Joe Herring Jr.

Tulahteka, a Schreiner home in Kerrville, Texas

Tulahteka, built in the early 1920s as a home for Louis and Mae Schreiner. Photo from 2018.
Until recently it was a corporate headquarters.
Click on any image to enlarge.

Several kind readers have forwarded me the real estate listing for what was until recently the headquarters building of the LDBrinkman Corporation. The building is for sale, though quite out of the price range of this rural printer.

Tulahteka, probably in the 1930s

Few people have had the opportunity to travel up the hill and see the building there, catching only glimpses of a large cream-colored building from a distance. It sits on a hill just south of the river, above Sidney Baker South, roughly across the street from the entrance to Rio Robles Mobile Home and RV Park, behind an imposing steel gate and curving driveway.
While having lunch with my son this week in downtown Kerrville, I looked up the hill toward the old building and realized I'd never told its story here. I'll try to remedy this today.
What most of us know as a corporate headquarters building started out life as a family's home. It was built for Louis and Mae Schreiner, with construction starting in 1920. It took about 2 years to build.
The house was designed by Atlee B. Ayres, of San Antonio, and constructed by McCreary & Schott of Kerrville.

Tulahteka during construction

The house itself had a name: "Tulahteka," which means "on the outer edge of town," though sources conflict from what language that word comes from. It's supposedly an Indian phrase, though there were hundreds of languages and dialects spoken by tribes of Native Americans; it might be a word from the subcontinent of India. I doubt anyone knows.
It is a big building: around 10,000 square feet, with two floors and a basement. The 800 square foot basement was blasted out of the limestone hill. The lower floor included a 21 by 40 foot ballroom, and a 21 by 64 foot grand hall. The grand hall featured Italian marble flooring and a large carved fireplace.
Three people lived in the five-bedroom house when it was built: Mr. and Mrs. Schreiner, and their daughter, Mae Louise.

Tulahteka stairway, 2018

Louis Schreiner was the third child of Charles and Magdalena Schreiner; while his inheritance from them included many assets, most people remember Louis Schreiner as the son who ran the Charles Schreiner Bank.
Tulahteka is a grand home, a mansion built in the "Georgian" style. It features a palatial porch with Corinthian columns, facing roughly east, toward the rising sun. The grounds included gardens and other buildings. It was built by craftsmen, and it appears no expense was spared.
I have often wondered why this house seemed so much more grand than other houses built for the Schreiner family. I jumped to the conclusion it was because Louis was the banker.
That may be true, at least in part. But there may be another reason: Louis Schreiner's wife, Mae, was also from a prominent family. Her parents were Henry and Louise Shiner, who donated 250 acres of land in Lavaca County to the San Antonio & Aransas Pass Railroad for right of way and a depot. A town soon grew up around the new transportation facilities, and became what is now Shiner, Texas. I'm guessing most of the town lots were sold by the Shiner family.

Tulahteka, 2018

Mae Shiner Schreiner passed away in 1932, just 12 years after Tulahteka was started. Louis Schreiner remarried in 1936. In 1940, Louis Schreiner sold Tulahteka to a Houston oilman, William Morgan.
According to an excellent news story by my friend Michael Bowlin, published in this newspaper in 1991, other owners of the house include John Sullivan, who owned the house from 1946 to 1949; Robert and Louise Hays (1949-54); Maxine and James Short (1954-58); V.P. and Ergeal Tippett (1958-62); Clyde McMahon, W. D. Caldwell, Herman Swan and Lowell Renfro (1962-66); G. E. Lehmann and Gordon Monroe (1966-67); and C. F. Biggerstaff (1967-78).
L. D. Brinkman purchased the property in 1978 and spent years restoring and renovating the property, using it as headquarters for his company, and housing his extensive collection of American Western art.
In August, 2018, Mrs. Brinkman was kind enough to let my son and me take photographs of the house and its interior. We were fortunate to see the interior while the artwork collection was still on the walls.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who enjoys exploring historic sites in Kerr County. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times October 18, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Ghostly shingle maker, splitting a cypress log.
Click on any image below to enlarge.

Since next Thursday is Halloween, I thought I'd share some ghost stories from my files:
Over the years I have heard numerous Kerr County tales of haunted mansions, scary cellars, and walking spirits. And once, when I was in middle school, a friend and I thought we saw a ghost downtown.
For many years residents of Delaney Hall at Schreiner University have reported seeing a young cadet, in military uniform, who appears, salutes, and then disappears. He's been known to open doors for students, as well.
Nearby, between Delaney Hall and the creek, are the seven grave markers of the Harris family who once lived on a farm there. The stones are flush to the ground, so they're hard to find, but stories are told about the air temperature being oddly colder at that spot. The grave monuments are not the originals – and the location of the actual graves may not be known. Perhaps Delaney Hall is the actual spot?
Several sites in downtown Kerrville have ghost stories attached to them.

Arcadia Theater, 1931

The old Arcadia Theater building once housed offices and shops on its second floor, including a jeweler who died in his little shop there. Some have claimed to hear the tapping of a small jeweler's hammer near the spot his workbench stood on the second floor.
The Kerr County courthouse is the spot of two separate stories:
The first involves a young couple who argued on the courthouse square, back in the late 1800s. Their disagreement turned deadly when the jealous young man shot and killed the woman, then later turned the gun on himself, right there in front of the old courthouse. Some people say, on moonless nights, you can see the pair in the shadows, and hear them bickering with each other, their argument never ending.

Haunted Kerr County Courthouse

The second story involves what was, for a while, the county jail. Looking at the front of the current courthouse, you'll notice a basement, two stories, and then a smaller third story at the top of the older part of the building. That third story was the county jail at one time. I've been up there -- it's creepy even in the daylight. County employees felt the old jail was haunted by an inmate who died in custody years ago. Some report the room has many strange noises, like keys turning a lock, or metal banging against the old steel bars.

Camp Verde Store

Camp Verde, south of Kerrville, is also a spot with many ghost stories. Some have seen a ghostly line of camels, walking in line, passing through the trees and shrubs near the old fort. Others have seen troops running across the bridge there.
Workers at the Camp Verde Store used to have stories of a ghost in the basement, an apparition they called Ruthie. She was a Civil War-era spirit who was a regular customer of the store when she was alive; the old stories say, when she's agitated, Ruthie moves pictures on the wall, rearranges cash drawers, throws merchandise across the room. I read about Ruthie in an article published here fifteen years ago -- I'm not sure if she's still active there.

Charles Schreiner Mansion

I remember as a boy being convinced that the Charles Schreiner Mansionon Earl Garrett Street was haunted.
In those days it wasn't a museum. It was just a big vacant mystery, filled with cobwebs and the stale smell of an abandoned building.
Many years ago, on a blustery October night, a friend and I saw the flickering light of a candle moving from the second story windows of the turret room and heading slowly toward the store; the light moving steadily through the big ballroom on the upper floor. As it approached the last window, half-hidden by the bent pinion pine, it stopped and moved closer to the window pane. The oval of a face was faintly illuminated, a small man with a silver mustache. It peered through the window, out toward the street, and looked at us, two boys scared to death, as we stared from the little alley next to the old Masonic Building.
Our faces must have been white with fear. The eyes looked calmly at us. The lips moved slightly, forming a hint of a smile. And then suddenly the candle went out, and the window was black. My friend and I understood instinctively we needed to be moving along, with haste, so I don't know what became of the old kind face in the window. Maybe it's there tonight, looking out across Earl Garrett Street, waiting for those two boys to come back.
Ghosts -- do you believe in them? I know some folks who do, who've seen and heard some strange things. One thing is for sure: ghosts sure make a good story.
Happy Halloween to everyone.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who has heard some strange things at the print shop after dark, a sure signal it’s time to go home for the night. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times October 26, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Drawing of the new H-E-B grocery store being built in Kerrville, to be completed in 2020.
Something special is highlighted above: the facade of the first store building.
Click on any image below to enlarge.

This week an image of H-E-B’s new Kerrville store was published in this newspaper; the building is scheduled to be completed late next year. The drawing showed something interesting in the façade of the building: there, in the middle of the new structure, was a tiny grocery store building, its outline similar to the Kerrville building in which Florence Butt opened her grocery store in 1905.

Building on Main Street
in downtown Kerrville
which housed Florence Butt's
tiny grocery store in 1905

A few years ago I happened across a remarkable newspaper story titled "True Fairy Story," published in the Kerrville Times of July 30, 1936, on page 4, and written by Mrs. Florence Butt. If anyone knows the story of how H-E-B began, it's Florence Butt; she was its founder.
The story appeared in a special section of that week's issue, celebrating the opening of a new store by the "C. C. Butt Piggly Wiggly Grocery Company." The new 1936 store was to be housed in a new building in the 800 block of Water Street, roughly where One Schreiner Center stands today. Given another new H-E-B store opening in Kerrville soon, her story seemed timely.
Here is Mrs. Butt’s story, in her own words:

Florence Butt

"Once upon a time," Florence Butt writes, "as all fairy stories begin, a woman with a sick husband, three boys, 10, 12, 14-years-old, came to Kerrville to make their home. This was 31 years ago [in 1905]. Our capital to start with was approximately $60.
"Then, the place on Main Street, where the Star Cleaners are now, was rented."
(The building which housed that first store was moved from the site decades ago, but stood about where the Hill Country Cafe is today, in the 800 block of Main Street. It is this two-story building memorialized in the plans for the new grocery store under construction.)

