USA > Texas > Tarrant County > Fort Worth > History of Texas : Fort Worth and the Texas northwest edition, Volume IV > Part 14
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 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73
A busy merchant, Mr. Bradley has always kept in close touch with the best interests of his community. He served as alderman four years under the administration of the late Dr. Bell, and at the death of Dr. Bell served for a short time as mayor, until a successor was elected. Later he served two years as alder- man under the administration of A. H. Britton.
Mr. Bradley is a member and chairman of the Board of Trustees of the First Christian
Church. He was one of the men chiefly in- strumental early in 1920 in organizing the Men's Bible Class, which before the year was out enrolled many of the prominent business men of the city, and this class is said to be the largest of its kind in Northwest Texas. The class was organized primarily with a view to furthering the work of the church and enabling the members to take a more active part in church and Sunday school, and there have also been some notable social features connected with the program. Mr. Bradley is leader of the class and has found this work one of his most congenial associ- ations. He is a Royal Arch Mason, and Shriner, a member of the Elks and Odd Fel- lows, and is identified with the Chamber of Commerce and the Rotary Club. Mr. Brad- ley married Miss Hattie Butts, of Fort Worth. They have two children: John W., Jr., born in 1903, now a student in the Texas Chris- tian University at Fort Worth; and Harriet Mead, born in 1910.
LESLIE HUMPHREY, former district attor- ney of the Thirtieth Judicial District, is a member of the Wichita Falls law firm of Bul- lington, .Bonne, Humphrey & Hoffman, a membership and connection that of itself rep- resents a high degree of achievement in the profession. This is one of the strongest law firms in the state, enjoys a very extensive general and special practice, and represents many of the leading interests of Wichita Falls and the great industrial section surrounding that city.
As a lawyer and citizen Mr. Humphrey does honor to the Northwest Texas country where he was born and reared. His birth occurred in 1884 at the historic town of Mobeetie in Wheeler County and the scenes upon which he first opened his eyes were one vast ex- panse of cattle range. His parents were T. B. and Mary (Triplett) Humphrey. His father, a native of Kentucky, came to the Texas Pan- handle in 1883 and allied himself with the nucleus of settlement at that time, Mobeetie, then the court town of practically the enire Panhandle country. He taught one of the pioneer schools at Mobeetie, but subsequently entered the cattle business, and was identified with that primary industry in the Panhandle country the rest of his life. He died in 1919.
Though the environment of his youth was largely a stockman's paradise, Leslie Humph- rey was given a thorough preparatory educa-
438
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
tion, completed his literary training in the University of Texas, and also studied law there. He was graduated LL.B. in 1909, and began professional practice at Henrietta. He came from Henrietta to Wichita Falls in 1914, while district attorney. He served as district attorney of the Thirtieth Judicial District from 1913 to 1918, and soon afterward joined the law firm above noted.
In addition to his busy professional prac- tice Mr. Humphrey is one of the directors of the City National Bank of Commerce, one of the greatest banks in the South, possess- ing over $22,000,000 of resources. He is also interested in oil production in Wichita County, and has considerable city and country real estate. He is a member of some of the influential local organizations, including the Chamber of Commerce.
Mr. Humphrey married Miss Lucy Hamil- ton, of Chico, Wise County, Texas. They have one son, born in June, 1914.
WILLIAM JESSE BOAZ. The late William Jesse Boaz was a man who was very well- known throughout north Texas and was rec- ognized as a citizen who stood for the highest ideals in business practice, and was promi- nently connected with some of the leading financial and commercial ventures of Fort Worth. In every undertaking he entered Mr. Boaz put his heart and soul into its develop- ment and his success did not lose for him the appreciation and respect of his fellow citizens, by whom he is still remembered with enthu- siasm and affection.
