Landmarks, Dallas County, Texas, 1926-1930

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(Updated June 7, 2004)

 

1928
TO OCCUPY NEW
RECORDS HALL
BY MID-JUNE

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REMOVAL OF COUNTY DEPART-
MENTS DELAYED BY AR-
RIVAL OF FURNITURE

     Because of the late arrival of a shipment of furniture, with which the new County Records building is to be equipped, that new building will not be formally opened until about June 15, County Judge F. H. Alexander said Saturday. The furniture has arrived and is now being installed. Only steel furniture is being placed in the building, which is fireproof throughout.
     The new structure, erected at a cost of nearly $800,000, including site and furnishings, is six stories with basement. It is located next to the Criminal Courts building on Main and Houston streets.
     Within ten days, the various administrative department of the county will begin moving into the new building. The old courthouse is to be utilized exclusively as a court building, except for the district clerk's office. It is necessary that the district clerks' office be located in the same building with the courts, as petitions and court papers are filed there.
     The two county courts at law, now located in the Deere building, across the street from the jail building, are to be moved into the old courthouse, as is Judge N. G. Williams' County Criminal court, now located on the first floor of the Criminal Courts building.
     Among those departments to occupy the new Records building are county clerk, county health officer, tax collector, tax assessor, county school superintendent, county engineer, assistant district attorney in charge of civil matters; county auditor, Commissioners' court and other minor departments.
     The grand jury quarters will remain on the third floor of the old courthouse.

- June 3, 1928, Dallas Daily Times Herald, Sec. II, p. 6, col. 1-2.
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REST CAMP FOR
CHILDREN WILL
OPEN MONDAY

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TUBERCULOSIS SOCIETY PRO-
VIDES FOR FRAIL YOUNG-
STERS AT BACHMAN'S

     With seventy children--boys and girls ranging in age from 7 to 12 years--as guests, the free rest camp, owned and operated by the Dallas Tuberculosis association, is to open Monday at the camp site at Bachman's dam, according to John W. Everman, president of the association.
     The camp has been conducted annually for a number of years, and hundreds of children have been helped to health by the association, through proper diet and exercise.
     No child with tuberculosis is admitted, and all of the small guests are carefully examined by the clinic staff of doctors.
     Children selected for the camp are chose because of being frail or under weight, and thus, more susceptible to the disease, or who come from tubercular parents, but themselves do not have the disease.

Careful Examination.
     "The association's medical director," said Mr. Everman, "in addition to examining each child before admission, makes weekly examination of each child to see that proper health improvement is going on, and also to guard against any disease creeping into the camp that might spread, and the success secured by this care is proven by the fact that no children's disease of any kind has ever crept into the camp, notwithstanding the many hundreds of children that have been cared for, and all were returned to their homes with improved health and gain in weight, and, in addition to this, the association arranges for the children, free of all expense, to have tonsils and adenoids removed and necessary dental work done.
     The children are selected from families who could not bear the expense of paying for a summer outing for their children. Treatment of the children at the rest camp consists of proper diet and ample rest periods. Meals are carefully planned, largely following national government health department advice, which makes special recommendations as to diet for gain in health and weight and, in addition to the three regular meals served daily, they are given milk between meals, averaging over one quart, per child, per day.
     The children are taught cleanliness and general health rules.

Equipment of Camp.
     The camp is equipped with a large swimming pool, where the children enjoy their daily dip. The camp has a library, representing gifts of good friends, picture books, principally, and when they take their afternoon rest in bed, each is furnished with a book to attract their interest.
     The camp is equipped with a merry-go-round that will accommodate fifty children, turn-table, numerous swings, see-saws and other play equipment. Some good friend presented the camp, two or three years ago, with a moving picture machine, and the moving picture companies of Dallas have combined, for several years (and will do the same this year), to provide the camp with sets of pictures, free, so that a picture show can be given every other night at the camp.
     The camp is provided with an electric washing machine and steam dryer, and, as the little children at the camp are very limited as to wardrobe, their day clothes are washed every night, and their night clothes washed every day to add to their comfort.
     The camp is supplied with adequate toilet facilities, has its own sewage disposal plant, all necessary repairs have been made on the camp building, camp equipage being painted, ground thoroughly cleaned and Dr. Carrick, who recently, personally inspected the camp, certified that it is in splendid sanitary condition.
     There were more than 250 children cared for last year, and the association returned to their homes, 650 pounds more of children than they received.
     The camp will continue in operation during June, July, August and the first week in September, and the Dallas folks are earnestly urged to come out to the camp and visit the children there. It is planned to take care of a total of about 250 children this summer, averaging about seventy children at one time. The association is a member of the Dallas Community Chest, receiving its financial support from that body.