Mrs. Butt in her first store

"It had rooms above to live in," she continues, "and the store room, all for $9 a month. In preparing the little grocery store, a small Bible was found on a shelf. A good omen, it was kept there. So, on the morning of November 26, 1905, 31 years ago [in 1936], the store opened. Before the front door was opened, the little Bible was read. Then a prayer for the Great Father and Giver of all things to be the Partner to lead and guide: then the front door was opened.
"The first month we sold $56 worth. One day, not a penny's worth was sold. Several days, only 5 and 10 cents worth of merchandise was sold. But the responsibility was there, and it had to make good.

Leland Richeson in the store's
delivery wagon, around 1915

"You can see the stock $60 would place on your shelves, but I had such good friends to advise and help me out. Our first delivery was a baby buggy with top taken off, and a box placed on the wheels. Then it was run over by a wagon, and we had to get a child's play wagon, costing $3.00, which was much for our limited capital. Then the rains came in the winter, the little wagon wheels would fill with mud and it could not be pulled any longer. So we bought a horse that cost $20, a wagon costing $5, a harness $2.50 -- $27.50 total cost for the first delivery wagon. But to the mother and boys that pulled the delivery wagon in the mud, it is to be remembered as one of the bright spots of growth in business. Every month was growth, but hard work.

Kerrville, 1903

"Hence, the continued work of the son, H. E. Butt, who never knew anything from 10 years old except work, has come this chain of 31 stores [in July, 1936], and has made it possible have our pretty [new] store in Kerrville.

The early employees of
the C C Butt Grocery Co.
around 1915

"With our many friends here, the Greatest Partner has truly been with us. So we thank Him and the many, many lovely friends who have helped in so many ways to bring success. We hope that in our new store, we will all be close together, and all go on to promote success and happiness to all. I want to thank my friends and tell them I love them. Everyone has been so nice to me. So we hope all will enjoy the new store with us -- Mrs. Butt."
The new store for Kerrville, hopefully completed in 2020, will be a giant compared to that first store. I’m happy the company chose to honor its beginnings, and its determined founder, Florence Butt, with a facsimile of their very first store.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who is a frequent shopper at Kerrville's H-E-B. It seems like he’s there almost every day. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times November 2, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

The Barker Building, 1950s. Later this building was called the Kellogg Building.
This corner is currently being worked by earth-moving machines.
Click on any image to enlarge.

Several kind readers, including one who is celebrating a birthday Saturday, asked this week about the lots at the corner of Main and Sidney Baker Street, where crews recently demolished the National Car dealership buildings and began excavating for a new bank building. The sights and sounds of heavy equipment made people wonder about the history of that part of downtown.
It turns out that little corner has been the site of many important parts of our community's story.
Lots 136-143, Block 2, J. D. Brown Addition, all face Sidney Baker Street and the courthouse square across the street, and are part of the earliest map of Kerrville.
When the very first commissioners court decided to place the county seat on land owned by Joshua Brown, they specified he provide a public square of four acres, with streets leading out from the public square to be 80 feet wide. Sidney Baker Street (then called Tchoupitoulas Street), was one of those 80 feet wide streets.

Secor Hospital, after
1911 renovations

The lots at the corner of Sidney Baker and Main Street faced the "public square" Joshua D. Brown conveyed to the county government. The "public square" is the courthouse square today.
The earliest use I can find for the corner of Main and Sidney Baker streets dates from the 1870s, when it was the site for one of the first public schools in our community.
J. J. Starkey, writing in the October 29, 1931 issue of the Kerrville Times, tells this story:
"Sometime in the seventies the school headquarters was located in the stone building...erected, I think by John Ochse, and continued to be used as a school house until the school term of 1882-83."
Starkey was himself a student in that school building, "under the teaching of Mrs. Retta Pottinger, an aunt of Bert C. Parsons. A brother of Mrs. Pottinger, Emerson Parsons, was principal of the school, and taught the higher grades while Mrs. Pottinger taught the beginners.
"One summer, while Mrs. Pottinger was teaching...a bolt of lightning struck the building. It came into the southeast end of the building, ran down the stove pipe, struck the floor which it tore up for a space, and threw the little school into confusion.
"It was raining hard and the doors were closed. Bert Parsons, who was one of those attending, says the room became dark and smelled like exploded gun powder.

Secor Hospital, 1940s

"In the confusion the doors could not be found and Marion Bess, a big red-headed boy, butted out the lower sash of a window, and the school children escaped, led by Joe Spray." The children ran toward a house across Main Street in the midst of a downpour and lightning storm. Two girls whose desks were next to the stove were absent that day, and were thus spared. No one was hurt in the incident.
On the 1898 Sanborn map of downtown Kerrville, the rock school house building which stood right on the corner of the intersection, is marked vacant. Beside it, toward Jefferson Street, is a building marked the Hutchison House hotel, which was run by a E. B. Elam. A newspaper ad for the hotel says "Nice cool rooms and clean comfortable beds. Table supplied with the best the market affords. Positively no Consumptives Taken."

Secor Hospital after a snowfall

Later, in 1911, a doctor approached Captain Charles Schreiner with an idea to put a hospital in the vacant rock building. The doctor offered to "match him dollar for dollar in the expense necessary to establish such an institution.
"Captain Schreiner was skeptical and frankly advised the doctor that he did not think such an institution could be made to pay in this out of the way place... He agreed, however, to spend $200 in improving an old stone building that had been an eye-sore to the town for years and the doctor put in upwards of five thousand in building and equipment and evolved a fairly decent little hospital. The local physicians cooperated and the institution was a success."
About 18 months after the hospital opened a fire broke out in the building, and it looked like there would be no hospital in Kerrville. The founding doctor thought about leaving town and starting a new hospital in San Antonio.
Schreiner, by this time, had realized how important the hospital was to the community. He worked with several community business leaders and they agreed to build a modern hospital building for the doctor and renting it back to him. The first 20-room wing was completed soon after, and about a decade later the hospital expanded again. That hospital, the Secor Sanitarium Hospital, named for Dr. William Lee Secor, operated on the corner of Main and Sidney Baker Street until Dr. Secor's death in 1937.

The Kellogg Building, 1980s

In 1920, Schreiner bought out the other investors and deeded the hospital to the City of Kerrville, while providing an endowment to help fund health care for the "poor and unfortunate."
In October 1937, Dr. J. D. Jackson bought the building and renamed the hospital the Kerrville General Hospital; after Dr. Jackson's death, the hospital was leased by Dr. D. R. Knapp, and operated until the opening of the Sid Peterson Memorial Hospital in 1949.
From 1949 until 1987 the building housed a variety of offices, and was known first as the Barker Building, and later as the Kellogg Building, and went through a number of owners. It was torn down in May, 1987.
The lots were most recently the home of John Miller's National Car operations. A bank building is currently under construction on part of the site.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who wishes Mary Ellen Summerlin a very happy birthday. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times November 9, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Kerrville's Blue Bonnet Hotel, at the south corner of Water and Earl Garrett Streets,
as it appeared in 1927, when it only had five stories.
Click on any image below to enlarge.

I read a news item here this week which mentioned a proposed hotel in the downtown area, near Spring Street, opposite Water Street from the Notre Dame Catholic Church campus.
It’s hard to believe today, but there was once an eight-story hotel overlooking the Guadalupe River in downtown Kerrville, the Blue Bonnet Hotel. It stood at the corner of Water and Earl Garrett streets; the site is a parking lot today, just across the street from the Weston Building, home of Francisco’s Restaurant.

Schreiner Bank, right;
Blue Bonnet Hotel, left, 1927

The Blue Bonnet Hotel opened to much fanfare in on April 2, 1927, with music during the afternoon, and a dance from 9 pm until midnight.
When it opened, it had five stories and 80 rooms. “Eighty rooms,” an advertisement read, “each with a private bath. A telephone in every room. Rates: $2.00, $2.50, $3.00 and $4.00.” Every room was an “outside room,” with views of downtown Kerrville and the hills beyond. Each room also had a shower, tub, fan, and “circulating ice water.”
Building the new hotel cost $250,000 according to news reports. It was designed by Paul G. Silber & Co., architects, of San Antonio. “In designing the Kerrville Blue Bonnet, the architects have incorporated all of the modern features of hotel construction combined with the beautiful design of Mediterranean architecture. Being strictly fire-proof, the building has been designed to carry three additional stories, thus increasing its room capacity eventually to 140 rooms.”

As it appeared in the 1950s,
with eight stories

That eventuality occurred within one year, when an additional three stories were added to the building, growing from the original five stories to eight.
“In addition to the spacious, bright, well-ventilated lobby, there will be installed a garden terrace, connection with both the lobby and dining room, for the convenience of guests. From the terrace, steps will lead to the garden, which, with its delightful walks, bridges, cascades, rustic arbors and seats, will form an ideal playground for tourists.”

The hotel from south of the
Guadalupe River

The construction firm of Walsh & Burney, under the leadership of local building superintendent P. L. Ragsdale, built the hotel in about seven months, breaking ground on August 25, 1926. Several local subcontractors worked on the building, including W. B. Brown of Kerrville, who installed the plumbing, and Ally Beitel, with Kerrville Lumber Company, “who furnished every foot of lumber used in the construction of this premier hostelery.”
The president and general manager of the Blue Bonnet Hotel Company was Floyd Singleton. The company hoped to build Blue Bonnet Hotels in other cities, including San Antonio. By 1928 it hoped to have six or seven new hostelries open and operating across Texas.

