As we look at John Fulbright, we are looking at a man who followed his father’s patterns. Were he alive today, John would not be at our reunion. He would be somewhere looking for something better and not interested in family tradition or the past He would have had his family with him. They moved together where opportunity was. We of later generations look back at tradition and history and attempt to preserve the past. Not Johan Wilhelm or his sons. Never! His father moved from Germany to Pennsylvania. While a boy, John moved from Pennsylvania to the Piedmont of North Carolina. From there, he moved to western North Carolina’s beautiful Smoky Mountains. Land was abundant and relatively inexpensive. When Thomas Jefferson made a daring move and signed off on the purchase of millions of acres of land at a cost of less than three cents an acre, John moved! He went to Tennessee and then to Missouri. Such a move could mean that the relatives left behind would never be seen again.

John was looking for more. More land, more money, and who knows what else. Watch what his sons do later. They follow the pattern. Not until they settled much later with large holdings and large barns, did the movement slow down and then not until they were spread from near Waynesville, Missouri to the Red River Valley of Texas. Only then did John’s progeny begin to stay in one place and develop the sense of a proud tradition.

It was in 1803 that President Thomas Jefferson paid an infinitesimally small sum for the Louisiana Purchase which was soon to be explored by Lewis and Clark who left St. Louis, Missouri in May 1804 for their famous exploration. They returned in the late fall of 1806. Word spread! The land was extremely good in places like present day Missouri. They had known that before, but now that land was available for a very reasonable cost and backed by valid land grants, protected by the full faith of the United States government. No longer were land grants questionable and unreliable. The land would be surveyed and laid out in plats. Louisiana, Missouri, Arkansas, Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska and Oklahoma and most of Kansas, Colorado, Wyoming, Montana and Minnesota were parts of this purchase, at an average cost of about three cents an acre.

That is motive to come to the new area! Frederick Jackson Turner said that such areas host different groups of people at different stages in history. From explorers, trappers, traders, through "maturing agricultural stages. . .", he wrote. Our family fit into his scheme of the frontier. They were those who came just after the initial exploration was made, the Indians pacified, and the situation stabilized. In other words, conditions were right to farm and carry out business.

John and his sons were farmers, traders, and speculators. They bought cheap and sold as high as they could. They bought far more land than they could farm. It was for investment and for speculation. They farmed, but they were not wedded to the land. It was an investment as much as a place to live. They traded livestock. They moved when the prospects in a new area looked good.

John Fulbright’s history begins before John Fulbright was "a little grain of corn" to use my Grandfather C.R. Fulbright’s expression. It begins with his family coming to America. The full story is too long to tell here! For now, let me say that his father arrived in America in 1740. His mother arrived in America with her family in 1732. All of us who are John’s descendants have an interest in the story, and those of you for whom he is an uncle have an interest as well. He is an interesting figure.

John was born on November 20, 1757 in Pennsylvania and baptized on November 29th at the Tohickon Reformed Church in Pennsylvania. His father had been an American for 17 years, when John was born. Northampton was a settled area with settled parish churches and the kinds of records one comes up with in such a situation. It was north and a bit west of Philadelphia. His father and mother probably moved from Northampton County, Pennsylvania in about 1769.

Before he was a land holder, he may have fought in the Revolutionary War. He was 24 years old. No military service records have yet been found. One family story is that he fought in the Battle of Cowpens. I don’t know the truth of the story, but it is possible, because this battle was fought to keep the British from coming across the South Carolina border into North Carolina. The battle was a huge success for the colonials. On January 17, 1781, they encountered Lord Cornwallis’ forces. General Daniel Morgan led about 1,000 colonials against 1,150 British troops. With loses of only 72 men, they managed to inflict 600 casualties. It is entirely possible that a short term of service, as was typical of the day, might have been to protect the integrity of the colony.

Incidentally, Jacob Fulbright claimed to have served in the Revolutionary War, a claim I believe. He was turned down for a Revolutionary War Pension, but his cousin Jacob Shook vouched that he was with him. I doubt Jacob Shook would have lied for Fulbright, or for any one else! (More of that story later.)

He did something else before he owned land. He married Elizabeth Coalter in 1784. He married his wife one year after the Treaty of Paris, the treaty which officially ended the Revolutionary War, was signed, and he married her four years before the Constitution was ratified. Elizabeth was younger than her husband but by only five years. She is reported to have been a cousin of Daniel Boone. It is probably a true story, but we do not have written documentation for it. Remember, when we talk about John’s life, we are often talking about colonial history. (As to the Boone story, my father, my grandfather, and my great-grandfather Fulbright told that story. They never questioned the truth of the story. It was something which was simply "fact" in their minds. It qualifies as oral history until we can document it. Attempts to do this which are known to me have fallen short of the needed documentation.)