- June 3, 1928, Dallas Daily Times Herald, Sec. III, p. 6, col. 1.
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STURDY HOME
OF COLONISTS
STILL STANDS

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NEW AND OLD TYPES IN DAL
LAS FURNISH INTEREST-
ING CONTRASTS

Photos by Miller

     Permanence and protection were [the lures] impelling the construction of early Texas buildings in protection from Indians was found necessary by the colonists and their rock homes were constructed on heavy foundations and with thick walls which would withstand the bullets of attackers.

The last home of the original Peters Colony, known as La Reunion,
at Westmoreland boulevard, near Colorado boulevard.


     In the section west of the Trinity river, near the point where Colorado boulevard and Westmoreland road cross, is the last remaining home of the Peters colony, the city of Reunion, a group of French settlers who settled there in 1850. The roof, which has been replaced several times, now sags and the door has fallen out, yet the walls [are] as sturdy now as in the early days of the French colony.

Top: the home of S. P. Cimiotti, 1131 Kessler boulevard, indicating a
true type of French renaissance. Bottom: the Spanish type home of
W. G. Davis at 1806 Colorado boulevard.


     In the new development in that section, embracing a portion of the colony territory, the French atmosphere has been carried out in the construction of a home of the Renaissance type, designed by modern architects and built of modern materials, affording an interesting contrast to the home built seventy-five years ago.

Reminders of Colonists.
     In other parts of the Stevens Park district, lie numerous other reminders of the early colonists, although increasing population and need for the land has resulted in the destruction of a number of [these] relics of the days before Dallas was a city and the year when John Neely Bryan was hunting squirrels east of the Trinity river.
     A memorial has been erected to the colonists, who optimistically established their little settlement in the section now chosen as a residence area of unusual attractiveness and beauty. There are natural-growth trees, many of which were on the spot when the colonists built their homes there, and many more, grown from the seeds of trees that have since died of old age and the onslaughts of the elements.
     The natural roll of the ground in that area afforded an opportunity for the development of winding boulevards and beautiful parkways and the subdivisions that have been developed there are planned by engineers who had that in mind.
     The subdivisions in the area include Stevens Park Estates, which occupies a portion of the old colony area; Kessler Park, Kessler Highlands, Kessler Square, Flander Heights, Evergreen Hills, Lafayette Heights, Beverly Hills, Westmont and others.

- June 3, 1928, Dallas Daily Times Herald, Sec. IV, p. 3, col. 1-6.
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HOPE COTTAGE, WHERE 1,500
BABES HAVE BEEN CARED FOR,
WILL OBSERVE ANNIVERSARY

     Commemorating its tenth anniversary, and in honor of the 1,500 foundling babies it has given status to, Hope Cottage will hold open house Sunday afternoon from 2 to 5 o'clock.
     As announced by the board of directors, the occasion, aside from its special significance, is, for the purpose of interesting the general public in the work of Hope Cottage, and to bring about a more accurate understanding of its part in the unified social welfare program of the city. Hope Cottage is the outgrowth of a perplexing condition that confronted social welfare workers during the war period, when the increased number of abandoned babies became alarming.
     Despite intense efforts of various groups, the situation continued to become despairing. A special group, headed by Mrs. Emma Wylie Ballard, present executive secretary of the cottage, and, at that time, director of the Dallas County Humane society, concluded that establishment of an institution for the temporary care of foundling children was the immediate need.
     On June 1, 1918, the cottage was formally opened in South Dallas. Within a brief period, the small residence proved inadequate and quarters were secured in the old Presbyterian Mission home, at that time, in disuse. Through various vicissitudes, the institution struggled along, managing somehow to launch into life, 542 babies during its first two years of operation.