From the area that would later
become Louise Hays Park

The Kerrville Blue Bonnet Hotel, when it opened, had two suites; on the fifth floor was the Governor’s Suite; on the fourth, the Blue Bonnet Suite. Both “exquisite suites, in which no detail of high class hotel facilities and service has been overlooked.”
The street level of the building had a coffee shop, barber shop, beauty parlor, and drug store, complete with soda fountain. Adjacent to the hotel lobby was a writing room, telephone booths, and two high-speed elevators (which had elevator operators, not buttons).
For all its self-proclaimed attention to detail and the comfort of its guests, the hotel lacked an important feature: air-conditioning. That absence, coupled with newer hotels, lead to the end of the Blue Bonnet Hotel.
I remember the Blue Bonnet Hotel from my childhood, when I attended Kiwanis Club meetings there with my father. Over the years I’ve collected items from the old hotel – its telephone switchboard, room keys, doors to rooms, a towel, and even a wrapped bar of soap.
In 1971, when I was about 10 years old, the building was torn down to make room for a drive-through bank for the Charles Schreiner Bank. That bank and the drive-through building are both gone today.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who visited the Blue Bonnet Hotel frequently in its final years. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times November 16, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Stonehenge at Hill Country Arts Foundation Ingram Texas

Stonehenge at the Hill Country Arts Foundation in Ingram, Texas.
Children will love it, as a place to play hide-and-seek.
Click any image below to enlarge.

Thanksgiving– my favorite holiday, a holiday that doesn’t require gifts, cards, or costumes, just a thankful heart and a hearty appetite. After the last bite has been eaten, though, and you look around at your sated dinner guests and think – ‘what now?’
Here you've got a house full of relatives, some of whom are children. Gentle Reader, children have a lot of energy, and it’s good to keep them busy.
Welcome to my updated "Free Things You Can Do with the Kids Until They Go Back Home" column. Hopefully there'll be an idea or two in the following paragraphs that will help you with your younger visitors this coming week. These ideas have two criteria: they must get the kiddos out of the house, and they must tire the children out a bit, so when you bring them home, they might (just might) be tired and want to be still and rest.
1.Play Hide and Seek at Stonehenge. Years ago, the late Al Shepperd constructed a huge replica of Stonehenge -- the ancient structure in England -- in a field in front of his house near Hunt. After Shepperd's death, the monument was moved to the grounds of the Hill Country Arts Foundation. While it is interesting to visit the replica and wonder about the purpose of the original, we discovered long ago it makes a perfect place to play Hide and Seek. The children in your life will love visiting the place, and there are thousands of potential places to hide. Each stone column will hide a child quite effectively. To get to Stonehenge, travel to Ingram, and take Highway 39 toward Hunt. Just past the Johnson Creek Bridge, you’ll see the structure in a field on your left, on the campus of the Hill Country Arts Foundation, near the Little League fields. Tip to the adult players: the shadows are an important tool in this game. Pro tip to adult players: you can take your time looking for the hiding children.

Kerrville's River Trail,
below Guadalupe Street

2.Go for a Nice Long Walk on the River Trail, which follows the Guadalupe River through the heart of Kerrville. There are several places where you can park, including the Dietert Center, on Guadalupe Street; Riverside Nature Center, on Lemos Street; Louise Hays Park, off of Thompson Drive; at the G Street crossing; and off of Loop 534, near the bridge. The trail is a concrete sidewalk with gentle grades, suitable for most walkers. Be sure to stay on the right side of the sidewalk, as there are many bicyclists also enjoying the path.

Tranquility Island, taken from
the Francisco Lemos Bridge

3.Learn to Skip Rocks at Tranquility Island. There is a beach of smooth stones near the far upriver point of the island, to the right hand side, just downstream from the footbridge below Francisco Lemos Street. The river forms a pool there, where water is still, usually without a lot of breeze. Teach the rugrats to throw a skimmer. (Instructions are available on YouTube.)

Footbridge connecting downtown
and Louise Hays Park

4.Find the Fisherman below the Louise Hays Footbridge. Not everyone knows there’s a footbridge connecting Louise Hays Park to the downtown area. From the pavilion at the end of Earl Garrett Street, overlooking the Guadalupe River, you can see the footbridge just downstream from the Louise Hays Park dam. I think it’s easier to access the footbridge from Louise Hays Park, since the stairway down from the pavilion is rather steep. Tell the young ones you're looking for a fisherman. You might run across a human fisherman or two -- but they're not the ones you're looking for. As you approach the footbridge, look downstream. A great blue heron usually stalks small fish there; I’ve also seen a white great egret there, too. You can tell the kids it's a "professional" fisherman -- it fishes for a living. Bonus: a pair of Egyptian geese have a new gaggle of baby goslings in the park. Look for them in the grass, near the riverbank, staying close together.

Fossils found near
downtown Kerrville

5.Hunt for Fossils. Fossils are everywhere in Kerr County, usually on the hillsides, one strata down from the crest of the hill. I’ve seen a lot of fossils by the footbridge described in No. 4 above, in the chalky conglomerate of the steep riverbank. While Texas Hearts and bivalve shells are easiest to find, you’d be surprised at the variety of fossils scattered all over Kerr County.
We are lucky to live in a place of such natural beauty, and we have so much to be thankful for. I hope your time with young relatives is blessed with safety, fun, and warmth.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who will be enjoying Thanksgiving Dinner at home with family, after trying to help Ms. Carolyn get everything ready. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times November 23, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

A portion of the Native American Pictographs at the
Hatfield Pictograph Shelter, Kerr County.
Click on image to enlarge.

There are faint red, black and yellow marks on a limestone bluff in the western part of Kerr County, markings which have been there, exposed to rain and sun, possibly for hundreds of years. They are at the only recorded archaeological site in Kerr County which includes pictographs, the Hatfield Pictographic Shelter, designated 41KR493. When the pictographs were drawn and painted is not known, but there is evidence from artifacts found at the site that rock shelter was in use from the Late to Transitional Archaic period, roughly between 1,500 to 5,000 years ago.
Pictographs are images or designs which were painted or drawn, usually on stone; petroglyphs were carved or chipped into stone. This site is called a rock shelter because a portion of the bluff above the pictographs extends slightly outward and above the pictographs, like a visor on a cap. It is at best an imperfect ‘shelter,’ but may have served as a place to escape weather and direct sun.
My friend Bryant Saner, Jr., an archeologist, showed me the site more than a decade ago. He’s also published papers on what is found there.
Other pictographs in Kerr County have been reported, most many decades ago. A. T. Jackson, in his book “Picture Writing of the Texas Indians,” first published in the 1930s, notes two sites in Kerr County. His reporting of those two sites does not include illustrations or photographs, and neither site was documented or recorded by archeologists from the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory. Today no one is completely sure where the sites Jackson mentioned might be located, or even if the images reported there over 80 years ago are even visible today. In his reports he notes the pictographs at the two sites were faded and hard to see.
Saner, in a paper published in “La Tierra,” the Journal of the Southern Texas Archaeological Association, in July 1996, suggests the Hatfield Shelter is not one of the two sites mentioned in Jackson’s book, but a third Kerr County site with pictographs. It is the only one to be documented and recorded.
The site was named for the person who discovered and reported it, Vicki Hatfield, in a site survey report on file at the Texas Archeological Research Laboratory, in 1992.
In the few times I’ve been to the site, I’ve noticed a fading of the images there. Some of the photographs I took on early visits show images much sharper and clearer than more recent photographs.
I’m sad to say the site has suffered from vandalism, mostly in the form of people digging for artifacts and disturbing the archeological record there. This destruction is against the law, and also robs future generations of the knowledge which could be gained from scientific study of the site.
A full-scale study has not been conducted at the Hatfield Shelter, as far as I know, with archeological investigations to determine and record more of the information hidden there. The site still holds a secret or two about life in the Texas hill country many generations ago. I’ve been told a lack of funding prevents that work.
The site itself is quite lovely, a rock shelter just above the river, hidden and protected by trees. It’s easy to imagine how it must have been, an unknown number of years ago, when a pigment, made from materials found in nature, was carefully applied to its rock walls.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who often wonders about those who lived here very long ago. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times November 30, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Reading "Big Wonderful Thing," a new history of Texas by Stephen Harrigan,
at my favorite lunchtime reading spot, the downtown pavilion
overlooking Louise Hays Park and the Guadalupe River.

If you accepted the task of writing a history of Texas, a book telling the story of our state, what writing tool would be most helpful? Would it be a complete research library, a quiet room in which to work, or a trusty IBM Selectric typewriter?

Stephen Harrigan
will be at Wolfmueller's Books
Thursday, December 5, from 4 - 6 pm

Stephen Harrigan, who recently completed a new book on the history of Texas, has a reply which might surprise you.
Speaking at the LBJ Library in Austin last month, Harrigan said “My most important tool in writing this book was my car. If I’m writing about, say, the pictographs along the Rio Grande – you know, they’re three or four thousand years old – I had to see that.”
And so Harrigan put thousands of miles on his car, visiting sites all over Texas, gathering information for his new book “Big Wonderful Thing: a History of Texas,” published this autumn by the University of Texas Press.
The result is a comprehensive look at the history of our state, beginning with shipwrecked Spaniards who washed ashore near Galveston Island in the late 1520s, and continuing to the early days of George W. Bush’s first term as president, when the World Trade Center buildings fell. Quite a few things happened in Texas between those two events.
Harrigan brings special talents to the project. As a writer he may be best known for his novels, though he’s spent decades reporting on Texas and Texans for magazines, and most of his published work is non-fiction. His novelist’s eye is evident in this history of Texas: he shares the important characters and scenes from our history as a story, not as a dry recitation of facts, dates, and names. Meanwhile, his experience as a reporter is evident in the depth of his research. He gets his facts right.

