USA > Texas > Tarrant County > Fort Worth > History of Texas : Fort Worth and the Texas northwest edition, Volume III > Part 46
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69
Mr. Poole himself has done a yeoman's part in politics. During the campaign of Governor Hobby his office was headquarters of the governor in the county and he was tendered any one of ten appointments by the governor, but he rejected all of them, desiring nothing for himself. He has served his party as delegate and chairman, being one of the delegation at the Waco State Convention when Governor Hobby was nominated. He was in the delegation to the Fort Worth Con- vention in 1920, a regular supporter of Gov- ernor Neff. For twenty-seven years Mr. Poole has been a member of the Texas Press Association and has been on its important committees.
He was also a leading spirit in organizing what is now the Chamber of Commerce of Cleburne. This was instituted as the Board of Trade by a gentleman who drew one-half of his salary from Mr. Poole and the other half from the Board of Trade and the citizens of Cleburne for a period of two years. The or-
ganization has changed names two or three times, gradually growing in interest and im- portance, but as the Chamber of Commerce it has done its big work in behalf of the growth and development of Cleburne. Mr. Poole and The Review Publishing Company have endorsed every bond issue for the build- ing of public improvements including the City Hall, public schools, splendid water works plant and sewerage system, and has opened the columns of the Review as its editor for the sponsoring of such progressive enterprises. In every city or bond election he has person- ally as well as editorially got into the fight and his zeal was particularly noteworthy re- cently when the county approved a two mil- lion dollar good roads bond issue.
At Cleburne, August 8, 1898, Mr. Poole married Miss Jennie Williamson of Hender- son, Texas, where he was born and reared. She was third in a family of five children, the others being Mabel, wife of David Davidson of Los Angeles, California; Monnie, Mrs. Lee Rankine of Terrell, Texas; Alice, wife of R. A. Douglas of Dallas; and Lee Wil- liamson of Terrell. Mr. and Mrs. Poole have one son, Eugene, who was a member of the class of 1923 at Austin College in Sherman, but is now (1921-1922) at the State Univer- sity taking a special journalistic course. His intentions are to make journalism and the newspaper business his life work.
HENRY MCCLELLAN MEANS. Of the many great departments and divisions of Texas life and affairs represented in the City of Fort Worth, perhaps the greatest of them all, past, present and future, is agriculture, and that is the special province of H. M. Means, pres- ent county agricultural agent for Tarrant County.
The name and work of Mr. Means are widely known and appreciated all over North Texas, where he has a number of important constructive achievements in practical agri- culture and agricultural leadership to his credit. He has been a resident of Texas nearly forty years. He was born in Shelby County, Indiana, November 6, 1861, a son of James Robert and Elizabeth Jane (Bales) Means, the former a native of North Carolina and the latter of Ohio. He was the youngest of their five children, four of whom are still living. Mr. Means grew up in an Indian? country community, attending rural and high schools there, and his time and energies were devoted to an Indiana farm until he came to
HM Means
241
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
Texas, landing at Dallas March 20, 1884. On the tenth of May of that year he went out to Weatherford, Parker County, and from that date to the present has been a student and fol- lower of agriculture, specializing both in horti- culture and agriculture. He has been instru- mental in perfecting some of the staple farm products of North Texas. He is widely known for the "Means Delicious Watermelon," which was awarded a medal at the World's Fair at St. Louis in 1904 and is now being grown ex- tensively all over the United States.
Mr. Means was elected president of the first Truck Growers' Association, organized in Weatherford in 1900, and filled that office for three years. While he was president he brought about much development of the water- melon and peanut industry in Parker County, and was also one of the original promoters of the growing of peanuts on a commercial scale throughout the state.
Beginning about 1910, Mr. Means organized and promoted community and county fairs at Weatherford and was active head of these fairs each year until 1913. He was then put in charge of a county agricultural exhibit for the Texas State Fair. Following the Fair he received an appointment as agricultural agent from the extension department of the United States Department of Agriculture and was assigned to Howard County with headquarters at Big Springs. He filled that office one year, 1914, and was then transferred to Vernon, Wilbarger County, being county agent of Wil- barger during 1915-16. While there he helped reorganize the County Fair of Vernon and succeeded in giving the agricultural depart- ment its appropriate and distinctive place in the economic 'resources represented at the Fair. For his endeavors in this line the direc- tors tendered him a special vote of thanks and put him in charge of the agricultural exhibit shown at the Texas State Fair in 1916. In the meantime his reputation as an agricultural adviser and leader was becoming widely known, and he was soon afterward tendered by the Department of Agriculture the posi- tion of county agent of Tarrant County, with headquarters at Fort Worth.