Klan Built Home.
     The character of its work began to draw attention and interest from various quarters, and in February, 1922, the Ku Klux Klan donated $50,000 for a permanent home, the present one at 2301 Wellborn street. Although the new home solved many of the problems of housing--for Hope Cottage was now caring for an average of fifty babies--the financial problems which had nearly forced it to close several times, continued to be one of indefinite hazards. And, it was not until formation of the Community Chest, that executives and staff could devote their entire time and energies to the work for which it was organized.
     At the present time, about seventy babies are cared for during the early months of life. Later, after fullest investigation and planning, they are placed in homes where they will grow up with opportunities equal to the average child of family.
     Contrary to much existing opinion, Mrs. Ballard explained Saturday, Hope Cottage is not a home for babies. It is only a temporary shelter where they are kept until plans can be made for their adoption. Very often, this means long days, and even weeks, of tender nursing and medical care. The majority come to the cottage within a few hours of birth, many of them having only a slender hope of life.

Not All Abandoned Babies.
     Not all children that reach the cottage are nameless, Mrs. Ballard said. Quite a few are from parents physically or mentally incapable of providing for them. When such is the case, it is a decision that has come only after the most careful forethought and investigation. Perhaps one of the finest bits of the work at Hope Cottage is that done with mothers who are, at first, determined to give their babies away, she said.
     "We make very effort to keep mother and child together," said Mrs. Ballard, "and very often, we succeed in bringing this about by caring for the baby until the mother is established in such position as makes possible the relationship. But, there are the hundreds who have gone into foster homes. There is always one question asked by visitors with the manifestations of the greatest interest. 'How do adopted children turn out?' And the answer, according to Mrs. Ballard, is: "Just about like other children."
     There is a surprising disparity between the facts and general opinion as to mentality and congenital disease of Hope Cottage babies, she continued. Looking back over the years and a large volume of correspondence from foster parents, Mrs. Ballard states the conviction that nameless and foundling children, if given equal opportunity in home and environment with other children, make equally good citizens.
     "There is no solution for the problem of the foundling children, other than caring for them during the first few months of life and then selecting the right home for them" said Mrs. Ballard. "Occasionally, this means finding the mother and father and inducing them to care for the child. But, with the present attitude of society and the general incompetency of many parents. This is impossible and the only answer is the plan of Hope Cottage."
     There are a number of babies at the cottage now ready for adoption and the general public is invited by the board of directors to interest themselves in their behalf.
     The reception and open house today is planned also as a period of informing the public as to the problem, and how Community Chest dollars are being expended to meet it.

- June 3, 1928, Dallas Daily Times Herald, Sec. VI, p. 7, col. 4-5.
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Sgt. Sam Hill is shown in the picture above, sitting at his desk at the new police sub-station in Oak Lawn, just after taking charge at 3 o'clock Saturday afternoon. The sub-station is shown above. It was formerly used as a sub-station for the telephone company. (Photos by Paine)
POLICE OPEN
SUBSTATION

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THREE NEW SERGEANTS ARE
NAMED IN SEPTEMBER
POLICE DETAIL.

     Material changes in the uniform and plain clothes division of the police department were announced Saturday afternoon when the regular monthly detail for September was made known.
     Three additional sergeants were announced, the personnel of the squads for duty at the new Oak Lawn station assigned and one promotion from the uniform to the plain clothes division was made.
     W. D. Williams and A. N. Vittrupp, with Harry Trammell were named as police sergeants. Williams was assigned on one of the details at the Oak Lawn station.
     Harry Trammell was placed on the desk at the city jail office to fill the vacancy caused by the removal to Oak Cliff of Sergeant Dietz.
     Sam Hall, sergeant at Oak Cliff for many years, was transferred to the Oak Lawn station and Sergeant V. S. Carroll was assigned as the third sergeant at the Oak Lawn station.
     E. V. Bunch was promoted from the uniform division to plain clothes to fill the vacancy caused by the promotion of W. D. Williams.
     G. T. Totten and E. D. Wofford, A. S. Cole and A. E. Cody, C. R. Gallagher and W. P. Slaughter, comprise the emergency squads working during the three eight-hour shifts at the Oak Lawn station.
     Sam Hall took over the new station Saturday afternoon at 3 o'clock with Squad Officers Cole and Cody.