There are so many characters, scenes, and facts in our state’s history, which itself can be a daunting problem. How to winnow between the wheat and the chaff? This well-written (and well-edited) book weighs just shy of four pounds, a detailed history of Texas in a mere 945 pages. It takes at least that many pages to tell the story well. I was thankful Harrigan chose not to chase too many rabbits. This is a focused telling of the story of Texas
This history of Texas is told from a present-day viewpoint, which sings praises when appropriate and discusses follies and sins when necessary. Harrigan doesn’t burnish the heights or ignore the depths of Texas history; his book reflects both the bright and the dark, like a piece of photographic film, recording light and shadow as it makes an image.
I am happy to recommend this book to you – for yourself, or as a gift to a history-loving friend.
This Thursday, December 5, from 4-6 p.m. Stephen Harrigan will be at Wolfmueller’s Books, 229 Earl Garrett, to discuss “Big Wonderful Thing: A History of Texas” at a book signing event hosted by my friends Jon and Sandy Wolfmueller. The event is free and open to the public.
Near the front of the book, an 1835 quote from Stephen F. Austin is printed on a page by itself: “I hope that a dead calm will reign all over Texas for many years to come – and that there will be no more excitements of any kind whatever.”
That did not happen, Mr. Austin. Not by a long shot.

This review originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times December 5, 2019.

A relic from 66 - 145 million years ago,
found in Kerr County last week.

Time has been on my mind this week.
Last week I wrote about the Hatfield Pictograph Rock Shelter, an archeological site in the western part of Kerr County. It’s the only recorded site in our county which includes pictographs. While no one knows when the drawings were made on the walls of the rock shelter, there is evidence from artifacts found at the site it was in use from the Late to Transitional Archaic period, roughly between 1,500 to 5,000 years ago.
That’s a long time ago. The Great Pyramid of Giza, for comparison, is about 4,600 years old. Stonehenge, in England, is about 5,000 years old. It is possible people were using the Hatfield Rock Shelter around the same time, right here in Kerr County.

Porocystis globularis --
algal fruiting body fossils

This past Wednesday I traveled even further back in time, spending an hour or so looking for fossils. It’s a quiet hobby I enjoy, getting me outside to enjoy the wind and sun for a few minutes.
I found quite a few fossils, mostly gastropods and a clutch of grape-sized algal fruiting body fossils, all from the Cretaceous period, between 66 to 145 million years ago.
There is really no way for me to understand that span of time, even if I hold a nice spiral tylostoma fossil in my hand, the rock record of an animal that once lived in what is now Kerr County. That animal lived here when all of our hills and valleys were at the bottom of a shallow sea.
There are many places in the Texas Hill Country where it is actually harder to find a rock that is not a fossil than it is to find a fossil. I know of several spots where the fossils are so numerous they carpet the ground.

A tylostoma and a
porocystis globularis
fossil

Years ago William Matthews wrote "Texas Fossils: an amateur collector's handbook," and it's available online for free at http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/56315 In it, I learned our area of Texas, the Edwards Plateau, just north of the Balcones Fault and south of the Llano Uplift, is rich in fossils.
Many of the fossils here are of marine animals -- such as snails, urchins, bivalves, and even fish. But the area also has dinosaur fossils, including fossilized dinosaur footprints. (There are at least two sites in Kerr County with these ancient footprints.)
Kerr County lies in the Lower Cretaceous geologic area of Texas, with plenty of limestone and shale. Limestone is a sedimentary rock, made up of layers and layers of debris and muck, and often the remains of animals, which can become fossilized.

A gift from a kind reader

As children, we often collected fossils we called "Texas Hearts," which are an internal mold of a Texas Cretaceous pelecypod. We also found many "stone ears," which were the shells of gastropods and pelecypods, a type of clam or mussel.
When he was a child, my son was especially good at finding fossilized tylostoma, the corkscrew fossils that look like snail shells. He found them in all sizes. They're the internal mold of a gastropod.
Ms. Carolyn once found a fossilized plant, a small leaf imprint. We've found what looks like fossilized coral. There are many types of fossils in our area.
Just last week a kind reader brought by a fossil I’d never seen before, the fossilized shell of a large bivalve, measuring 8 inches from edge to edge.
I’ll have all of these fossils on display at our family’s print shop for the next few weeks.
Before winter takes a firm hold here, take a few moments to get outside and look around. You never know what you might find.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native with odd hobbies. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times December 7, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

The restored Union Church, on the Schreiner University Campus,
after a snowfall, 2003

History can be made even during the busy holiday season, as I found in my dusty files:
Not many know that churches in our community also had their beginnings during the Christmas season.
Although Joshua Brown and his crew of shingle makers arrived in our area in 1846, settling permanently in 1848, the first church buildings in Kerrville weren’t built until 1885 with the completion of the Union Church.

Union Church, 1914

The Union Church’s story is interesting to me for several reasons, because the building was shared by four congregations.
Considering that it took our community so long to build churches – almost 40 years – a generation of Kerrville residents had grown up in a community without a church building.
In 1876 the Kerr County Commissioners Court approved the use of the county courtroom for “use as a place of worship of Almighty God,” but this arrangement, for several reasons, “wasn’t satisfactory.” The court’s order stipulated that the sheriff be paid $5 per day for the use of the courtroom, and that “no distinction shall be made between associations, sects, classes, or denominations of the community.”

Union Church, ca. 1955

This experiment was not successful, and was soon abandoned.
In 1885, according to Bob Bennett, “Mrs. Whitfield Scott, who had come to Kerr County with her husband Captain Whitfield Scott, a Confederate veteran, and her sister, Miss Laura Gill, who later became Mrs. William Gray Garrett, began to solicit funds for the building of a Union Church. They were later joined in this work by Mrs. J. M. Starkey, a Methodist, and Mrs. Adeline Coleman, a member of the Christian denomination.
“These ladies went from house to house on horseback and wrote appealing articles in newspapers of that day to stimulate interest. There appears in the Christian Observer, a Presbyterian publication, in 1885, an article under the title “An Urgent Call,” which told how the youth of Kerrville were growing up without religion training, how there was no place of worship…, and how valuable a church would be to the growing community.”

Union Church, on Lemos Street
around 1970

According to an article published in the Kerrville Times in March, 1928, “Mrs. Scott and Miss Gill drove from house to house, not only in Kerrville, but throughout the county soliciting funds. It was hard work. People were poor, some did not believe in churches.”
The ladies were persistent, and ultimately successful.
Two lots were given by Capt. Charles Schreiner for the construction of the church in September, 1885; the lots were located on Clay Street, across the street from Pioneer Bank. A convenience store and gas station are on the site today.
The original church cost $190 to build, which was the low bid presented by A. Allen & Co. The building was completed just before Christmas, 1885.

Union Church, 2002, in its
current location

“For several years thereafter, all denominations held services in the Union Church. It was agreed that the Methodist Church should use the building the first Sunday of every month; the Presbyterian the second Sunday; the Baptist the third; and the Christian Church the fourth Sunday. After 1914, when the other denominations had erected their own places of worship, the Christian Church began to use the building.” The building was deeded to the First Christian Church in September, 1925.
Years later, the building was moved to Lemos Street, and when I was a boy housed an Army Navy Surplus store where a generation of children bought camping gear.
Then the Friends of the Kerr County Historical Commission restored the church, and it now resides on the corner of the campus of Schreiner University, moving from its original lots donated by Captain Schreiner, next to Lemos Street, and finally to a corner site on the college campus which bears his name.
I suppose at Christmastime back in 1885 there was a lot of rejoicing in the new church building. As you visit your church during this time, take a moment to remember those determined women, riding house to house on horseback, working to build the community’s first church.
Until next week, all the best.

Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who remembers his father today, who was born on December 14, 1936. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times December 14, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Charles Schreiner's original store in downtown Kerrville,
opened on Christmas Eve, 1869. Illustration by Harold B. Hugbee.
Click on any image to enlarge.

This coming Tuesday, Christmas Eve, will be exactly 150 years since Charles Schreiner opened his store in Kerrville.
“It was a small beginning,” he told J. E. Grinstead years later, “just a little cypress shack that stood where my residence now stands.” The “shack” was only 16x18 feet, made of cypress, and stood in the middle of the block, facing Earl Garrett Street (then called Mountain Street).
When we think of Charles Schreiner these days, we often picture an older man, wealthy beyond imagination. It is true, late in life, he was very rich, owning over 500,000 acres of the Texas Hill Country, along with banks, wool warehouses, shares in numerous businesses, buildings, hotels, ranches, herds, and even part of a railroad. There is no doubt the man had a genius for business.
None of that was evident 150 years ago, however. He was just a young veteran opening a store in a tiny town on the edge of the Texas frontier. There was no cash in the country, and most commerce was in bartered transactions. There was no transportation to or from major markets, except for freight wagons hauled by mules or oxen. Every item for sale in Schreiner’s store, except those raised or grown locally, was brought here by wagon: every nail, bolt of cloth, jar, pan, or piece of candy was brought here through incredible labor and effort.
It wasn’t his first mercantile venture. With his brother in law, Caspar Real, in 1857 he had operated a store serving Camp Verde, the Williams Community Store, which was about a mile south of the military post. Because of the sparse population around Verde Creek, Schreiner and Real only opened the store on army paydays. Running a profitable store on such a limited schedule was tough, and made worse when the soldiers stole from the store. Real and Schreiner supplemented the store’s income by securing contracts to supply Camp Verde with beef, wool, and wood.
Meanwhile Schreiner was ranching on a small scale on Turtle Creek, again with his brother in law Caspar Real.

