Memoirs of Linn A. Boyd as told to Miss Edith Slaten — April 20, 1957

Wichita County Pioneer

Miss Slaten: Mr. Boyd, a group of our citizens have decided they would like to record a lot of historical information of some of our early settlers and people who have had an important part in the development of Wichita Falls. Your family are among this list, therefore, we would like to get some information: First, on your back ground; where did grand parents live and give us their names and such brief information as you can with reference to them.

Mr. Boyd: My paternal grandfather was John Boyd, and grandmother was Amanda Wortham, of Tehuacana, Limestone County, Texas, near Waco. My grandfather is buried there. My grandmother is buried in Riverside Cemetery.

My father and mother were James P. Boyd and Lelia Stroud. They were married in Groesbeck, Texas, on February 24, 1881, by Rev. W.E. Beeson, President of Trinity University. Both are buried in Riverside Cemetery in Wichita Falls.

My maternal grandfather was Logan A. Stroud, who had lots of land in Limestone County between Mexia and Waco, and was one of the largest slave owners in the South during the Civil War. He contributed financially to Trinity University.

Mrs Slaten: About when did your family move to Wichita Falls?

Mr. Boyd: It must have been about 1882. My father and mother and my grandmother, Amanda Wortham Boyd, came from Limestone County.

Q: What business was your father engaged in?

Mr. B: He was a lawyer.

Q: How many children did your parents have? Give names and addresses.

Mr. B: They had two boys and a girl. My brother Craig was born in Limestone County and died her in 1948, and is buried here. I was born in Wichita Falls on April 13, 1884. My sister, Mary Boyd Woods, was born here in 1887, and now lives in Dallas.

Q: Mr. Boyd, I think you are now a single man.

Mr. B: Yes

Q: Mr. Boyd, was Mr. Linn Boyd of Kentucky, who was speaker of the House of Representatives of the United States, related to you?

Mr. B: He was my great uncle. I was named after him. He was the brother of John Boyd, my grandfather. His old home, Oak Lands, built in 1833, is now a historic shrine in Boyd County, Kentucky, which county was named for him.

Q: Mr. Boyd, I am informed that your grandfather, Mr. John Boyd, gave the land for the original site of Trinity University at Tehuacana, Texas.

Mr. B: That is right. He gave the land and, while the first buildings were being built, the old John Boyd house was Trinity’s first home. Tehuacana was on a hill known as Tehuacana Hill; there was a 40’ drop, and you could see the city of Waco from the University. Trinity came into being at Tehuacana, Texas, on April 22, 1869. After 33 years at Tehuacana, Trinity was moved to Waxahachie, Texas, where it remained until, 1924; it was then moved to San Antonio. On May 13, 1952, Trinity was moved to its new campus adjoining Brackenridge Park.

Rev. W.E. Beeson, a Lt Colonel in the Confederate Army, was the first president. My father and mother were both graduates of Trinity; my father having a degree in law.

Q: Mr. Boyd, I am informed you are the oldest living citizen who was born in Wichita Falls. Do you think that is correct?

Mr. B: I have been told that I am, but I don’t know for sure.

Q: Mr. Boyd, will you give us some of the early history of Wichita Falls and the business people who were here when you first remember?

Mr. B: We lived at 1502 Travis Street and I was born there April, 13, 1884. Judge Barwise told me many times that he was at our house the day I was born and was the first person to see me after I was born. I remember him well. He was a great and good man; he loved people and was always smiling and friendly. He was a leader in Church and civic affairs. He was the second county judge and held other public offices. He was really the founder of Wichita Falls. He told me that when he first came here, he went to 1100 Austin Stree, where he eventually built his home, and could see the valley to the east and north, also Holliday Creek. He could see where Holliday Creek ran into the Wichita River.

He told me he hauled freight from Gainsville to Wichita Falls when there was no railroad to Wichita Falls; and on one of his trips, with his team of oxen, he brought a young man from Henrietta to Wichita Falls and let him live in the Barwise home for two years. That young man was Robert E. Huff, of Bellbuckle, Tennessee, who had a degree from a law school in Tennessee.

Q: Mr. Boyd, were you living here at the time of the City National Bank robbery?

Mr. B: Yes, I was going to school on 13^th street.

Q: Can you tell us anything about it, the circumstances and results?

Mr. B: I remember that on the day of the robbery, February 25, 1896, they let out school and we boys went to town. I saw somebody on a stretcher or cot who was being moved from the bank. That proved to be Mr. Frank Dorsey, who was Cashier at the bank, and had been shot and killed by one of the bank robbers.

Q: Was P.P. Langford working for the bank at that time?

Mr. B: Yes, he was shot in the hip. Mr. Frank B. Hardesty was Deputy Sheriff, and the bandits — Kid Lewis, about nineteen years old, and Foster Crawford, about thirty years old — shot Hardesty, but hit a big silver watch he had in his vest pocket and flattened it out. He showed us boys the watch.