- September 2, 1928, Dallas Daily Times Herald, Sec. II, p. 1, col. 2.
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Entrance to New Supper Club

The front entrance to the $150,000 supper club that will be built on the Fort Worth pike, eight miles from Dallas, is shown in the above picture. Contract for the building proper has not been let. Foundation work has been completed, according to F. W. Day, who will be general manager of the club. The building will be of Moorish design. The architects are W. Scott Dunne and Herschell D. Smith & Son. The above sketch was drawn by Guy F. Cahoon.

WORK STARTS
ON HIGH-CLASS
SUPPER CLUB

______

INNOVATION FOR DALLAS IN
NIGHT ENTERTAINMENT
IS PROMISED

     Work has been started on a $150,000 exclusive high class supper club on the Fort Worth pike, eight miles from Dallas, it was learned Saturday. The club will be one of the finest of its kind in the Southwest, the builders say.
     The foundation for the building was completed last week. Contract has not been let for the building itself yet, but will be awarded soon, according to F. W. Day, who is to be general manager of the club. It may be let this week, he added.
     The club will be constructed by the Bagdad Enterprises, Inc., a Texas corporation, controlled by Eastern capital. Stock in the corporation may be sold to Dallasites later on, it was announced. The corporation is a subsidiary of a large Eastern company that confines itself to various theatrical lines.
     The name of the club is to be "The Bagdad Supper Club. It will deal with trade of only high class nature, according to Mr. Day. He added that it would be an innovation in forms of entertainment that Dallas has been receiving.

Moorish Design.
     The building will be of Moorish design, according to the builders. It will be a two-story structure, stuccoed on the outside. The building will have rounded spires, just as the old buildings of the Moors. It will be distinctively oriental in all of its features.
     The structure will be built on a four and one-half acre tract. It will be set back three hundred feet from the pike. A "horseshoe" driveway will be constructed to the building, in addition to a walk.
     In the center of the walk leading to the building, a large fountain will be constructed. A parking space will be provided for over three hundred automobiles around the building.
     A stage, dance floor, dining rooms and lounging rooms have been provided for in the plans. The dance floor will be one of the largest in the Southwest, says Mr. Day. Plans call for the main dining room to have a seating capacity of 450 persons.
     Mr. Day will leave for Chicago this week to obtain the services of a nationally known band for the opening of the club, and also to secure recognized entertainers. He said that a floor show would be obtained that consisted of from twelve to fifteen people.
     According to present plans, two shows will be staged each night, one about 6:30 p. m., during the dinner hour, and the other about 1 a. m. for the after theater crowd.
     The performers will be provided with living quarters at the club, so they may be available at any time for special occasions.

- September 2, 1928, Dallas Daily Times Herald, Sec. III, p. 5, col. 1-3.
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- March 20, 1948, The Dallas Morning News
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Many Dallas Landmarks
Declared Obliterated

     Returning to Dallas after an absence of thirty-two years, N. H. Goodwin, formerly manager of the American Press Association here, Saturday found that the city had developed so much that he was unable to find any of the old landmarks with which his memories of Dallas are associated. He made a tour of the city with E. S. Eberly, who was a bookkeeper for him when he was in Dallas.
     "Dallas has certainly changed and grown since I was here," he said. "My offices of the American Press Association at that time were in a building at the corner of Main and Akard streets, where the Southwestern Life Building now stands. On the third floor was the telephone exchange. I think six operators handled the entire Dallas traffic"
     Goodwin, who was connected with the American Press Association until it was merged with the Western Newspaper Union, is now retired and lives at Santa Anna, Cal. He recently made a boat trip to New York City and is now on his way back by rail to California.
      He will be in Dallas until Monday noon as the guest of Eberly at 5516 Tremont street.