Charles Schreiner, 1880s

There is some evidence all of this hard work was not resulting in enough income, and so Schreiner enlisted in the Texas Mounted Volunteers, which were later commissioned into the Texas Rangers. For this service, Schreiner was paid – in his last enlistment in 1859, for a service for around three months, he was paid $114.
In 1861, Charles Schreiner married Mary Magdalena Enderle in San Antonio. In 1862, he enlisted in the Confederate Army, reporting for duty just three weeks before their first son, Aime Charles, was born. He served in the Confederate Army until the end of the war, returning home in 1865.
He returned to a land devastated economically by the long Civil War. The store near Camp Verde lacked customers; the U. S. Army did not man the post again until 1866, and abandoned it in 1869. Having a store there did not seem prudent: there were no customers.
Still, Schreiner stayed busy. In addition to ranching, he was elected Kerr County district clerk in 1865, some four years before opening his store in Kerrville. In 1868, he was elected Kerr County treasurer, a post he held for 30 consecutive years. I think these elections demonstrated two things about Charles Schreiner: first, he was likable, and won votes in numerous elections; second, he was trustworthy.
And what of Schreiner -- what was he like?

Schreiner residence on Earl Garrett Street.
I believe the original store building can be seen
just to the left of the wool wagon.

"Captain Schreiner was not so large a man as his photographs make him appear," Gene Hollon wrote in 1944 for the Southwestern Historical Quarterly. "His height was only around five feet and eight inches, and his weight never reached more than 170 pounds."
Meaning he was about my height and my weight -- by modern standards short, but back in those days Schreiner was probably about average in height among his neighbors.
"In his prime he was trim and fleet of foot," Hollon wrote. "It was said he could outrun any man in town in a foot race, and he often proved it...he did participate in foot racing down Main Street, a stunt not exactly considered dignified for a middle-aged man today, but quite proper then."
And so, 150 years ago, on Christmas Eve 1869, a 31-year-old man opened a store in Kerrville in a cypress shack on a muddy street in a town with few people. Once again, he had a business partner, this time August Faltin of Comfort.
It was a small start, just like he said. But it was the start of something big.
Until next week, all the best.

2 coffee-table books
filled with historic
Kerrville photos

Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who remembers shopping at Schreiner’s, starting when he was a boy, back in the 1960s. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times December 21, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

The St. Charles Hotel, Kerrville, in the late 1920s.
Click on any image to enlarge.

On Christmas Eve, my new friend Louis Amestoy, who is managing editor of this newspaper, wrote a column on several topics, including well-deserved praise for Bob Waller, a compelling photograph taken by Tom Holden of this year's last full moon, and, well, squirrels. He'd found a clip from an old issue of this newspaper which talked about a "squirrel barbecue."

Mattie Morris

I was intrigued. Although a recipe for preparing squirrel, complete with instructions on how to clean and skin the game, can be found in our 1980s-era copy of "The Joy of Cooking," it's not an entree I have ever enjoyed. Or, more accurately: I don't remember ever having squirrel on my plate. I do remember a few wild game dinners at the Ag Barn in the 1990s where it's quite possible squirrel was among the various smoked proteins I happily consumed.
I dug further on the particular clipping mentioned by Amestoy and found this, from the March 27, 1930 Kerrville Times:
"Mrs. Geo. Morris gave a squirrel and chicken barbecue at Camp Rest, five miles below Kerrville Monday at noon. Sixteen guests of the St. Charles Hotel attended the feast. Mrs. Morris gives these barbecues frequently and they are certainly enjoyed by all those who attend them."

George Morris

Well, then. I might choose the chicken, with just a taste of the squirrel.
In 1930, Mattie Morris was a widow. Her popular husband, George, had been dead five years. He is buried in Gillespie County, at the Hill Crest Cemetery, which was then a part of the giant Morris Ranch.
George Morris was born in Burr Oak, Michigan, which is near the Indiana state line. His family's ranch between Kerrville and Fredericksburg was famous for the racehorses it raised and trained there.
George and Mattie (Gowan) Morris were married in 1891 at the Morris Ranch.

St. Charles Hotel, 1907

In 1907 they moved to Kerrville and purchased the St. Charles Hotel from the Lee Mason family. The St. Charles was on the eastern corner of Water and Sidney Baker Streets, and was probably the best hotel on the long road between San Antonio and El Paso. It was built in 1883, a two-story frame structure facing Water Street. Over the years it was grew like a tomato vine, sprouting a third floor, and additional wings and guest rooms. When the Morris family owned the hotel it even had an on-site dairy herd, with cows housed in a little barn about where today's Kerrville city council meets.
George Morris served as mayor of Kerrville from 1916-1917. Mattie Morris was active in the community as well, in the Eastern Star, and serving on various committees, hosting countless banquets and dinners, from the very first meeting of the Kerrville Rotary Club to graduation dinners for several decades' worth of Tivy graduates.

St. Charles dairy herd, around 1915

Including, it seems, a squirrel and chicken barbecue in March, 1930.
In 1930 the St. Charles Hotel was in peril: only a few years earlier a much nicer hotel had been built in Kerrville: the Blue Bonnet Hotel, just down Water Street at the corner of Water and Earl Garrett Streets. It was taking business away from the much older St. Charles, which had been built for a much different traveler in a much different time.
Mattie Morris had been the sole owner of the St. Charles Hotel since her husband's death in 1925. She knew her hotel was facing difficult days.
Only a few days after the squirrel and chicken barbecue, the Kerrville Mountain Sun announced Mrs. Morris had sold the old St. Charles Hotel to the owners of the Blue Bonnet Hotel -- for a whopping $75,000. It was front page news on April 10, 1930.
So, that squirrel and chicken barbecue at Camp Rest was likely the last one she held for guests of her hotel. Undoubtedly the deal to sell her hotel was already in the works while her guests "feasted" in the countryside near the river between Kerrville and the airport.
Mattie Morris lived another 8 years, passing away in September, 1938. She is buried here in Kerrville, at the Garden of Memories.
I have some of the personal papers of Mattie Morris in my collection, mostly about the various business opportunities she pursued. I need to see if there happens to be a good recipe for squirrel among her files.
Until next year, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who has harbored murderous thoughts toward the squirrels who visit his garden each spring, taking only one bite from a beautiful tomato, and leaving the rest of the tomato to molder. This column originally appeared in theKerrville Daily Times December 28, 2019.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Here are the top 10 stories of 2019, as measured by pageviews of the stories here on the blog:

10.

"History at the corner of Kerrville's Main and Sidney Baker streets," published in November. Construction of a new bank building on that corner prompted me to write about the other buildings which have stood on that site.

9.

"Found in a Garage: Hundreds of Historic Photographs,"published in April. A member of the Meeker family found an old trunk filled with hundreds of negatives, most taken by pioneer photographer Starr Bryden.

8.

"Passenger rail service between Kerrville and San Antonio, 1923,"published in October. Few remember when trains traveled to Kerrville; fewer still when passenger service stopped here. The train's arrival here in 1887 was a real game changer for our community.

7.

"Kerrville folks remember good places to eat," published in January. Makes me hungry just reading about some of the restaurants.

6.

"The Voelkel's triangle-shaped building in downtown Kerrville," published in March. The story of the building with the interesting shape at the corner of Water and Clay streets. Its first use surprised even me.

5.

"Kerrville's Tulahteka: Just a simple starter home," published in October. The mansion on top of a hill just south of downtown Kerrville was once the home of Louis and Mae Schreiner, and their daughter, Mae Louise. It must have been crowded for just three people.

4.

"Kerrville's Louise Hays Park: Built in One Day," published in September. New photographs of the day the community came together to build a park were shared with me, and I shared them with you here.

3.

"Ghost Stories of Kerr County,"published near Halloween, of course. Whether you believe in ghosts or not, you have to admit there are some strange stories told in late October.

2.

"The Mystery of the Old Courthouse in Comfort,"published in January. Some say Kerr County's second courthouse is still standing -- just across the Kerr County line, in Kendall County.

And the most popular story for 2019:

"Florence Butt tells her story:
the very first H-E-B," published in November. Florence Butt, who founded what is now the H. E. Butt Grocery Company, wrote a newspaper article about her memories in 1936 -- which I happened to stumble across while researching something else.

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Thanks for your encouragement and support in 2019. I really appreciate it! Until next year, all the best.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

A camel in Central Park, New York, New York, in the late 1860s. (Wikimedia Commons.)
Click on any image below to enlarge.