Mr. Means took up his duties in this capac- ity at the beginning of 1917. His official headquarters are at the Chamber of Com- merce. He is a member of the Fort Worth Rotary Club. Since becoming county agent he has organized the Fort Worth Federal Farm Loan Association, the Tarrant County Pure Bred Livestock Association, and a large
number of rural activity clubs. Mr. Means derives the greatest pride and satisfaction from the fact that more boys' agricultural clubs with the largest total enrollment of membership have been organized in Tarrant County than in any other county in the United States. During the four years in which agri- cultural efforts have been on an organized basis in Tarrant County, these organizations have won more prizes at the Texas State Fairs through demonstrators, co-operators and club members than any other county in Texas. To Tarrant County was awarded a trophy cup and two silk banners in succession, while in 1920 the county organizations won every prize offered on peanuts at the State Fair, and among other honors is a silk banner on team work in corn production for the county. Fort Worth and Tarrant County naturally take great pride in these honors and achievements and appreciate Mr. Means' service accordingly.
Another achievement in which Mr. Means takes deep interest is the Tarrant County Com- munity Library and Entertainment Cycle, and to him belongs the credit for the inception of the idea and the carrying forward to prac- tical operation of this most excellent adjunct to the educational facilities afforded the rural communities. Through the co-operation of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce a motor vehicle equipped with a carefully se- lected library, Delco lighting system, a Vic- trola and a modern Motion Picture Projector, and accompanied by a corps of competent in- structors, visit the various sections of the county, and has become an important factor in educational and social work, and has at- tracted national attention.
BENJAMIN F. PASCHALL. Half a century of residence and more than a third of a cen- tury as a merchant give Benjamin F. Paschall a position of honorable distinction in the com- munity of Denton. He is now retired from business and is one of the older men of the community, as would be understood when it is stated he was a Confederate soldier in the war between the states.
Mr. Paschall was born in Weakley County, Tennessee, January 19, 1846. He lived in his native community the first seven years of his life, then for four years in Graves County, Kentucky, and was eleven when he accom- panied the family to Kaufman County, Texas. His father, Pat F. Paschall was a native of Virginia, was reared and married in Ten- nessee. Pat Paschall brought his family to
VOL. III-16
242
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
Texas in 1857 and in Kaufman County engaged in the stock business, the line of effort in which most of his years and the greater part of his success were achieved. He lived in Kauf- man County until January, 1871, and at that date established himself on a ranch a mile east of Denton. Seven years later he moved to Stephens County where he continued to range his stock and engage modestly in farming. Later he located near Miller Grove in Hop- kins County, Texas, where he spent the rest of his life and where he died in June, 1901, in his eightieth year. Not long after coming to Texas Pat Paschall joined the Confederate forces and his service took him from the rank of lieutenant to colonel. He was a colonel in the Texas Militia when the war ended. His life was largely spent out on the range and he had no time and little inclination for practical politics. He was a democrat and a Baptist. His first wife was Rebecca Kindrick, whose father Jacob Kindrick was a Pennsylvanian and of Dutch ancestry. Mrs. Paschall was born and reared near Madisonville, Kentucky, and died at the age of thirty-seven being buried near Terrell, Texas. Her children were : Mary E., wife of J. E. Turner, and a resident of Tarrant County, Benjamin Franklin of Denton; Jesse, of McLean; Perry, who was a merchant at Cisco, where he died; Katie, wife of W. B. Turner, who died in Bridgeport, Texas ; Lucy, who died at the age of fourteen ; Newton, who died in Arizona in 1899. Pat Paschall was four times married. His sec- ond wife was Malinda Garrett who left him 110 children. His third wife was Mrs. Charity Berry who died at Miller Grove, Texas. His fourth wife was Mrs. Lucy Long. By the third marriage there were a number of chil- dren including Mrs. Ada Pippin of Hopkins County ; Marion D. of Cisco; Linn Boyd of Ranger, Texas; Nannie of Hopkins County, widow of Charles Corbett; Mrs. Lola John- son of Hunt County ; Emma, wife of Bloom Johnson of Hunt County ; Charles, of Hop- kins County ; and Cecil of West Texas.