William Jesse Boaz was born in Hickman County, Kentucky, August 26, 1840, a son of Samuel and Agnes (Freeman) Boaz, natives of Virginia and North Carolina, respectively. They had five sons and two daughters, and of them all William Jesse was the fourth child. He was reared in his native county and attended a school held in a log schoolhouse. In 1860 he came to Texas and located at Bird- ville, Tarrant County, where he was engaged in the cattle business, but his venture was interrupted by the outbreak of the war between the North and the South, and he enlisted in the Confederate army and was made sergeant and then lieutenant, and was for a time in command of his company, and served about three years. during which time he was wounded. After the close of the war he re- turned to Birdville and was a clerk in a store until he was able to accumulate a little money
with which he went into business for himself. On August 22, 1868, Mr. Boaz was mar- ried to Mary Bell Anderson and in the suc- ceeding January, moved with his bride to Fort Worth and opened up a mercantile establish- ment. As time progressed he so gained the confidence of the people of Fort Worth that he was urged to go into the banking business and in time became president of the California & Texas Bank, which office he held until he sold his interests in it and became connected with the Traders National Bank, of which he was also made president, and he also served as president of the American National Bank. In the meanwhile he was acquiring other inter- ests and so found it impossible to continue to discharge the duties pertaining to the bank presidencies, and so resigned from them. From then on until his demise he occupied himself with his extensive real estate opera- tions, and was one of the heaviest landowners in Tarrant County. Mr. Boaz was very active in public affairs and did much to advance the interests of Fort Worth. While he was a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, he was very generous in his donations to other religious organizations and contrib- uted liberally to the building funds for many churches, for he believed in their influence on the community, and wanted to extend their good work. He was the first man who reduced the rate of interest at Fort Worth to ten per- cent, the regular rate when he set about this movement being three percent per month. Mr. Boaz was also much interested in the develop- ment of public schools, and did all in his power to secure excellent teachers and erect comfortable schoolhouses not only at Fort Worth, but throughout the county.
The death of this excellent man and good citizen took place December 14, 1916, and the whole city mourned his loss. He was the father of four sons and two daughters, namely: Mary Ola, who is the wife of L. B. Comer of Fort Worth ; and Samuel D., who lives at Houston ; and Clement A., Wallace P., Ernest O., all of whom reside at Fort Worth ; and Jessie Agnes, who is the wife of C. C. Gumm of Fort Worth. Mrs. Boaz' grandfather on her mother's side, Maj. John B. Dickson, was an officer in the war of 1812, under General Jackson, and one of the early merchants of Fort Worth.
JOHN CLEMENS PHELAN, president of the Independence Mining Company of Phelan in Bastrop County, has his home at Phelan and
439
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
many of his family and social interests in that city.
Mr. Phelan, who was the pioneer to in- troduce lignite as a fuel for industrial pur- poses in Texas, was born in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana, July 1, 1860, a son of Patrick and Ophelia (Eseneault) Phelan. He was liberally educated in the Jesuit College at New Orleans, and came to Texas as a young man, in 1884. For some years he was in- terested in the Martin-Brown Company, wholesale dry goods, but gained his first real distinction in business affairs when he organ- ized the Hunter-Phelan Savings and Trust Company. This was the first institution in the state of Texas doing a general trust busi- ness and the first to introduce the savings bank account in the state. Mr. Phelan is widely known for this fact and other reasons in banking circles, and is credited with having been one of the chief forces in placing upon the statutes the present Texas law providing for the incorporation of banking, insurance and guaranty companies.
Mr. Phelan has been a capitalist and finan- cier with a high vision of responsibility, and it was this spirit as well as the hope of profit that prompted him to educate the public as to the advantages and economies of lignite coal as an industrial fuel. He took the lead in opening the lignite coal deposits in Bastrop County, and the Independence Mining Com- pany of Phelan is one of the largest organiza- tions in the southwest producing and distrib- uting lignite coal. Through a campaign of education carried on by the company and Mr. Phelan personally lignite is now widely used for stationary steam plants, gas making and domestic purposes.
At Fort Worth November 23, 1892, Mr. Phelan married Miss Maude Lee Hunter. Their two children are Hunter Clemens and Janet W. Phelan. Mr. Phelan is a life mem- ber of Fort Worth Lodge No. 148, A. F. and A. M., is affiliated with Hella Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Dallas, and in politics is a republican.
GEORGE E. WEBB was born in New Bruns- wick, New Jersey, June 26th, 1859, a son of Major Moses F. Webb and Mrs. Sarah E. R. Webb. He spent his early years in New Brunswick, afterward moving to Brooklyn, New York, in which latter city he was edu- cated in the public schools, graduating from Public School No. 11 in the city of Brooklyn in June, 1874.
