| Recommended
Books on the Texas Panhandle |
| | |
|
SCHOOL
DAYS
J.T.
Brown as told to Louise George |
|
J.T.
Brown was born about ten miles southwest of Dumas
in 1914. He started school in the home of a neighbor. Later he attended Middlewell
School, but it only went through the seventh grade. In his own words J.T. tells
some of his experiences after he started to school in town.
“I
remember my first morning going to Dumas
schools when I was starting eighth grade. I was to ride my bicycle up the road
here two miles and catch the school bus that came right by there. But, I missed
it. It had done run, I had got a late start or something. Anyway, I decided, well
heck, I’m not going to miss the first day of school. So, I just rode my bike on
in to school which was about ten good miles and there wasn’t any roads whatsoever,
just a cow-trail all the way into town. So I rode my bicycle all the way in to
school. I was pretty well used up that night.
“When I was in school,
the school was up there where the Christian Church is now, up there on west Fifth
or Sixth, somewhere in there. There were two big old two-story buildings there
for schoolhouses. The class I graduated with in 1931 was the last class to finish
in the old school building. The class of ’32 started in the old building, but
during the school year they moved up to where the junior high is now. At that
time, that one building up there, and that was before it was added on to or anything,
people would talk and say what in the world does Dumas need such a building for?
They never will fill that school house up, up there. And look at all the elementary
schools they have now and the high school besides the junior high.
“One
day it was almost noon and this plane came right over the school house. Our study
hall was upstairs, and there was a fire escape that you slid down. We all hit
that fire escape, all of us who were upstairs. Mr. Reed, the superintendent was
an aviator and he was right along with us. The plane landed right out there by
where the depot is now. Of course, there wasn’t anything out there then. We all
went out there. It was a Ford Tri-motor. Boy, that was a big plane then. |
| | A
Ford Tri-Motor on display at the Naval Aviation Museum in Pensacola, Florida
Photo
courtesy Sam Lester |
| “Mr.
Reed went with these guys on a short hop around there and they came back and they
decided to take some passengers. They were going to circle Stratford and come
back for ten dollars. Well, I didn’t have no ten dollars in my pockets. So I run
down to the bank and Mr. Morton (the old man Morton) he was sitting back in his
little office and he said, ‘Come in, J.T. What could I do for you?’ I told him
I needed ten dollars awful bad, to ride that airplane. He said, ‘Well, I’ll loan
you ten dollars.’ And he fixed out a ten dollar note. I signed the note and took
the ten dollars and stuck it in my pocket and got back to the school just as quick
as I could, but it was too late. They done had a load and they went ahead without
me. So, I missed my flight on the airplane.” |
| ©
Louise George
History by George
- October 18, 2005
Louise George is author of two books, No
City Limits, The Story of Masterson, Texas and Some of My Heroes Are Ladies, Women,
Ages 85 to 101, Tell About Life in the Texas Panhandle. Louise can be reached
at (806) 935-5286, by mail at Box 252, Dumas, TX 79029, or by e-mail at lgeorge@NTS-online.net
See
Dumas, Texas
Texas
Schoolhouses
Texas Panhandle
More
Columns |
|
|