- October 7, 1928, Dallas Morning News,
Local & Womens News Section, p. 1, col. 1.
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1929
Added June 7, 2004:

New Structure to Rise on Site of
Big Building of Early Dallas Days


$400,000 Home
To Be Built for
Dreyfuss Firm

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Six-Story Main and Er-
vay Structure to Be
Ready in 1930.

_______

$4,000,000 for Lease
_______

Lansing Building Site to
Be Used for Expand-
ing Clothing Firm.

     Lease for a period of ninety-nine years of the Lansing Building, four-story structure at the northeast corner of Main and Ervay streets, and plans for erection on the site of a modern five or six-story building for the use of his firm, was announced Saturday by Sol Dreyfuss, president of Dreyfuss & Son, Dallas clothiers, now located at Main and Murphy streets. The Lansing Building property was acquired on the long-time lease from Z. E. Marvin, James E. Forrest and John Sayeg, owners, at an aggregate consideration of about $4,000,000, Mr. Dreyfuss said.
     The new building to be occupied by Dreyfuss & Son, will be designed by a Kansas City architect, in association with a Dallas architectural firm, and details will be considered with the arrival here Tuesday, of a representative of the Kansas City firm. Tentative plans call for a fireproof building five or six stories in height, to cost $350,000 to $400,000, work on which, will be started by Sept. 1, with completion early in 1930.
     Mr. Dreyfuss also announced that his firm would add ladies' ready-to-ware, boys' clothing and shoe departments to its present lines of men's wear when the new building was occupied. Specially designed show windows will be a feature of the building, which will have a frontage of seventy-five feet on Main and 100 feet on Ervay street. Planned especially for the uses of the tenant, it will be one of the most modern merchandising establishments of its kind in the Southwest.
     Built about forty years ago, the Lansing Building, probably as well known as the Marvin Building, reflected the romance of the growth of Dallas and the vast enhancement in property values here within the last few decades. Middleton brothers built the structure at Main and Ervay, it then being the largest building in that part of the city, and one of the largest in Dallas. W. H. Middleton, 1700 South Ervay street, one of the original owners, said Saturday that the building cost new, about $38,000, and that the value of the land, now one of the most prominent corners in the downtown district, was then about $5,000. It is probably worth more than that per front foot now, exclusive of the building.
     The Middletons sold the building a few years after it was erected, and it passed into the hands of Ashford Hughes, then to Sol Blum, and later to Z. E. Marvin and associates, the name having been changed to the Marvin Building, by which designation the structure was known until the erection of the present Marvin Building at Main and Akard streets, when it was rechristened the Lansing Building.

- June 16, 1929, The Dallas Morning News, Sec. II, p. 1, col. 1.
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1930
DUST OF NEARLY FIFTY YEARS
RISES AGAIN AS MOVING DAY
AT OLD POST OFFICE ARRIVES

By ALEX ACHESON.

     The dust of fifty years ago drifted through the corridors of the "old postoffice" Saturday, as moving men began their task of transferring the various federal departments from that structure at Main, Ervay and Commerce, to the new United States postoffice and courthouse at Federal, Bryan, St. Paul and Ervay streets.
     As they moved some of the old desks and tables and ripped some of the carpets from the floors, the movers, experts in such matters, opined that some of the dust they encountered must have lain there since the old building was first put in use nearly a half century ago.
     Before Sunday morning, all of the equipment, furniture, records and the like, for the postal service will be in its new quarters. Others who were moving Saturday are Judge William Hawley Atwell and Mrs. Sara Menezes and E. Crippen, assistant United States district attorneys.
     The other departments will begin moving Monday, although some of them could have gone Saturday, had they had their drayage arrangements for that day.
     The last of the departments to vacate the old building will be the federal prohibition agents. They do not plan to leave before next Thursday or Friday, when the district director will move over from Fort Worth, and all of the agents will work out of one headquarters in the new building here.
     The first articles moved out Saturday came from the office of Assistant Postmaster Bruce Luna. His office was virtually all moved by noon. The handling of other postal equipment went more slowly, since there could be no interruption in the handling of mail.
     No definite date has been set for moving the liquor that the federal agents have seized in raids and stored away in the basement of the old building, United States Marshal Sam Gross said. There is a considerable quantity of this liquor, which must be kept until after the January docket for the United States district court for the northern district of Texas has been called.