His business life was commenced in Wall Street on January 1, 1875, and he was en- gaged until November, 1884, in dealing in "commercial paper." At that time he left New York, coming to Texas to make his home, having theretofore visited Texas and made some examination into its possibilities from a health and business standpoint. In 1884 he came to Tom Green County, and has resided in that county and in San Angelo since that time. In 1886 he was cashier of the Concho National Bank of San Angelo for several months, and in 1888 was cashier of the San Angelo National Bank for a short time. In September, 1889, he re-entered the Concho National Bank, now the First National Bank, as cashier, and has been connected with the First National Bank as cashier or president continuously since 1889, having been presi- dent of the bank since 1896. He is the largest shareholder in the bank. He is also identified with many other organizations in San Angelo, particularly the San Angelo Ice & Power Company, of which he has been president since 1898, and the West Texas Building As- sociation, of which organization he has been treasurer and director since 1894.
In November, 1884, he was married to Miss Lena B. Flanders in New Jersey, then moving to Texas. Mrs. Webb died in October, 1908, leaving four children: Clarence R. Webb, Marguerite E. Webb, Lyndon F. Webb and Helen K. Webb. He was married in July, 1910, to Miss Hanna Yerkes Flanders, of New Jersey, who died in June, 1913. In April. 1916, he married Miss Ella Scott Fisher of San Angelo, Texas, formerly of Galveston.
Mr. Webb has been identified with every public enterprise for the betterment or im- provement of conditions not only in his own vicinity but throughout the state. He was one of the commissioners from Texas for the St. Louis exposition and although he lived at a great distance from headquarters he was prompt in his attendance at every call, liberal in his contributions and active in securing sub -: scription for carrying on the work from his friends and neighbors.
RICHARD F. BURGES, son of William H and Bettie Rust Burges, was born at Seguin, Texas, on the seventh day of January, 1873. He was educated in the public schools of Seguin and attended one year at the A. & M. College of Texas. He read law, first in the office of J. D. Guinn, at New Braunfels, and
440
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
afterward in the office of his brother at El Paso, and was admitted to the bar at El Paso in 1894, where he has since practiced his pro- fession.
Mr. Burges was city attorney of El Paso during the administration of the late Captain Charles Davis, under which administration was inaugurated the policy of municipal im- provement which has characterized that city. While serving in that capacity he wrote the charter establishing the commission form of government for the city. In 1908 Mr. Burges was appointed by Governor Campbell to rep- resent Texas at the White House Conference of Governors, convened by President Roose- velt. He has been for many years an active leader in the conservation movement, and was president of the International Irrigation Con- gress in 1915-16. With the late Felix Mar- tinez, he organized and directed the movement which resulted in the great Elephant Butte Irrigation project on the Rio Grande.
Mr. Burges was a member of the House of Representatives in the Thirty-third and Thirty-fourth Legislatures. He was the author of or instrumental in passing the Texas Irri- gation Code, the Royalty Mining Law, the Forestry Law, the Married Woman's property Act, the Compulsory Education Act, and he actively supported amendments to the State Constitution extending the right of suffrage to women. When the United States entered the World war in 1917 Mr. Burges raised a com- pany of infantry at El Paso, which served throughout the campaign in France as Com- pany A of the One Hundred and Forty-first Infantry, Thirty-sixth Division, A. E. F.
The splendid young manhood of the south- west responded to Captain Burges' call for volunteers, and twenty-seven of the young men who enlisted with Captain Burges re- ceived commissions before the armistice was signed, and many others received distinctions and promotions in various branches of the service, a record probably not surpassed by any other company.
Captain Burges received his military train- ing immediately under Major Ed. Hutchings, and when that gallant young officer was killed at the head of his troops, on the 8th of Oc- tober, at Medeah Farm, Captain Burges suc- ceeded to the command of his battalion and was promoted major. For his services on that day Major Burges was awarded the Croix de Guerre by Marshal Petain.
Major Burges is an enthusiast on the his-
tory and development of Texas, and his library is rich in rare Texas material. He married in 1898 Miss Ethel Petrie Shelton, daughter of E. A. and Harriet Hobson Shel- ton, of El Paso. One child, Jane Rust, was born of this marriage. Mrs. Burges died in 1912.
UBERT D. EZELL, M.D. A physician and surgeon whose capable work has made him known over an extensive region of western Texas, chiefly Johnson and Bosque counties. Dr. Ezell represents a family of physicians, and is now an honored resident of Cleburne.