Benjamin F. Paschall in the several locali- ties where he spent his boyhood had few school opportunities. He learned the fundamentals and has made splendid use of them in his con- tact with the world and in solving life's prob- lems as they have arisen. He was only fifteen when the war broke out between the states but for two years he was in the Confederate army. He joined Captain Kizer's Company G, Twelfth Texas Cavalry under Colonel Parson, and served in the Trans-Mississippi Depart-
ment. His active service was rendered during Banks' Red River campaign, his last fight being on Yellow Bayou. Otherwise he and his com- pany were in Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas with only an occasional skirmish. The regi- ment disbanded in Robertson County, Texas, in June, 1865.
When the war was over he went back to the home farm and remained with his father until the age of twenty-five. He was associated with many of the old time Texas cattle men, and saw much of the historic ground on which the old Texas cattle industry had its home. He continued thus identified for a time after com- ing to Denton, having a ranch near historic old Fort Griffin.
It was in March, 1871, that Mr. Paschall engaged in the grocery business at Denton, and for a period of thirty-five years he was one of the leading merchants of the city. Those years included a time when the stock of every grocery merchant carried as an in- dispensable item a supply of "straight whis- key." Besides his service to the community as a merchant Mr. Paschall was for four years a brick maker and building contractor with John Johnson. This firm built abutments for eight important bridges in the county and a dozen or more of the permanent business houses of Denton. Among these are two standing on the west side of the Square and another owned by Mr. Paschall himself on the northeast corner of the Square.
Mr. Paschall at all times has sought to do his duty as he understood it and make himself useful to his fellow men as well as to himself. However, his fifty years of residence in Den- ton contains a brief record of formal public service. He was a school trustee, and during the World war he was a member of the selec- tive service or draft board, better known as the Exemption Board, and gave much of his time to the examination of soldiers and the other duties. He has always been a democrat. How- ever, he could not bring himself to vote for Horace Greeley, the fusion candidate of the party for President in 1872. He voted for Samuel J. Tilden in 1876 and regularly since then. He was reared as a Baptist and has owned that as his religious connection. Mr. Paschall is a prominent Mason, is past master of his lodge, past high priest of the Royal Arch Chapter, and past eminent commander of the Knights Templar and has sat as a member of the Texas Grand Lodge.
In Kaufman County he married Miss Molle Chambers, daughter of John and Sallie
243
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
(Wilson) Chambers. Mrs. Paschall was born in Mississippi in May, 1843, and her father died in that state, the family later moved to Texas. Mrs. Paschall is one of a number of children and several of her brothers were Confederate soldiers. She is now the last survivor of these children. Of the children of Mr. and Mrs. Paschall the oldest is Miss Min- nie ; the second, Birdie, is the wife of C. Lips- comb, Jr., of Denton, and they have three children, Mrs. Parvin Taylor, Cuvier Paschall Lipscomb, and Jo Lipscomb. The third daughter, Mamie, was married to W. J. Stovall of Dallas and died at Denton, leaving a daugh- ter, Margaret Rosalie. B. F. Paschall, Jr., is a resident of Frederick, Oklahoma, and by his marriage to Nelle Parker, daughter of John L. Parker, of Aubrey, Texas, has a son, Benjamin III. The youngest of the family is J. Carroll, of Amarillo, Texas, who mar- ried Beatrice Hogue, daughter of Reverend and Mrs. C. L. Hogue, and has a daughter, Beatrice Hogue.
R. A. J. KEEL. An intelligent and efficient public official, R. A. J. Keel is the present tax assessor of Johnson County, and has been identified with that section of Texas as a mer- chant and in public affairs for upwards of a quarter of a century.
.
He was born in Todd County, Kentucky, January 22, 1861. His pioneer American an- cestor came from Scotland. His grandfather Solomon Keel was born near Bowling Green, Kentucky, the home of the pioneers of the family. Solomon Keel was one of seven sons, and from Bowling Green he removed to Todd County, and in 1840 came to Texas taking the water route through New Orleans. He set- tled in Grayson County at Bee Berry Mound close to the present Sperry ranch. He was a physician and practiced medicine in that pioneer community, but died in a few years near Denison. He left his family in Kentucky while proving up his land claim and died about the time he was ready to return home. He reared two sons, John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson Keel.