Shortly before Thanksgiving my friend Michael Bowlin, who has been writing about Kerr County history a lot longer than I, sent over a clipping from the Janesville, Wisconsin Gazette, dated February 10, 1868:

1858 Camp Verde map, found by
the late Joseph Luther

“Fourteen camels, raised in Texas, have arrived at Indianola, to be shipped to New York, and placed in the Central Park of that city. Some years ago, it will be remembered, a lot of camels were imported by the War Department for use in transportation of supplies across the desert regions of New Mexico; and the lot above referred to came from that stock, having been raised in Camp Verde, Texas.”
What became of the Camp Verde camels has been a local question since the fort was finally abandoned in 1869. The question persists, even beyond Kerr County. In a recently published novel, Inland, by Téa Obreht, the fate of some of the camels and their cameleers is crucial to the story, which takes place in the deserts of southern Arizona. Closer to home, a Camp Verde camel can be found in The Which Way Tree, by Elizabeth Crook, a writer who lives in Austin.
Why, you might ask, were there camels at Camp Verde?

Camp Verde, around 1935

Camp Verde was established in 1856 – the same year Kerr County was organized. It had been the idea of Jefferson Davis, then Secretary of War in the Pierce administration, to use camels “for transportation purposes” across the deserts to our west.
According to Bob Bennett, in his useful history of Kerr County, Davis conceived this idea during the Mexican War of 1847-48, while serving with his father-in-law, Zachary Taylor.

Mowing "Sheep Meadow,"
in New York's Central Park
(centralpark.org)

A bill appropriating $30,000 for the purchase of the camels was passed by Congress in 1855, and a Navy store vessel, the “Supply,” was sent to obtain camels. The “Supply” visited Turkey, Egypt, Syria, and other countries, and brought 33 camels back to Indianola in April, 1856. Three Arab drivers came with the camels: Mico, “Greek George,” and Hadji Ali, known from here to Arizona as “Hi Jolly.”
The trip from Indianola to San Antonio took fourteen days; the camels were finally driven to their home at Camp Verde in August, 1856.

Camp Verde, by Bryden,
probably 1940s or 1950s

Lt. Edward F. Beale was ordered to open a wagon road from New Mexico to California, and chose camels for the task, hoping to demonstrate their “practicability.” On this journey the camels “carried water on the desert for the mules; they traversed stretches of country covered with sharp volcanic rocks without injury to their feet; with heavy packs they climbed over mountains where mules found it difficult to go, even with the assistance of their dismounted drivers, and to the surprise of all the party, the camels plunged into rivers without hesitation and swam with ease.”
Two things doomed the experiment to introduce camels to the American west: the Civil War, and the fact that most Westerners had no experience with (or use for) camels.
The war ended the experiment because those involved were called to fight. The Confederate soldiers at Camp Verde during the war saw the herd increase to 100 head, but little was done with them during that time.

Camel rides, Central Park
(centralpark.org)

Those who worked with the camels had little use for them. According to Bennett, “Horses and mules had an unconquerable fear of them; packers and soldiers detested them.” These feelings were probably because the soldiers and packers had little experience with the animals.
After the war, of course, anything associated with Jefferson Davis wasn’t given high priority by the federal government, so by 1869 the experiment and the fort were history.
In 1866, the federal government got “out of the camel business,” selling sixty head of camels to Bethel Coopwood in San Antonio, at a price of $31 each. Camp Verde was abandoned November 30, 1869.
As for the camels other than those sixty sold to Coopwood, local lore says many were simply released into the wild.
Whether the camels shipped to New York’s Central Park were from the herd owned by Coopwood, no one knows.
The February 13, 1868 issue of the New York Times had this on page 4:
“The young people who frequent the Central Park, and the musical amateurs also, very probably, will be glad to hear that the camels are coming, being at present on their way from the State of Texas, for the purpose of being domiciled along with the rest of the fauna now in the menagerie of our metropolitan pleasure-ground. These camels are native Americans, born of the animals imported from the East several years ago for some of the more desert tracts of the South and the West.”
The camels proved popular, and several photo postcards from that time show camels wandering around Central Park, or being fed by visitors. Not a bad gig for 14 Kerr County natives.
Until next week, all the best.

Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who would like to visit the grounds of Camp Verde. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times January 4, 2020.

Two books, filled with historic photographs of Kerr County, are now available. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Inside the one-room Turtle Creek School, Kerr County, taken many years ago.
Click on any image to enlarge.

This past week I attended a briefing about the progress being made in the construction of the new Hal Peterson Middle School being built on Loop 534 across from Tivy High School. This new middle school campus is going to be fantastic. Kerrville Independent School District voters overwhelmingly supported a recent school bond election, and the new middle school campus is one of the major building projects underway for Kerrville students.
Seeing plans for the modern, new school made me think about my own time on Kerrville Independent School District campuses, starting at Starkey Elementary School over 50 years ago. Quite a few things have changed since those days, and most for the best. (Air-conditioning, for one thing. I attended all twelve years of public school in classrooms lacking air-conditioning. I almost froze to death in classrooms during my first week at the University.)
Although some readers may not believe it, I did not attend the first schools in Kerr County. Those were built slightly before my time.

First Kerr County Schoolhouse,
now at the Y.O. Ranch

Many believe the oldest building in Kerr County is a former school building which originally stood in Center Point. Its historical medallion reads “First Schoolhouse. Built in 1852 by J. L. O'Conner at Center Point with cypress logs (12 by 14 inches) cut from nearby Guadalupe River. Mortar was a hand-mixed mixture of baked lime and sand dug from local shallow pits. The making of cypress shakes for roofing was first industry along Guadalupe in Kerr County. Cabin served as first school for pioneer Texas children in Center Point community in 1858. Moved to Y. O. Ranch; Restored.”
‘Restored’ might be better written ‘renovated,’ as the old cabin has been put to service as a guest cabin at the Y.O. Ranch under the name ‘Sam Houston.’
I visited the renovated schoolhouse at the Y.O. a few years ago. Even in its current form (with indoor plumbing!) it’s a far cry from modern school campuses.

Cypress Creek School

Our county was dotted with schools at the turn of the last century, and a few of the old schoolhouses still remain. I have happy memories of visits to the Cypress Creek School building, and the Turtle Creek School building, both of which serve as community centers today.
The Kerr County Album, published in 1986 by the Kerr County Historical Commission, lists a lot of rural schools I’ve never heard of, each serving a group of young students living far from town. There were schools at Pebble, the Auld Ranch, the Haby Ranch, the Reservation, Lane Valley, Buzzard Roost and Grape Creek.

Students at Lowrance School.
Note boys in the oak tree.

Herbert Oehler, one of my predecessors on these pages, wrote extensively about his time at the Sunset School, which was between Ingram and Mountain Home. He was a student there in the 1910s. I know about the Lowrance School because I have a photograph of students playing outside the schoolhouse.
Most of these schools were small and constructed of lumber; the Cypress Creek School is an exception, sturdily built from cut limestone. Most only had one room – the classroom. Many of the old schoolhouses have long since disappeared.
Of these rural Kerr County schools, only one survives as an actual school: the Divide School, which continues to serve students in western Kerr County, between Mountain Home and Garven Store, near the Y.O. Ranch.

Divide School, around 1999

My long-time friend Bill Bacon is superintendent of the Divide Independent School District, and he wears many hats in the operation of the school. Bill is not only one of the teachers there, but also the transportation director, and maintenance director, as well as “other duties as assigned.”
The Divide School has students from pre-kindergarten through sixth grade; the Texas Education Agency website says there were 17 students there last year, though I think there might be 18 this year.
The Divide School can trace its history back to 1882, when classes were held in the home of a teacher; in 1893 a one-room wooden schoolhouse was built near the intersection of Highways 41 and 83. The current building was built in 1936 on land donated by F. B. Klein family.
Educating young people is a noble calling, and students in each of Kerr County’s school districts are blessed with dedicated professionals. Schools and classrooms may have changed over the years, but the miracle of learning is the same today as it was in our county’s earliest days.

Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who is married to one of those miracle-working educators, the lovely Ms. Carolyn. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times January 18, 2020.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

The home of Aime Charles and Myrta Zoe Schreiner, as it appeared in August, 2018.
Click on any image below to enlarge.

This week, with some fanfare, the City of Kerrville, in a joint workshop with the board of the Heart of the Hills Heritage Center, announced their partnership in housing and creating a new history museum to tell the story of the Texas Hill Country. The museum will be housed in the house at 529 Water Street, which was built in 1909 for A. C. and Myrta Schreiner. It’s the old mansion between the Butt-Holdsworth Memorial Library and our print shop, at the intersection of Water and Clay streets.
At that meeting, I was asked about the history of the old house. Here’s what I found:
Aime Charles Schreiner was the eldest son of Charles and Magdalena Schreiner. He was born in 1862 in San Antonio; In 1885, he married Myrta Zoe Scott, and together they had a daughter, Hester, and two sons, Aime Charles Jr., and Whitfield Scott.

A. C. Schreiner, Sr., at his desk,
Schreiner Company, Kerrville

A. C. Schreiner was very involved in our community, serving on the very first Kerrville City Council in 1889. A. C. was a member of Kerrville's volunteer fire department, and he was a mason with the Kerrville Masonic Lodge.
He was also active in his family's business, serving as president of the Charles Schreiner Company, which was the Schreiner store; president of the Schreiner Wool Commission Company; organizer and president of the Kerrville Telephone Company; president of the board of trustees of Schreiner Institute, which is now Schreiner University.

The Schreiner home before
the current house -- 1899.