He was born at Austin, Texas, January 5, 1867. He is of French ancestry. His great- grandfather, Jeremiah Ezell, was born in France, and founded the name in this country. The grandfather of Dr. Ezell of Cleburne was Dr. Ubert Ezell, who was born in Davidson County, Tennessee. December 8, 1809. He
graduated in medicine at New Orleans in the institution that later became Tulane Univer- sity. He practiced medicine at Nashville until 1861, when he came to Texas and joined his son at Austin and died there in 1871. Dr. Ubert Ezell married Isabella Marshall, who was born in Rutherford County, Tennessee. September 9, 1811, and died at Austin about 1900. They reared eight children, four of whom are still living: John, who was a Con- federate soldier, has been a contractor and carpenter in business and is still living at Austin ; Jane, wife of David McFarland, a resident of Austin; Mary Culistine, wife of Pike McFarland of San Antonio; and David of Amarillo, Texas.
The father of the Cleburne physician was Coriolanus Ezell, who was born about five miles northeast of Nashville, Tennessee, but in early childhood the family moved to Nash- ville where he grew up and served an old time apprenticeship to the trade of wheelwright. That trade he made his lifelong occupation. In 1849 he started for Texas, coming from Nashville, and he and his wife spent several months in Arkansas on the way and thence proceeded on horseback in company with a friend. When they reached Indian Territory the friend decided to return home and the Ezells went on alone. They came in contact with the Comanche Indians, but found them friendly and considerate. At San Antonio Coriolanus Ezell was employed at his trade for about five years, and then settled perma- nently at Austin. At Austin he made a spe- cialty of baby buggies, and probably made the
1
И.Д. Едісе Ян.
441
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
first of these vehicles in the state. This he found more profitable than making horse vehicles. He was still active in his work when he died in November, 1871, at the age of forty- nine. His life was spent quietly and without the honors of public office, though he saw some service as a Confederate soldier under Captain Carrington on the border. Most of his fighting was with Mexicans and outlaws, and he was in the state all the time except one incursion into Louisiana, where his com- mand came in contact with Federal troops. He was very industrious, thought little of affairs other than his own and his family and their spiritual welfare, was devout, a close reader of the Scriptures, and his old Bible is a prized possession of Dr. Ezell.
Coriolanus Ezell married Martha Robinson, who was born in LaClede County, Missouri, February 27, 1850, her parents being natives of Tennessee. By her first marriage her two children were Dr. U. D. and Mary Culistine, who died at Amarillo, the wife of Ed Orbison, leaving a son, Curtis Orbison. Martha Ezell married for her second husband, M. B. Pogue, and the eight daughters and son of that union now live at different points in Texas, Okla- homa, Missouri and Arizona. Mrs. Martha Pogue died March 18, 1917, at Cleburne. Her mother was a Hardeman, a cousin of Tine, Gotch and Dr. Black Hardeman, old time and prominent Texans, after one of whom a county of the state was named.
In December, 1871, Mrs. Coriolanus Ezell moved to Bosque County to be near her peo- ple. Ubert D. Ezell was then four years of age and he grew up on the Ezell farm and attended a little country school house on his mother's land. At the age of seventeen he graduated from Add-Ran College at Thorp Spring. This was followed by an experience of two summers and one winter on the range as cowboy, an occupation that gave him the money to pursue his medical education. He was employed by the Kit Carter Cattle Com- pany, the headquarters of which were in Palo Pinto County, but his work as a range man covered a wide extent of the plains. Dr. Ezell entered Tulane University Medical School, where his grandfather had finished his course. He graduated June 3, 1889, and had pre- viously practiced to some extent on a district certificate. He began his real career as a phy- sician and surgeon at Kimball in Bosque County, and continued the arduous work of his calling there thirty-four years. On leaving Kimball he removed to Cleburne. During his
residence in Bosque County he carried on in connection with his professional duties stock farming, and was a successful breeder and handler of registered saddle horses of the Blue Bull and later the Hall strain. Dr. Ezell never participated in county politics, but has always voted as a democrat.
At Kimball, July 1, 1890, Dr. Ezell married Miss Ada James, who was born at Meridian. Texas, daughter of John and Ara ( Bateman) James, her father a native of Missouri and her mother of Tennessee. Mrs. Ezell's mater- nal grandfather was a physician. Of the three children in the James family the oldest was Fred James, now deceased ; Mrs. Ezell is the second, and her sister Annie is Mrs. Jo Boggs of Cleburne.