Andrew Jackson Keel was born in Todd County, and pursued the vocation of agri- culture during his life. His death occurred when his children were small, and he left the farm home to his widow who took charge of it and aided by her sons carried on the work in the fields as well as in the house. She was both father and mother to the children, and wove and spun and knit and sewed by hand
by the light of the fire, and brought up and educated them and saw them make good citi- zens and the best of it all is she still lives and maintains her motherly interest in her chil- dren today and is as solicitous of their welfare as when they were young. Her home is with her son R. A. J. Keel, familiarly known among his many friends as "Tom." She is one of the good Christian women, a member of the Mis- sionary Baptist Church, and at the age of eighty-six is still vigorous in mind and active in body, and the heavy burdens her shoulders have borne and the manual toil her hands have performed seem to have stimulated her and increased her powers as she passed along the stony pathway of life. Her maiden name was Allie Delphia Barbara Foster, and she was born in North Carolina in July, 1835, daughter of John W. and Isabel ( Moore) Foster of Irish ancestry. The Kentucky branch of the Foster family moved from Orange County, North Carolina, to Simpson County, Kentucky, and later to Todd County. Mrs. Keel had three children : James William, who was a merchant in association with his brother at Rio Vista, Texas, when he died in 1910, leaving a widow and three daughters and a son, as follows: E. T., Olga Belle, Angie, and Allie Jay. The other Keel chil- dren are Robert Andrew Jackson, and Olga Belle, who is is Mrs. Nathan Mallory of Cleburne.
R. A. J. Keel who has never married and has lived with his best friend, his mother, since his birth, was six years of age when his parents moved to Logan County, Kentucky, and there he grew up near Gordonville. Later the hamlet of Keel came into existence, and is still a village center, though the postoffice is abandoned. Mr. Keel attended school at Greenridge and later the Lions School in the country. As a child he was afflicted with rheumatism, a malady that has pursued and afflicted him all his life and his achievements have represented a brave conflict with ob- stacles. Instead of becoming a burden to society he has made himself useful and pulled more than his own weight in the world. He grew up on a farm and followed agriculture until past thirty when he was incapacitated for further physical labor. On his partial recovery he came to Texas in 1894 and located at Rio Vista, where he engaged in merchandis- ing, handling a general stock and later gro- ceries and hardware. He was a merchant at Rio Vista fourteen years and in 1908 made his first campaign for office as a candidate for
244
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
tax collector. He won the nomination in a field of three candidates and was elected to succeed Claude White. In 1910 he was re- elected without competition. After two terms he was appointed deputy by his successor Lon Morgan, and thus for eight successive years performed the duties of tax collector. Then for an interim of four years he was out of office, attending to his private affairs. In 1920 he became a candidate for county asses- sor, received the nomination over two rivals, and was elected to succeed J. C. Clayton, tak- ing office in December of that year. He had familiarized himself with the duties of asses- sor by office work of several months prior to his formal inauguration.
JOHN E. POINDEXTER came to Johnson County, Texas, to take possession of some vacant lands that had been acquired by his father some years before. He had the land but no financial capital to work it with, and the striking lesson of his career is contained in the industry and determined enterprise with which he set about to achieve something sub- stantial in a material way, and in the progress of that achievement has also won the con- tinuing esteem of his fellow citizens.
Poindexter is one of the oldest American families. Originally they were French Hugue- nots. There is a record of them as land owners on the Isle of Jersey as early as 1250. In 1424 John Poingdestre as the name was then spelled, is mentioned as bailie of the Island of Jersey and his son and grandson also named John filled the same office.
George Poingdestre, whose name was sub- sequently Anglicized to Poindexter, came to Virginia about 1640, probably settling in New Kent or Charles City County. His posterity spread to other counties, including Louisa, where they had grants of land. Mr. Poindex- ter's grandfather, John Poindexter, spent the early part of his life in Louisa County. In 1816 he left Virginia accompanied by all his children except James H., who was then a youth of sixteen and declined to follow. This son kept in touch with his parents for a time, but owing to the uncertainties of communica- tion of that day they finally lost track of him altogether. In an earlier generation the Poin- dexters were represented by soldiers in the Revolutionary war.