He and other members of his family gave the land for Kerrville's post office, which now is the site of the Kerr Arts and Cultural Center; gave the land for what is now the V. A. Medical Center; and he and his wife Myrta built and donated the First Presbyterian Church building, the portion which is now called the 'Schreiner Chapel.'
His business interests included ownership of the Blue Bonnet Hotel. In addition, he served as president of the Kerrville Amusement Company, which operated the Cascade Swimming Pool and the Arcadia Movie Theater.
Myrta Scott Schreiner was born in 1865 in Bosqueville, Texas. She moved to Kerrville around 1880, when her father, Captain Whitfield Scott, purchased the St. Charles Hotel.
She was a deeply religious woman and was among those who organized the First Presbyterian Church of Kerrville. She served her community in many ways, including as chairman of various committees of the local chapter of the American Red Cross. She was a charter member of the Kerrville Women's Club, serving as president several times. She directed the choir at the Presbyterian church, and was a soprano soloist there.

529 Water, in 1973

It is said she influenced Captain Charles Schreiner to establish what is now Schreiner University, and also convinced him to associate the new school with the Presbyterian faith.
The house at 529 Water Street was not the first home of A. C. and Myrta Schreiner on that property.
According to one source, originally there was a small frame home there, built on property purchased from the Quinlan family.
Later, a much larger frame home was built was built there, which faced down Water Street toward the Schreiner store. I have not found out exactly what happened to this building, but I can see it in photographs as early as 1896.
The building standing at 529 Water Street today was completed in 1909. One source says it designed by James Flood Walker, who had an architecture practice in San Antonio. One project designed by Walker was the St. Anthony Hotel in downtown San Antonio. Another source says the home was designed by Atlee B. Ayres, who served as the State Architect of Texas from 1914 to 1917. Ayres is known to have worked with other members of the Schreiner family on other projects, so it's possible he designed 529 Water Street.

529 Water, today

An interesting change happened between the 1896 home and the 1909 home: the current home doesn't face down Water Street, but rather the porches and front door face toward the rising sun, roughly toward the east.
A. C. Schreiner died at this home in 1935, at the age of 73. His widow, Myrta Scott Schreiner, also died at home in 1958, at the age of 93.
The house has had many owners since Myrta Scott Schreiner passed away there, including a couple, the Herman Beckers, who were Christian missionaries in China; A. P. Allison, who purchased it in 1959; the Harold Saunders family purchased it in the early 1960s and lived there; L. D. Brinkman purchased it in 1980; the last couple to live there, Walter and Barbara Schellhase, purchased the home in 1992.
In 2015, an anonymous donor purchased 529 Water Street from the Schellhases and donated the property to the City of Kerrville.
I’m thankful for the leadership of several folks in getting this museum project announced, including Dr. Bill Rector, president of the museum board; Mark McDaniel, city manager; two other members of the museum board, Linda Stone and Toni Box; and Scott Schellhase, the architect on the project.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who has fond memories of playing at 529 Water with his childhood friend Kay Ann Saunders. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times January 25, 2020.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Kerrville's Doyle School, May 1947
Click on any image to enlarge

Last Saturday, February 1, at 5 p.m., a unique celebration took place at the Doyle School Community Center, 110 West Barnett in Kerrville. The event was called “Living the History,” and featured a guest speaker, Sylvia Doyle, who is a descendent of the woman for whom the Doyle School is named.
The Doyle School Community Center is housed in the former Doyle School, which, until the mid-1960s, was a segregated school for Kerrville’s African-American students.
In working on the printed program for the event, I learned some new things about Annie Walker Doyle, for whom the school is named, and about her husband, Henry Sebastian Doyle.
The Doyle family came to Kerrville around 1910 because Henry was ill with tuberculosis. In those days many came to Kerrville seeking health. It was thought the dry climate here was helpful for tuberculosis patients.

The Doyle family,
Shreveport, 1903

She was a teacher, and he was a pastor, and they both were well-educated; Henry had a doctorate and Annie was a graduate of the Tuskegee Institute.
Soon after their arrival here, "she collected money and purchased three lots...and persuaded the members of the school board to donate an old school building for the purpose of establishing a school. She was the only teacher at the school, and served as principal for more than 25 years," according to the Kerrville Mountain Sun.
After Henry Doyle died in 1913, Annie Doyle stayed on and continued to teach. She was paid $85 per month to be the sole teacher at the school, which was considerably less than other teachers in the Kerrville school district made at the time.
She passed away in 1937, and in 1940 a married couple, B. T. and Itasco Wilson arrived in Kerrville to teach at the "Kerrville Colored School." One of the first things the Wilsons did was change the name to the Doyle School, in honor of Annie Doyle.
Here are some things I learned while working on the program for the celebration planned for February 1st:

Henry Doyle, back row, 2nd from left,
in London, 1901

Henry Doyle was very active in Georgia politics; in 1892 he made speeches all over the state for Tom Watson, a white candidate for Congress, running on the People’s Party ticket. At issue was the price of cotton, which many believed was held artificially low by brokers and middlemen, to the detriment of those actually growing cotton – the cotton farmers. That issue affected all cotton farmers, regardless of race, and having Henry Doyle, a black preacher, speak in support of Tom Watson, who supported reforms which would have helped all cotton farmers, proved to be dangerous.
More than once shots were fired at Henry Doyle as he spoke at political events. In one case the shot missed Doyle, but struck and killed a person standing nearby. Doyle received death threats, and, in one incredible event, Doyle was guarded by crowds of armed farmers – white farmers. In 1892 Georgia, that was remarkable. Tom Watson lost the election, and there is evidence the election was stolen from him by illegal means.

Annie Doyle, Teacher

However, Henry Doyle’s calling was not politics, though he remained active in that field. He was called to be a pastor, serving churches in several states.
In 1901, Henry Doyle was a delegate to the “Great Ecumenical Conference of Methodism,” held in London, England. A photo from that conference is about the only image of Henry Doyle I’ve found.
In 1895, in Alabama, Henry Doyle married Annie Magnolia Walker. Together they had four children; one son, Levi, died as an infant. When the Doyle family moved to Kerrville, they came here with their three surviving sons: Albion, Bertram, and Henry.
The couple lived in several places before coming to Kerrville, including Washington, DC; Augusta, George; and Shreveport, Louisiana. In each city, Henry Doyle served as a pastor. In 1908, he was a “candidate for the episcopacy;” I believe that means he was ordained as a bishop in the Methodist Episcopal Church that same year.
Sometime in this period, Henry Doyle contracted tuberculosis, and he and his family moved to Jefferson Street, here in Kerrville. Henry Doyle passed away in Kerrville in 1913.
Annie Doyle lived in Kerrville the rest of her life, passing away in 1937. She had a long life, living until the age of 68. She was a teacher most of her years in Kerrville.
Henry and Annie Doyle are buried in Shreveport, Louisiana.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who is fascinated by the stories of families who moved here because of tuberculosis, and how those families changed our community. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times February 1, 2020.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

One of the history resources I’ve really enjoyed exploring are the oral histories recorded and preserved by members of the Kerr County Historical Commission. (An oral history is basically a structured interview of a person, where they tell about their life, their community, or of a specific event.)
The KCHC has conducted many, many of these interviews, and a lot of them are now available online at the Portal to Texas History (texashistory.unt.edu), which is curated by the University of North Texas. Contributors from all over the state of Texas provide invaluable historical items, including many from our own community.
Over the past few weeks I’ve enjoyed reading several of these histories, often focusing on folks I know. It’s fascinating learning about people you’ve known for decades, and discovering something new about them.
Take, for instance, Raymond Hardee. I feel like I’ve known Mr. Hardee all of my life. I remember he was in Kiwanis with my father. His late wife, Billie, worked alongside my wife at Starkey Elementary years ago. I went through 12 years of Kerrville Independent School District classes with one of his sons, Todd; we graduated from Tivy together in 1979.
So I was delighted when I found the interview Mr. Hardee gave in 2016 to Francelle Collins and Bonnie Florie.
Mr. Hardee was born in Kerrville in 1938 at home. The authors write: “He was born at home because blacks were not allowed in hospitals at the time.”
Likewise, because of his race, he was not allowed to attend public schools with white children; he attended the Doyle School, a separate campus for African-American children, at the corner of Paschal and West Barnett. Though the school, through the leadership of its teachers, including Mr. and Mrs. B. T. Wilson, provided an excellent education – the very fact of segregation and its unequal facilities was shamefully wrong. Despite these obstacles, students at Doyle received a firm educational and social foundation, and still have a strong attachment to their school.
For many years Mr. Hardee was a local Allstate insurance agent, and later worked for the Kerrville Independent School District. He’s retired, now.
There is one story in the interview I found particularly interesting: the story of Raymond Hardee’s great-grandfather, Jack Hardy. (The spelling of the last name Hardy was later changed to Hardee.)
As Mr. Hardee told the story, “There was one Saturday around noontime, they had a sawmill down in Center Point, and [Jack Hardy] was walking home, and these Indians came by and captured him and took him with them as they raided ranches and homes. They also got a little white girl, he stayed with them for a while and he freed that little white girl, and they went around counties here robbing and killing and everything and he stayed with them so long, he learned the language.”
Jack Hardy’s story is recorded in several other places, too. It is featured in Andrew Jackson Sowell’s book “Early Settlers and Indian Fighters of Southwest Texas,” which was published in 1900.
“After the Civil War, when all the slaves were freed, Jack lived near Comfort, below Center Point. On one occasion, when he was about 12 or 13 years of age, he was sent to the mill with a turn of corn, and it was then the Indians got him.”
(I think this took place around 1870; at the time of the publication of Sowell’s book, Jack Hardy was 42.)
Because some of the Indian riders wore hats, Hardy thought they were settlers, and he continued on his way home from the mill unconcerned. “Up to this time he had never seen Indians,” Sowell reports. There were around 15 riders, with long hair, shields, bows and arrows. They captured Hardy, and initiated him to captivity among the Comanche “with a severe whipping with a live oak stick, the scars of which are still to be seen on Jack’s head.”
He was taken with the party on many raids, including one on the Terry family, along a tributary to Verde Creek. It was from this family the young girl, about 8 years old, was captured; her father was murdered by the Indians in the raid.
During his time with the Indians, Hardy saw many violent scenes. The raiding party seemed to be unconcerned with their own capture or even of being pursued.
Hardy eventually escaped through a brave act of deception while most of the raiders were involved in stealing a herd of cattle; he was saved by a kind rancher, John Dickson, who took the boy to his house, gave him warm clothes and plenty to eat, and saw to it he returned home safely.
Jack Hardy survived because he kept calm and avoided the ire of the warriors, and was very brave each time the Indians threatened him. And because he survived, he went on to found an important Kerr County family, the Hardees, who have made our community a better place.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who has enjoyed the many oral histories recorded and shared online by the Kerr County Historical Commission. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times February 8, 2020.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

