A Contemporary History of Fort Worth & Tarrant County<br />
Old Orange County Courthouse: A Centennial History<br />
Plano: An Illustrated Chronicle<br />
Rich With Opportunity:<br />
Images of Beaumont and Jefferson County<br />
San Antonio, City Exceptional<br />
The San Gabriel Valley: A 21st Century Portrait<br />
Southwest Louisiana: A Treasure Revealed<br />
The Spirit of Collin County<br />
Valley Places, Valley Faces<br />
Water, Rails & Oil: <strong>Historic</strong> Mid & South Jefferson County<br />
8 8 ✦ H I S T O R I C P A L E S T I N E
$29.95<br />
LEADERSHIP SPONSORS<br />
Bailey and Foster<br />
Funeral Home, Inc.<br />
About the Author<br />
E R I C<br />
D A B N E Y<br />
Eric was born and raised in Kremlin,<br />
Oklahoma, and received his undergraduate<br />
and graduate degrees from the University<br />
of Central Oklahoma, where he now serves<br />
as an adjunct professor in the College of<br />
Education. He is the series editor for Bob<br />
Burke’s Commonwealth Publishing, is a<br />
contributing writer of over thirty<br />
publications of Lammert Inc.’s <strong>Historic</strong><br />
Publishing Network, and is the co-author<br />
of Fearless Flight: The Adventures of Wiley Post, <strong>Historic</strong> South Carolina, <strong>Historic</strong> Rogers<br />
County, and The Life of Bill Paul. Eric and his wife have three daughters and live near<br />
Guthrie, Oklahoma.<br />
PHOTO COURTESY OF ALICIA MOORE PHOTOGRAPHY.<br />
ISBN: 9781935377672