Of the four children of Dr. and Mrs. Ezell the oldest is Dr. Coriolanus V., who grad- uated from the Cleburne High School, is a medical graduate of Vanderbilt University, and is now actively associated in practice with his father at Cleburne. He married Catherine Winstead. The second of the family is Leslie Muton, a resident of Cleburne. and formerly connected with the Santa Fe Railway Com- pany. The two younger children are Marcileta. who finished her education in the Meridian High School, and James Marshall.
L. G. GILBERT. Among successful men of Fort Worth the story of L. G. Gilbert is an illuminating experience of a foreign born American who discovered his opportunities in small things that are usually overlooked and by making every year count toward larger achievement has in time built up what is recog- nized as one of the largest and most complete department stores in Northern Texas.
Mr. Gilbert was born in Russian Poland, August 15, 1864. He lived there until he was about twenty-one years of age. He had the normal educational advantages of that country and also had some training in business. In 1887 he was conscripted for service in the army of the Czar. His service was of twenty- four hours' duration, since he managed to es- cape at the end of that time and got across the boundary and came to America. He landed at Boston and thence took the train for New York. He was in New York about six months, and the first $5 he earned in this country was made by shoveling snow on the streets of New York. The rest of the time he worked for $3 a week. With a few dollars saved he went south to Augusta, Georgia,
-
442
FORT WORTH AND THE TEXAS NORTHWEST
where he outfitted himself with a pack of goods and started peddling over the country. After four years as an itinerant merchant he set up a little store at Lafayette, Alabama, and two years later, in 1892, arrived at Fort Worth.
Only a few of the old timers will recall Mr. Gilbert's first establishment in Fort Worth. It was at the corner of Fourteenth and Main, a little shanty building which he rented for $30 a month. There was sufficient roont to display his modest stock of merchan- dise, and he did much of the work himself, relying on the service of one clerk, whom he paid $30 a month. In January, 1893, Mr. Gilbert married Yetta Levy, of Fort Worth. In April following his marriage he moved his business to a new brick building at 1308 Main Street. For four years he and Mrs. Gilbert lived in the rear of the store, one reason being that he did not have enough merchandise to fill up all the store space. His next move was into the one-story building known as the Queen Theatre, and by that time his capital enabled hin to completely equip this store with merchandise. There he had a fifty-foot frontage. This was the site of the Gilbert store for five years, and he then returned 10 the corner of Fourteenth and Main, oppo- site the site of the little shanty store, where he began his Fort Worth business career. Here he had a two-story building, with a fifty- foot frontage. From there he made his final move to his present location at the corner of Third and Houston streets. On that site he opened a stock of dry goods in a two-story building with a fifty-foot frontage. Three years later he took over an additional store space, running through to Main Street, two stores and with twenty-five-foot frontage on Main. The latest addition to the Gilbert store was made in the spring of 1920, when the fifty-foot frontage on Main Street adjoining the West- brook Hotel was acquired. This gives Mr. Gilbert an aggregate frontage of 125 feet on two floors, reaching from Houston to Main street. This is now a general department store, employing a force of 125 people, and doing a business of more than $1,000,000 a year.
Mr. Gilbert's three sons, David, Julius and Sidney, are all department managers in the business, David having charge of the shoes, Julius, of the clothing, and Sidney, the wom- en's ready-to-wear department. Of his two daughters Reba is the wife of Charles Swartz-
burg who conducts a women's ready-to-wear store known as the Fashion Shop at 611 Houston street and another at 90912 Houston Street. Miss Ruth has finished school and one son, Sol Mitchell, is still in school.
Besides his large mercantile enterprise Mr. Gilbert has invested heavily in Fort Worth realty, his property including a business cor- ner, seventy-five feet frontage, on Main and Third streets, opposite his store, his beauti- ful home at 308 South Adams Street, and other valuable residence property. He is one of the quiet and efficient business men of Fort Worth and has won a high standing and esteem as a citizen through his admirable qual- ity of paying the closest and strictest atten- tion to his business. Mr. Gilbert in 1920 re- turned to his native land, partly as a recreation but primarily to look up his relatives there. When he returned to America he brought with him seven nieces and nephews, and in the war impoverished section of Russian Poland he was also instrumental in the dis- tribution of about $10,000, much of it supplied from his own means.
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.