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Bend,
Texas
Chapter
5 - The Fry Familyby
Harland Moore
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In
the nearby county of Burnet, William Peter Fry and his wife Louise had a grown
son by name of Charles Thomas Fry. Charles went over around Smithwick and eloped
with the fifteen year old daughter of George Lafayette Jackson and his wife Frances
(Fannie). The Daughter was Mary Belle Jackson. I understand that Grandpa Jackson
tried to stop them but that they changed directions and went to another county
seat to get the license. After they were married, they lived with Grandpa and
Grandma Jackson, or near by, for at least a year or two. The 1900 Burnet Co census
shows them living near by and they had a daughter, Fannie.
Some time later,
Charles and Mary Fry moved their family to Irion County where they homsteaded
a ranch and lived there for several years. Jonnie Irene Fry and some of the other
children were born there on that homestead. Some time later they moved to Nix,
in Lampasas County. I don’t know how long they lived there, but Mother went to
school there for a while, I think. Some time later, they operated the telephone
switch board at Bend. Mother went to school at Bend
for a while and had Lee P. Burkett for a teacher. Some time along about here,
Mother went to Burnet and stayed with Great Grandpa William Peter Fry, and went
to school at Burnet for a while. Charles and Mary Fry later bought a farm on the
Colorado River about two miles northwest of Bend. I think that they bought it
from Bob Lewis. The 1920 census shows Charles and Mary Fry living there with the
following children: Fannie, Alfred, Jonnie, Jackson, Marie, Lois, Jaunita and
George. It should be noted here that their youngest child, Doris, was born in
August of that year. Dr. Edward Doss, my great grandfather was the attending physician.
He retired shortly after that and moved to Ralls,
Texas.
Uncle Alfred Fry and my dad, Jarrell Moore, got jobs as cowboys
and rode the range about eight or ten miles down the river from Bend on the Lower
Heller Ranch. The ranch is now the Colorado
Bend State Park. Daddy said that they used to ride horseback from there down
the river to Tow Valley. That is some of the most rugged country in Texas. There
was no road from the Heller Ranch to Tow Valley and there still is no road through
there. Uncle Alfred married Edith Lewis, Bob Lewis’ daughter. Jonnie Irene Fry
was married to Silas Jarrell Moore on July 29,1921. Jarrell and Jonnie were married
under an elm tree on the Colorado River near Bend by P.C. Key, minister of the
Church of Christ.
Their first child was born Sept. 20 1922 at the home
of my maternal grandparents, Charles and Mary Fry. and they named him Harland
Francis Moore. The old Fry home place was located about two miles NE and across
Cherokee Creek from Bend. It was a short distance up the river from Cal Crossing.
At one time there was a railroad crossing near this location. The railroad was
built from near Lometa
to a point 5 or 6 miles SE of Bend called Tanyard. It was used to haul cedar post
to market. The railroad was torn down and moved away before I was born but I still
remember seeing the remains of the old railroad dump in several places when I
was a child.
My parents lived in a small two room house on the Fry place
about two or three hundred yards from the Fry home. There was no well or water
supply at that house so Daddy used a wagon and team to haul barrels of water from
the Colorado River at Cal Crossing. On one occasion it was very cold when he went
after water but Mother put a heavy overcoat on me and let me go in the wagon with
Daddy. He drove the wagon and team into the river until the water was up close
to the wagon bed so he could stand in the wagon and dip the water up with a bucket
and pour it into the barrels until they were full. I stumbled around and fell
out of the wagon into the water which was well over my head. Daddy said that I
went under but my coat tail floated up and he grabbed the coat tail and pulled
me into the wagon. He said that the temperature was near freezing so he removed
my wet coat and put his jumper around me and whipped the mules into a run all
the way home to get there before I froze. I was soon in dry clothing and seated
by an old wood heater with a roaring fire of cedar wood.
My dad worked
some with Grandpa Fry on the farm. They raised sheep, cows horses and mules and
of course chickens and meat hogs. They raised hay, cotton ,corn and sorghum cane.
This farm had an irrigation system that pumped water from the Colorado River.
It was powered by a large one cylinder gasoline engine. The fly wheels on that
engine must have been at least five feet in diameter and it made a terrible noise
that could be heard for a mile up and down the river. It would go " POW----POW----sush
--sush POW --sush --POW--POW---shush." Such noise was frightening to a young lad.
the water was pumped from the river up into a flume. The flume was a long elevated
water trough mounted on cedar posts. It started at the pump and sloped downward
gradually and carried the water to the upper end of the field. Here it was routed
into a ditch and eventually down the crop rows.
Most or the irrigation
was used to water the sorghum cane. When the cane was ripe for harvest, it was
stripped of the side leaves , cut and hauled to the syrup mill which was located
near by. The syrup mill looked like a large metal clothes wringer mounted on the
end. It was powered by a mule hitched to a long pole . The mule walked around
and around turning the mill to squeeze out the juice. A man was seated at the
base of the mill to insert the stalks end ways into the mill. The long pole passed
over the man's head every time the mule came around. The juice was caught in a
vessel at the base of the mill. It was then placed in a large cooker pan where
the expert syrup maker cooked it just the right amount of time. It was then put
into buckets and sealed. Grandpa Fry labeled the buckets with a printed label
which read " CHAS. FRY'S HONEY DRIP SORGHUM' He would then haul the syrup to other
towns and peddle it out.
We must have lived in the little house on the
Fry place for three years or so because I have a picture of me standing on the
front steps on the house. I also have another picture made in the yard. I am seated
in a little red wagon with Orlene Bagley and W. R. Bagley is pulling the wagon.
It is interesting to note in these pictures at the age of three my hair is white.
Of course it turned dark later on then white again much later. |
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