Franklin Country History Association Newsletter, Volume 13, Number 3, May & June 2008
Click the "FCHA Calendar" tab to the left to find the 2008 Calendar of FCHA Meetings.
Please show your support to the Franklin County Historical Association and the preservation of our county by paying your dues. We are promoting and sustaining an attitude of pride within the community.
See the "How to Join" tab to the left for the form to use in renewing your membership or in becoming a member for the first time. Dues for the year 2008 are past due! Send payment to the FCHA at P. O. Box 289, Mt. Vernon, TX 75457. Following are the categories of membership:
Individual $15
Family $25
Patron $50
Sponsor $100
Along with the general meeting notice, and a letter from the FCHA president, on this page you will find the following regular and special items from the newsletter:
FCHA Receives Historic Cookbook
Next General Meeting
Winfield Women Raise Funds
Order a Special Gift - Cookbook
West End Outing, Reported by Betsy Cook
In Loving Memory: Mary Dupree Scovell & Billy W. Harper
Special Contributions in Memory or in Honor of Special Persons
One Thing Leads to Another
Geocaching "Better Than Botox"
FCHA Receives Historic Cookbook
A copy of the MARECHAL NEIL COOK BOOK has been sent to our organization by Dr. Shirley Brooks Laseter, granddaughter of Albeit E. Brooks, who operated the A. E. Brooks Dry Goods Store in Mt. Vernon in the early 19O0s. Dr. Laseter's father was Morton Palmer Brooks (1909-2001), her mother is Edna Cargile, who lives near her daughter in Prattville, Alabama. Morton Brooks was best man at the wedding of Tom Wilkinson's parents. The cookbook, named after a very popular flour of the day, is a ''Collection of Valuable Recipes Furnished by the Ladies of Mt. Vernon, and Published by the Ladies Aid Society of the Central. Christian Church of Mt. Vernon, Texas.'' Price for the publication was $.75. Here are a few excerpts:
''One-Two-Three Pie Crust'': 1 cup sifted Marechal Neil Flour, 2 tablespoons of lard rubbed
wet: into the flour, a pinch of salt and 3 tablespoons of cold water. Mix well and roll quite
thin.
''Maryland Beaten Biscuit No. 2”: 1 lb flour, 4 ounces Card, a pinch of salt. Sift into bread
basin, add salt and Card; mix these together. Then add enough cold water to make stiff
dough. Beat on biscuit board with a hatchet for half an hour or run through food chopper 3 or 4 times. Bake in hot oven until nicety browned. This quantity should be 18 small biscuits. - Miss Kate Crowder
''Toast Water'': 1 cup stale bread toasted, 1 cup boiling water, salt. Cut bread in thin slices
and in inch squares, dry thoroughly in oven until crisp and a delicate brown. Break into
crumbs, add water and let stand 1 hour, strain through cheese cloth, season and serve hot or cold. Valuable in cases of fever or extreme nausea.
Next General Meeting
JULY 7, MONDAY, 7:00 PM
Program: Orphan Train, presented by Martha Sue Stroud
Hosts: Jean Ann Marshall, J. D. & Iris Baumgardner, Ron & Libby Milton
Location: Texas American Bank Community Room - Covered-Dish Meal
Winfield Women Raise Funds
The women of Winfield are creating a cookbook/history to raise funds for a sign near the interstate to alert travelers to the town of Winfield. Any monies garnered will be used for this and for other community improvement projects. Please contact Jean Pamplin at 903-524-2929 or mail your own recipe with its history to her at P. O. Box 471, Winfield, TX 75493. Each recipe must include a paragraph about the cook and his or her ties to Winfield.
Order a Special Gift
Sweet Heritage is the Franklin County Historical Associations unique collection of dessert recipes from days gone by, including biographies of contributors. To obtain one for yourself or to purchase a Christmas gift for someone special in your life, send $14 tc The Association office at P.O. Box 289, Mt. Vernon 75457 or call 903-537-4760. Here is one of the many signature recipes:
Exerdine Clampitt Elliott's Colonial Holiday Ring
1 C butte1" 1 C sugar 4 eggs 4 C sifted flour 1 tsp soda 1/2 tsp salt 1 1 /2 C buttermilk 1 T grated orange rind 1 C chopped pecans 1 8-oz pkg chopped dates
Glaze: 1 C orange juice 2 C sugar 2 tsp grated orange rind
Cream sugar and butter. Beat eggs; add to creamed mixture and beat all. Sift together flour, soda and salt. Add to cream mixture, alternating with butternlilk. Add orange rind, dates and pecans. Pour into greased and floured tube pan. Bake at 325 for 90 minutes or until done. While cake is still hot and before removing from pan, punch many holes all the way through with an ice pick or skewer. Dissolve sugar and orange juice in small saucepan over low fire. Do not boil. Add orange rind and pour hot glaze over cake. Let glaze drip into holes in cake. If cake has not pulled away from sides, loosen with knife so that some of the glaze runs down the sides and center of cake.
Let cake stand overnight in pan.
West End Outing, Reported by Betsy Cook
At 10 a.m. on February 9, a chilly Saturday morning, 42 of our members met at the West End Preserve. Our mission: to hike about a mile, hoping to see and hear woodpeckers, and to enjoy our newest nature area. The woodpeckers were wary (we did see a few), but Randy Crane, our resident bird caller, summoned Barred Owls for our enjoyment as well. We lost count of these beautiful birds because we often lost sight of them as they flew from tree to tree. They are difficult to keep in view once they have chosen a perch! By noon the weather was wonderful, and we could remove our jackets for the sunshine to warm us as we chatted about our great morning. We are hoping to do it all again, with a botanist, as spring arrives and the beautiful foliage begins to appear. There are Ironwood trees and great Southern Pines, to name a few - which is why we need a botanist with us! Watch for our next scheduled date, and plan to join us. It is truly a whole different world, and its right here in Franklin County.