The Famous Door Cafe historical marker; approved 2012, dedicated in 2015.
Click on any image to enlarge.

Kerrville, like most rural towns in the Texas Hill Country, is a collection of communities, subsets which each add to the depth, strength and diversity of the whole town. Sometimes neighborhoods become little communities within the larger town.
One such Kerrville community is located in the blocks surrounding what is now the Doyle School Community Center, a neighborhood which was originally home to many of Kerrville’s African-American families. Although these families were unfairly segregated from most areas of Kerrville life, including housing, certain businesses, and even hospitals, they built a solid community within those few blocks, complete with churches, a school, and businesses.
Years ago I wrote about a conversation I had with Clifton Fifer, a retired Kerrville educator, about his memories of growing up in Kerrville.
Fifer was born in the early 1950s, and was a student at Doyle before integration of all students; when integration took place, he was transferred from Doyle and graduated from Tivy High School, followed by college.
According to Fifer, there were four especially great things about growing up in Kerrville's black community: the people, the churches, the school, and the businesses in the neighborhood.
The people were "a friendly parental community," Fifer said. Everyone knew each other, and visited frequently as people walked in the neighborhood, leaning over fences to talk. Fifer remembers his childhood as one of safety and love from his neighbors.
The churches, too, played a role: both Mt. Olive Baptist and Barnett Chapel Methodist were actively involved in the community, especially with the young people of the neighborhood.

Kelley's Cafe, around 1934, which preceded the
Famous Door at 215 West Barnett.

And, of course, the Doyle School was so important, too. Besides the Wilsons, Fifer fondly remembered teachers such as Mr. Theodore Martin, Mrs. Walker (who later became Mrs. Griffin), Mrs. Nellie Crayton, and Lou Ella Cheeks (who had a doctorate).
Fifer remembered times when B.T. Wilson, who was the principal at the Doyle School, would come by Fifer's own classroom when Fifer was a teacher. "He'd ask what I was teaching my students, and I'd go into a long presentation of the lessons I was giving. When I finished, he'd simply say 'You've got to teach them how to learn!'"
And then there were the social places in the community -- the six or so "jute" joints which provided entertainment there, all in two-block area. They included the Famous Door, the Cabin, the Dream, Ella Phelps' place, the Green Door (which catered to kids), and the Pleasure Garden.
The Green Door served no alcohol, and attracted not only the neighborhood youth, but also families. The Pleasure Garden was famous for its barbecue.
Big acts came to these venues, including Gatemouth Brown, Big Momma Thornton, and the Ink Spots. Because some of these artists played at venues where Fifer's parents forbade him to go, sometimes Fifer and his friends would climb the chinaberry trees which were outside the surrounding fence, just to see the shows. "I only did it once -- that was off-limits to all kids."
In 2015, an historical marker was dedicated at one of these venues: The Famous Door, at 215 West Barnett Street. The marker reads:

The Famous Door, February 2020.

“The Famous Door served the African American community in Kerrville for seventy years as a café, grocery store, and most prominently, as a dance hall. Henry Kelley established his café and grocery in the 1920s, at a time when Jim Crow laws segregated and restricted all aspects of life. The café became an important part of the African American community, hosting a 1938 dance for Emancipation Day and a 1942 dance to benefit the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis (later the March of Dimes). Edward Bratcher, Sr., a prominent African American chef at the Bluebonnet Hotel, became manager and changed the name to Bratcher's Place. In 1944, property owner A. L. Lewis sold Bratcher and his wife, Cordellia Mills Bratcher, the restaurant and other adjacent property.
“With segregation excluding African Americans from music venues, entrepreneurs created an alternative known as the Chitlin' Circuit. Tour stops hosted local performers and nationally-known jazz, rock and rhythm and blues musicians. During this time, the restaurant began hosting musical acts and changed its name to the Famous Door Café, advertising as being "famous for friends, food and fun." As new musical trends developed, The Famous Door integrated its lineup, including groups from Kerrville and San Antonio often credited as early developers of psychedelic rock in the 1960s. Patrons later recalled The Famous Door as the first integrated business in Kerrville that welcomed all customers before it closed in 1996. Music provided a common language that helped bridge cultural and generational gaps.”
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who is thankful for the diversity of our community. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times February 15, 2020.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

Mount Olive Baptist Church and Barnett Chapel United Methodist Church,
the main churches in the Doyle School neighborhood, as they appeared in February 2020.
Click on any image to enlarge.

The neighborhood around today's Doyle School Community Center has a rich history, centered on the old Doyle School and the businesses of that area, including the Famous Door, which was a cafe and dance hall honored with an historical marker a few years ago. For many years this area was primarily an African-American neighborhood, segregated from the rest of the community, denied access to many important parts of our community, including health care, better education facilities, and access to many public businesses.

Mt. Olive Baptist

And yet, despite these obstacles, that neighborhood is remembered fondly by those who grew up there as a place of community and warm fellowship.
Over the past few weeks I've written about the Doyle family for whom the Doyle School is named, about a brave young man named Jack Hardy who survived capture by Comanche raiders, and about a few of the businesses that served the neighborhood.
There's another part of the history there I haven't written about, yet: its two main churches, Mount Olive Baptist Church and Barnett Chapel Methodist Church. I've found the story of these churches in the Kerr County Album, which was published in 1986 by the Kerr County Historical Commission.

Mt Olive historical marker

"Mount Olive Baptist Church was organized in 1902 by the Rev. G. W. Merriweather of San Antonio. The church met in a small schoolhouse located on Paschal Street where the Barnett Chapel now stands. The church later moved to the home of Mr. and Mrs. George Owens."
When the congregation built their first church building, it was "a simple building without a bell, pews, or musical instruments. Members would bring chairs from home to be used for church services."
Charter members of the church were Rev. Robert Evans, Mrs. Zula Blanks Gilliam, Mr. and Mrs. Fisher, Mrs. Henrietta Blanks Mosby, Mr. and Mrs. George Owens, Mitchell Grinder, Mrs. Celeste Campbell, Mr. and Mrs. Buck Elias, and Mrs. Helen Blanks Neal.
Over the years the church enjoyed milestones: its first Sunday School Congress, its first Young People's Union, and its first piano, which "was donated through the efforts of Mrs. T. H. Allen," and its first baptizing facilities, which "were donated by Mr. and Mrs. Mose Walton."
The white frame church building was replaced by a brick building in 1961, which included "central heat and air, modernized baptistry, spacious classrooms, kitchen facilities, a grand piano and a Hammond organ."
The congregation has been served by many pastors, including one, the Rev. C. V. Everage, who retired "after forty-one years of service," according to the Kerr County Album.

Barnett Chapel UMC

Barnett Chapel United Methodist Church began in 1896, according to Finding History In These Hills, a history blog by my friend Deborah Gaudier.
"Barnett Chapel United Methodist Church, 710 Paschal Street, was established in 1896. It is the oldest historically black church in Kerrville," Gaudier writes.
"Recognizing the need for a church and school, Jim and Josephine Barnett were instrumental in organizing the first religious observances, first in homes then in a small, one-room building in 1897. Later the congregation met in an old schoolhouse.

Barnett Chapel
historical Marker

"In 1898 they bought the land they still own today and have worshiped at this location continually since. The present house of worship was erected in 1963, adding a parsonage in 1976 and a multi-purpose building in 1982."
Early families who were members of Barnett Chapel include the Bensons, Fifers, Colemans, Butlers, Wares, Dimerys, Lotts, Knoxs, and Allens, according to the Kerr County Album.
Barnett Chapel was served by circuit-riding preachers until 1902, when Rev. W. M. Mosby became the first full-time minister at the church.
These churches are still a very important part of their neighborhood, and have served our community for more than a century.
Until next week, all the best.

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Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who has fond memories of attending services at each of these churches, though decades ago. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times February 22, 2020.

I have two books available, both filled with historic photographs of Kerr County. Both books are available at Wolfmueller's Books, Herring Printing Company, and online by clicking HERE.

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