After Grandfather Johan Wilhelm (John William) had been in Pennsylvania for 29 years, the family settled around present day Hickory, North Carolina. John first bought land in the area in January, 1790 with a purchase of 100 acres on the south fork of the Catawba River for 50 shillings. Later, he added to this holding another 150 acres in March, 1792. There are later records of his owning land on Lyles Creek which he purchased in 1793. It was on Lyles Creek, adjoining his father’s land and his own land. He would have been 36 years old by the time he bought land in the vicinity, and he would have been 37 before he purchased his second plot, which brought him to a total of 425 acres. Like his father before him, he probably worked and saved money to buy his land. No credit card mentality is to be found in the North Carolina of his day! His father waited for 29 years after coming to America before buying a significant amount of land in America!

Following the pattern that he was helping to refine, John followed his cousin Jacob Shook to the mountains of North Carolina. Jacob was there by 1795 or earlier.

John left everything he had in Lincoln County (a Piedmont county) and moved to Buncombe County and later to Haywood County, North Carolina. Today, we are talking about present day Clyde, Canton, and Waynesville, North Carolina.

Grandfather did not fool around. Perhaps, it was because he had money from his prior holdings to work with. Perhaps it was because he knew exactly what he was doing, having done it before. After all, he was 42 years old now. He bought a lot of land, beginning in 1799. He bought the following land: 300 acres from John Strother, in 1799. 150 acres on the Pigeon River in 1801. 250 acres on Hominy Creek in 1802 and 200 acres on Hominy Creek in 1804. 100 acres on the Pigeon River in 1804. 250 acres on Hominy Creek in 1806. All of this was in the mountains of western North Carolina. It is a total of 1250 acres.

Was all of the land his? I have to say that I do not know, because there was more than one John Fulbright. I can say that what was sold by "John Fulbright" at about the time our John left for Tennessee and Missouri roughly matches this acreage. Much if not all of it was in what became known as Fulbright Cove. Businessman that he was, he began selling land in Fulbright Cove to other early families such as the Smathers family.

John owned enough land in the cove, which is a valley in North Carolina that it was called Fulbright Cove and later named Dutch Cove, as many, many German families moved into the area.

I noted in my introduction that John left North Carolina for new land in the Louisiana Purchase. By 1815 or 1816, the new territory had been surveyed and laid out into plats of land which could be purchased by eager settlers. He was 57 years old, when he went on his latest adventure, but one must remember that John now had other issues with which he had to deal.

His family was growing, and the boys needed land of their own which was now becoming more expensive and more crowded. My own grandfather Daniel (son of John) had purchased his first land in Fulbright Cove, but he and the other boys needed to make their mark and raise their families. The west had to look good to them. My grandfather Daniel left only 129 acres in North Carolina and was to later own 1400 acres of far better land in Missouri! My reading of the evidence is that all the boys did well!

At 30, William’s clock was ticking. On the frontier, a man was no longer youthful at 30. David at 16 was not yet married but by frontier standards would have expected to be soon. My grandfather, Daniel had a small piece of land on Hominy Creek.

They moved. There history becomes very murky, and much research needs to be done. There are reports that they were in Henry County, Tennessee. These come from poll tax records.

I really cannot add to the words of John Fulbright who wrote the original edition of the Fulbright Miscellany:

"About 1815, John Fulbright moved to the newly acquired Louisiana Purchase section, and to a district which later became Washington County, Missouri. Here, on Coataway or Huzzah Creek, he lived the balance of his life and here he died, and was buried on the banks of Huzzah Creek, which is close to De Soto, Missouri. He has the remarkable distinction of having made his own coffin and chiseled his own grave from a solid rock on the hillside, and he was buried in these shrouds of his own handiwork."

The pattern continued with his sons, Uncle John and Uncle Billy. They came to Springfield. in 1829, just about the time of the pacification of the Delaware Indians. In "The History and Directory of Springfield and North Springfield" by George S. Escott (1878), he writes, "The probable removal of the Indians from Southwest Missouri, about the year 1830, seemed to be the signal for quite a large influx of pioneers."

They came once the conditions were ripe for settlement and the attendant farming, trading, and business. Both John and Billy, sons of John and Elizabeth, came to Springfield. Brother-in-law A.J. Burnett came to Springfield and ultimately moved to the area of Jacksonville, Oregon.

My own grandfather Daniel Leeper claimed land, about 1400 acres of it not far from Lebanon, Missouri. He stayed, farming and trading livestock.

David or Judge Fulbright moved to Texas, and continued the family pattern, as he established himself in the Red River Valley of Texas where a small town named after him, Fulbright, Texas. Fulbright is today predominantly a black community.

Martin Fulbright settled around present day Waynesville, Missouri and later moved with his children to Texas.

Written and presented by David L. Fulbright. Son of Daniel Leeper Fulbright. Grandson of Charles Ruby Fulbright. Great Grandson of Daniel Leeper Fulbright. Great Great Grandson of Daniel Fulbright. Great Great Great Grandson of John Fulbright.