Q: After the bank robbery, the fellows escaped. Do you remember any of the details about that?

Mr. B: They went down the east side of the Wichita River and, when they got three or four miles from town, down Turkey Bend, they crossed over to the north side of the river. The Rangers, headed by Captain McDonald, had been here for several days because of rumors that the bank was to be robbed, but, when nothing happened, they decided they were no longer needed. They were on the train leaving, when they got word of the robbery and, at Bowie, they caught the train coming back here.

Horses were waiting for them here. They rode about eight miles from town and located the robbers in a thicket down by the river bridge. I don’t know the particulars about how they captured them, but they brought them back, put them in jail and left town. That night the mob broke into the jail and got the robbers and lynched them on the big telephone pole at the corner of the City National Bank, Seventh and Ohio Streets. I didn’t see them, but my brother went down and he saw them hanging on the telephone pole.

My first job was working after school and on Saturdays for T.B. Noble, who had a confectionary store, bottling works and candy factory. Later I was a Bill Clerk for J.A. Kemp Wholesale Grocery. When they sold out to Coleman, Lysaght and Blair, the new firm had a bill clerk but promised me a job if I would learn shorthand.. I went to Dallas and learned to write the Gregg System of short hand, but never could read it. However, when I came home, Mr. Wiley Blair, gave me a job anyhow and I would work every night till twelve o’clock. Then I worked for the City National Bank. My job was to keep General Ledger, send out the checks and look after the lock boxes. Oral Jones and Tom Reese were tellers then.

I knew Mr. Langford well. He told me that some years before my father had suggested to him that he run for County Treasurer, but he hesitated to enter the race because there were already four candidates. My father promised to get him the votes, so he ran and was elected. Mr. Kemp then put him in the City National Bank, in order to get the county money on deposit. He stayed in that bank forty-five years and was considered all over the state as a great banker.

When a man tackled him for a loan, Mr. Langford would often tell him the bank didn’t have the money but he, himself, would let him have some money; however, the note was always made to the bank. He was a very popular man.

During my connection with the bank, Mr. Kemp had a man from Clinton, Missouri, and was dickering with him to get a packing house built across the river. The man told Kemp that he knew a man in Clinton who was a good banker and the City National Bank needed him. Mr. Kemp said, "Send him down". The man in question was C.W. Snider, who was with the City National Bank until his death a few years ago.

About 1911, I ventured into the real estate business and made $4000 the first month. There was a tract of land belonging to the Truehart Estate, between Tenth and Eleventh and Baylor and Denver streets. The price was $10,000. It would cut up into twelve lots on Tenth and twelve lots on Eleventh Streets. I asked Mr. J.C. Ward if he would like to go into the deal and furnish the money and we could make a good profit. I showed him the lots and told him we could sell the ten inside lots on Tenth for $1000 each and the two corner lots for $1200 each; and the ten inside lots on Eleventh for $700 each and the two corner lots for $800 each, making a total of $21,000, of which $11,000 would be profit. Mr. Ward was a conservative man. He took me to Mr. Kemp’s office and told him what we wanted to do and that we wanted to borrow $10,000. Mr. Kemp said "Why not let me in on it and split it three ways? I will carry the notes with one-third cash and one-third in one and two years". This is what we did. I had Mr. L.C. Hinckley, county surveyor, survey and plot the lots. I sold eighteen and Mr. Ward, six. My part of the proceeds was $4000. I continued to make money until 1920 or 1921, when I went down with the busted boom.

When I went into the real estate business, William N. Bonner was a stenographer for Carrigan and Montgomery, and he was getting a license to practice law. We were brother Elks and officers in the lodge at the time. Bill suggested to me that we rent some offices from J.C. Ward, who was completing the Ward Annex on Eighth Street. He saw Mr. Ward and rented six rooms. I told Bill we did not need six offices, that all I needed was desk space. Bill said "You have to put up a front; you are just as successful as you look and act".

Judge William N. Bonner became the youngest District Judge in Texas, when appointed Judge of the 78^th district court here. Today he is president of the Harris County Bar Association in Houston.

Mr. J.C. Ward must have come here about 1882 or 1883. He and a Mr. Stanley owned Red Store on Eighth and Ohio Streets. At that time, there was no railroad west to Seymour or Abilene, and Wichita Falls was the trading center in every direction for fifty to one hundred miles. Wichita Falls was the terminus of the Fort Worth and Denver Railroad. When the railroad was extended to Harrold, many who lived here moved to Harrold to take advantage of the boom. When the railroad went farther west, Harrold became a wide place in the road.