The James H. Poindexter just mentioned was born in December, 1800. While he pos- sessed some inheritance, he made the bulk of his property by his own efforts and gained
considerable prominence in Virginia where he was a merchant and financier. It was in April, 1857, that he invested some of his surplus funds in Texas lands, acquiring three sections in Johnson and one section in Navarro County. The price paid was thirty- five cents an acre. It is asserted that the authorities must have thrown in many acres since the surveys overran when they were sub- sequently run off. James H. Poindexter never came out even to see his land, and none of his family until John E. Poindexter accepted this opportunity for a great deal of hard toil, which was instrumental in developing what is now a very prosperous community of farmers. James H. Poindexter distributed his personal interest to many phases of civil life, though he was never active in politics beyond voting the democratic ticket. He gave a large part of his fortune to the Southern cause, saw four of his sons in the Confederate army, and with a firm faith in the favorable outcome of the Confederacy invested heavily in its securities, sacrificing this in addition to his slave property.
James H. Poindexter married Miss Sarah A. Mundy of New Jersey of Scotch descent. He died in 1867 and she in 1873. Their six sons were: Charles, who spent his life in Richmond, Virginia, where he was State Librarian for many years and where he died ; George H., a business man of Richmond, de- ceased; Alfred, whose life was spent in Florida, New York, and St. Louis, but who died at Richmond where he is buried; Wil- liam M., who was reared at Richmond but subsequently became an architect at Washing- ton, D. C., and erected many prominent build- ings at the capital and other places in the East, including the State Library at Rich- mond; John E., next in age; and Thomas, who was a successful Richmond merchant and also prominent in philanthropic and religious work. Four of these sons were Confederate soldiers and the only one captured by the enemy was Charles, who was taken prisoner at Gettysburg and thereafter languished for many months in Forth Delaware and Point Lookout.
John E. Poindexter of Cleburne was born January 6, 1850, at the family home at Nine- teenth and Marshall streets in the City of Richmond, where he grew up and was old enough to receive many definite impressions of the Confederate struggle during the war. He witnessed the evacuation of the city, the burning of the tobacco warehouses, the entry of the Federal troops and the restoration of order. Mr. Poindexter was classically edu-
X
245
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
cated, and when about twenty years of age went to Savannah, Georgia, and spent a year in merchandising. He then resumed mer- chandising in his home city, and was in busi- ness there until he came out to Texas to put into service the extensive family lands.
Four miles south of Cleburne on some of this land he built as his first home a two room cottage. Raising stock was his first approach to profit, but later he began plowing the land and broke out a thousand acres, erected tenant houses and conducted business on an extensive scale. For the first ten years he lived here he hauled water and the domestic supply of water was contained in a barrel although without his knowledge an abundance of arte- sian water lay underneath the ground. As a stockman Mr. Poindexter's efforts were di- rected to horses and mules and cattle, and occasionally he fed and fattened some for beef. This work continued until 1912 when he disposed of his holdings, and the Poindex- ter estate is now parceled out in small farms and is an important corn and cotton growing section of Johnson County.
Mr. Poindexter set himself a big task when he located south of Cleburne, and Mrs. Poin- dexter shared with him the cares and responsi- bilities of that life. He had been reared in a home of plenty but taught to work, and the work habit stood him in good stead in Texas. He acquired a few head of livestock bought at the prevailing price in 1885 and the next year came a slump in the livestock markets and he had no cash capital to continue him through the period of depression. Gradually his stock and cattle multiplied until he was wintering two hundred and fifty head. The feeding of these cattle he did himself, though Mrs. Poindexter drove the team while the hay was being thrown off. His neighbors declared that one man could not feed and handle so many stock, but the fact is he did and it was a lesson in industry and economy that his neighbors did not forget. He gathered about him horses by the score, and his wife almost covered their building site with chickens and turkeys which brought an income of no small dimensions. In season hundreds of tons of hay was put up by Mr. Poindexter with the aid of hired help. In the fall and winter he per- sonally hauled quantities of the best forage to Cleburne and filled the mows of livery stables and private barns.
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.