Big Liquor Vaults.
     Then, it will be poured into the gutter.
     Mr. Gross said that he can store 50,000 gallons of liquor, if necessary, in the vault that has been specially constructed for this purpose in the basement of the new building. His only objection to the new vault, he said, is that it has only one opening, and he fears that there may not be enough ventilation in it when the pouring of liquor is started.
     This lack of ventilation can prove a rather serious menace, he pointed out, because of the fumes of the ether and other adulterants, which are in so much of the liquor. These fumes frequently make men engaged in pouring the liquor into the sewer, so sick that they have to stop work for a time.
     Antique dealers will, no doubt, want to bid on some of the things which the government is leaving behind in the old post office. Such office furniture as it will leave, will hardly hold their interest. But, some of the lighting fixtures might, if for no other reason than the one that it would be hard to find some of the globular effects of the nineties and early 1900's that are in the old building, outside of a museum. Then, too, there are several mantles in the building that are solid marble, of the carved ornate sort that were characteristic of so many "parlors" in the late Victorian era.

Pictures Are Problem.
     What to do with the pictures which have been accumulating on the walls of the old building as the decades passed, was a question over which one department head was puzzling Saturday morning. This accumulation begins away back in the time when even football teams wore whiskers, to say nothing of the mighty beards to be found upon the chins of military men and statesmen. It ends with, or rather includes, autographed likenesses of Coolidge and Hoover.
     Inasmuch as the walls of the new building are without moulding, in fact, provide nothing at all on which to hang pictures, this official was wondering what would become of this collection.
     The new federal building, begun about eighteen months ago, will cost approximately $1,500,000, including the site, which cost $240,000.
     The old building, the first unit of which, was completed in the eighties, and to which units were added from time to time, until early in this century, will be auctioned off at a minimum price of $1,250,000, the ground upon which it stands, included.

- November 16, 1930, Dallas Daily Times Herald, Sec. II, p. 1, col. 2-4.
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1930
Monument Site Where Saloon Walls Failed to Rise

(click here for enlarged view)
 "Confederate Monument Lot," a small, historically interesting triangle at Elm, Good and Monument streets, was deeded to the city in 1872, by Captain A. H. Shepherd, who came to Dallas from Georgia, as a memorial site for the Confederate dead. The captain, on his horse, "Blue Grass," ceremoniously carried three large stones to the place for corners. The Shepherd deed was not recorded at once, and the giver died suddenly. During the scramble for possession that followed, it almost became a saloon site and still remains undocumented.
STRANGE HISTORY OF SITE,
GIVEN TO CITY FOR SOLDIER
MONUMENT, PIECED TOGETHER
By Mrs. D. R. P. McDermett.

     I was asked by one who had heard something of a "Confederate monument lot," situated in East Dallas, to tell just where it is. Not knowing the facts myself, and, as the historian of Dallas Chapter U. D. C. No. 6, I began to investigate, not only for myself, but for all who are interested, in what was intended as a memorial to the Confederate dead.
     When one begins to explore into the past, made dim by years, and what may really be indifference, though not intended as such, one marvels that so many fine intentions and gifts are neglected and so hidden by the lapse of time to be often lost entirely. But, good luck came to my help in a mine of rich information in some priceless old scrap books of Misses Lizzie and Marian Brown, daughters of the late Major Henry Brown. It is like opening the sepulchres of past events and peoples long since gone from the walks of men. One could browse in those old scrap books for days, digging out gold nuggets of valuable information. What a legacy they would be to the Dallas Historical society!
     This is the story of the monument lot. And, I shall quote from the Dallas papers, the facts published then:

Deeded Lot for Monument.
     About 1870 or 1871, Captain A. H. Shepherd, a bachelor from Georgia, came to Dallas. His home was in the center of the block between Live Oak and Bryan streets -- Pearl street on the east and Olive street on the west -- now occupied by an automobile company. On the corner of Live Oak and Pearl streets, Major J. H. Brown lived. He and Captain Shepherd became very close friends. The old-timers remember Captain Shepherd, a fine, cultured gentleman, and seen every day on his fine steed, "Blue Grass," for he rode like a cavalier. He lived in his small house alone and went out for meals. His pleasures were in congenial friends.
     In 1872, he subdivided some property in to lots and blocks. He deeded a triangular lot on Elm, Good and Monument streets as a site for a monument to the Confederate dead. The lot has 36 feet, 6 inches on Good, 20 feet, 8 inches on Elm, 41 feet, 2 inches on Monument street. J. J. Good and Captain Shepherd gave the ground for a new street and Captain Shepherd named it Monument street. It is just the length of the lot. The paper stated "Captain Shepherd carried three large stones on his horse, 'Blue Grass,' and placed them at the three corners."
     The trustees of the lot were Major J. H. Brown, J. J. Good, Captain Alexander Harwood and Wallace Peak. Major Brown was president, Mr. Harwood, treasurer, and Mr. Peak, secretary. It seems the deed was not recorded at once. The details, I will omit, though, I read them with keenest interest. After Captain Shepherd's death, his executor being ignorant of a former deed, purchased from Captain Shepherd's heirs, the triangle lot for $25, and when he went to record the deed, Captain Howard told him of the first deed, whereupon, the executor said he would rather lose the $25, than to contend for it. He died suddenly, but the deed he held was not destroyed. His successor again sold the lot to other parties and a long litigation followed. In the meantime, all the trustees died, except Major Brown.
     I quote from The Dallas Times Herald, W. O. Sterrett, editor; C. F. Gilbert, manager:

Dismissed in Court.
     "In the district court this morning, the famous suit of E. M. Thurman vs. J. H. Brown, the only surviving trustee, involving the 'Confederate Monument lot,' at the junction of Elm, Good and Monument streets, and which has been pending since August, 1884, was called for trial when the plaintiff dismissed the suit, leaving the monument title without a cloud to appoint trustee, in the place of Messrs. Shepherd, Good and Peak, deceased, when immediate steps will be taken to build the monument."
     Later, the paper stated:
     "June 5th, 1888.
     "Judge Aldridge has appointed Messrs. John M. Stemmons, David A. Williams, W. H. Gaston, E. G. Bower, Ben M. Good and Ripley Harwood, who, with Major J. H. Brown, the only surviving members, will constitute the trustees of the Dallas Confederate monument lot. They will organize, at once, and take steps to build the monument."
     During the scramble for the possession of the lot, it was leased to a party who took chances on building a house to open a saloon. The foundation was made and about one foot of the wall erected, when word came to Major Brown what was being done. The next morning, the papers carried the following:
     "Friday, May 4, 1888.
     "With his battering ram, Major Brown knocked down the walls of Jerico. The question is whether the monument lot is to be occupied by a saloon or a monument. Despite the fact the rays of the sun streamed down like blasts from a furnace, the old veteran, his gray locks floating in the breeze, worked for nearly three hours, until not one brick was left upon the other, Major Brown's friends justified his act under the recent act of the court."
     Those trustees were among the finest of Dallas. They are all gone now.
     I stood beside that little triangle a few days ago. It is still unmarked. Captain Shepherd's dream has never come true. And, I wonder, as I write of these things, why he did not put the marker there. He must have left ample means to have put a modest monument in memory of his comrades who went to war, as did he, and never came back. And, after all the years that have passed, as I look on that little plot of ground, I felt a reverence for the gift, for the spirit the trustees (though the work was never done) to hold the ground sacred, but most of all, honor to the one (Major Brown) who hazarded his own life that hot day, May 4, 1888, to clear the ground of a proposed evil. This is the sad story of "The Confederate Monument Lot." The two last trustees -- Captain W. H. Gaston and Ripley Harwood, transferred the deed to the city of Dallas, who now becomes trustee, guardian or custodian. Some day, the city may mark the spot.

- November 16, 1930, Dallas Daily Times Herald,
Feature Sec., p. 3, col. 1-6.
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