Among those who moved to Harrold was Mr. P.P. Langford, who was a bookkeeper in Mr. Ward’s store. Shortly before that time, C.E. Reid was a clerk in the same store and he wanted to make the race for county clerk, but didn’t have sufficient money. Mr. Langford loaded him $200 and Mr. Reid was elected. Mr. Langford and his brother, who had come from South Carolina, opened a livery stable in Harrold and later his brother was drowned while swimming in a tank. When the boom in Harrold busted, Mr. Langford and another man went to Anadarko, Oklahoma Territory, and opened a livery stable there. They ran out of money and Mr. Langford returned to Wichita Falls on a black horse, which was all he had left of the livery stable. He said he was hungry and his clothes were well worn. He slept in the County Clerk’s office several nights, then Mr. Reid said, "Lang, why not go to work for me in the County Clerk’s office? You write a beautiful hand and the recorded instruments would look good." Mr. Langford accepted the job and the Clerk’s records are full of his handwritting.

Shortly after my parents came to Wichita Falls, Robert E. Huff and my father became law partners and were probably the first law firm here. Mr. Huff was the first County Attorney of this county. Then they dissolved partnership and in 1884 my father ran against Mr. Huff in the second election for County Attorney and was elected. My father received 177 votes to Mr. Huff’s 125 votes. Two years later, Nat Henderson showed up and he told me the first man he met when he got off the train was my father. The records show that, st the third election, Mr. Henderson ran against my father for County Attorney and my father received 195 votes to Mr. Henderson’s 97.

Q: Mr. Boyd, I understand that you were a small boy, only about nine years old, when your father was shot and killed by a lumber dealer. Would you care to tell us any of the circumstances about that?

Mr. B: A suit was brought against my father by the lumber company for an account of $17, for lumber used in the Cumberland Presbyterian Church; my father probably guaranteed payment of the account, for I know that both my father and mother helped build the church and solicited funds for that purpose. After the suit was filed, my father went to see the lawyer handling the suit; an argument probably followed, and my father was shot and killed by the lumber dealer named Offutt on January 18, 1894. He was buried January 20, 1894, in Riverside Cemetery here.

In 1893, my father had built a fine two-story home at the corner of Tenth and Brook streets, on six acres of land bounded by Brook and Baylor and Tenth and Eleventh Streets. In December of that year, we moved from 1002 Burnett Street to the new home — just before my father was killed. I was nine years old; my brother Craig was eleven, and my sister Mary was about seven.

When we moved into our new home on Tenth and Brook Streets, there were no housed between our home and the schoolhouse on Thirteenth Street. The day of my father’s death, my brother Craig and I, and Mark and Sam Moore, sons of Sheriff R.M. (Butler) Moore, walked from school to our home, and that was when I learned that my father had been killed.

Q: Mr. Boyd, you have seen Wichita Falls grow from a frontier settlement to a modern city in one life span. Would you care to comment on how and why this came about?

Mr. B: Wichita Falls has gone forward fast because she had men here who had vision to go forward and who bet all they had on Wichita Falls. First there was Judge Barwise, her first permanent citizen. My vocabulary is inadequate to express the great admiration I have and always have had for Judge Barwise.

Another was Joseph A. Kemp, a great and good man, who had vision for Wichita Falls. From the time that he and Mrs. Kemp came here in 1883 from Clifton, Bosque County, Texas, Wichita Falls was known as a city with a future. I knew a lots about Mr. Kemp as I worked for him in the wholesale grocery, and later, in the City National Bank of which he was president. This bank and the Panhandle National Bank, which later became the First National Bank, were both organized by Colonel James. The First National Bank was controlled by R.E. Huff and associates; the City National being controlled by Mr. Kemp and associates.

Then there was J.C. Ward, mentioned elsewhere in the narrative, and J.C. Hunt, who was a prominent grain man, and was active in civic and religious affars. There were numerous others who showed up on the scene.

I have seen the wheels of fortune turn fast her in Wichita Falls. We had had booms — and every boom has been followed by a bust. I have been through all the booms and busts.

When World War I was over in 1918, this town had probably the greatest boom in the history of boom towns. Burkburnett and the northwest oil pools created the boom.

Q: What do you know about the White Elephant Saloon?

Mr. B: The saloon was owned by Billy Keys; the building was owned by Gus Newby, who had the ice plant here.

Q: What became of the nice home your father built just before his death?

Mr. B: The house was later sold to Dr. Wade Walker. In 1910, he sold to Clint Wood, who built the beautiful home at Tenth and Brook, the present home of the J.I Staley Family.

Q: Can you recall changes that have taken place in this area?

Mr. B: About 1893, I rode in a buggy with my father from here to Archer City, and there wasn’t a fence of any kind between here and there, and I don’t think there was any plowed land between here and Archer City.

Q: Are you a member of any fraternal organizations, or any other group?

Mr. B: I am a member of the B.P.O.E., and the oldest Elk in Wichita Falls. I am also a member of the First Presbyterian Church.

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