In Loving Memory
Mary Dupree Scovell passed away December 27, 2007 at the age of 96 years. She was born in Mt. Vernon in 1911 and was the daughter of Bess McAuley and Norman Dupree. She graduated Valedictorian from Mt. Vernon High School and then attended SMU where she earned a B.S. in Education. She was a member of Tri Delta Sorority and Phi Beta Kappa. She married Norman Scovell. She was an active volunteer at Children's Medical Center; she was a Cotton Bowl Board member and founding member of Preston Hollow Presbyterian Church. Mrs. Scovell gave Dupree Park to the FCHA as a tribute to her parents. She was a great supporter of our organization and took an avid interest in our endeavors. Any and all memorials in her memory will be acknowledged in this newsletter. Indeed, she was a rare and accomplished lady, and she will be sorely missed.
Billy W. Harper died suddenly at his residence in Mt. Vernon on April 11, 2008. Members of the FCHA were saddened to learn of the loss. Mr. Harper was a long-time member of our organization and a valued citizen of Franklin County. He was born in 1933 in Mt. Vernon to Argus Harper and Clemmie Cordelia Jackson. He is survived by his wife, Rae Harper, and sons Richard, David, and Michel, and daughters Mary Troutman and Cathy Armstrong. He is also survived by a brother, Howard, and sister, Dorothy. Billy Harper was a great volunteer for our organization and for his church and community. He will be greatly missed by all who knew and loved him.
One Thing Leads to Another, by Betsy Cook
It started out innocently enough – I just asked the Board if I could paint the walls at the Museum's second floor, because they were looking a little shabby - well, maybe a lot shabby. There would be no cost to the Association; this was my "good deed" for the year. Volunteers came 'round to help: Jim Johnson, John Tutor, Nancy Miller all represented themselves as painters, and Catherine Coffey made claim of being a cleaner, but not a painter. (Big mistake on her part - tumed out that the entire Museum needed a good cleaning, even the exhibit cases!) So lots of folks did their good deeds for the year!
Last to join this elite group was Mary Lou Russell, the Museum curator, who brashly stated that she already knew how to clean, but would rather leam how to paint. Well, we started with the walls, but that led to the shutters that needed to be sanded, stained and revamished, the floors that needed to be stripped and rewaxed, the wood trim that demanded to be repainted next to the bright new walls, and that, somehow led to the closets.
There are three closets, and two of them had large holes in the outside walls, which admitted not only the elements, but also the wasps. So, I enlisted my husband, Jack, to fill the holes, put up shelves, hang the brooms and mops, and while he was at it, to weather-strip the outside doors.
Meanwhile, the "elite group" gave the restrooms a face-lift, and started cleaning the Library. Disaster!! Nancy, who insists that each book be dusted, found live termites in several of Tom Wilkinson's prize volumes; an active colony was busy studying - by eating. Gary's Termite & Pest Control ousted them immediately; J. D. Baumgardner replaced the eaten-away wall paneling, and the Library returned to normal, minus some books.
We need to hang a few fire extinguishers ($39.97 each), get an electrician to install illuminated exit signs and a few smoke detectors ($16.50 each), and the Museum needs a First Aid Kit ($17.97) on the premises. Need to find the money for these items, hopefully outside the FCHA budget.
The last closet, under the stairway, is still a work-in-progress, but should be fInished by the time you read this, and the Museum will look great inside, top to bottom, and in the closets. The Museum outside, however, remains a project to be tackled.
The exterior stone work needs to be repointed, and we have looked for volunteers with this skill, but haven't found one so far. Our crew would be willing to learn to do this, but we haven't found a teacher with enough patience as yet.
One more thing - we need a plunger to have on hand for the commodes, just in case. Please call me if you can help! With a fInal spring cleaning touch-up, the group will move on to the Thruston House, where we will again clean, paint, and fIx up as necessary, we hope.
And, for a change of pace, Mary Lou wants to put in a couple of gardens - one for flowers and one for herbs - to make the Thruston site mirror its 1868 state. Any volunteers?? Our "well-experienced" committee is ready to start again, with new members wanting to learn new skills (or polish their old ones) welcome! (Thoughts for fInding $$ are most welcome also.)
Musings, by B. F. Hicks
If you haven’t picked up some of our brochures lately, stop by the museum or e-mail our webmaster and we’ll mail you some brochures. The maps brochure we published is given out to school groups as an educational tool on a regular basis.
A recent article regarding the El Camino Real was really telling: The article pointed out that in 1991 the State had tried to determine the route for the King’s Highway from San Antonio to Nacogdoches. That there were five main routes: all used at various times for various purposes. The travel variables of the day included the flow level of a particular river on a particular day and what Indians were in what area at a certain time and what kind of mood they were in on that day. Clay Coppedge says that “Tracing the exact route of Texas’ first road is daunting because, even in its heyday, much of the trail was more of a suggestion of a road than an actual road; and it was more than one road.”
For us: The Cherokee Trace through Franklin County is well documented; deeds recorded in Franklin County as late as 1936 reference land titles measured back from the east and west sides of the Cherokee Trace and there is not much doubt that the main route lies clearly back into Franklin County. However, the early route for the road also probably meandered up along a high water crossing during wet seasons a half mile to the east; and the pioneers buried their dead at the Tranquil Cemetery where the Protestant Methodists were worshipping in February 1841 before the April 1841 massacre of the Ripley family.
Our “Maps and Trails” brochure gives an introduction to the early settlement patterns for this region. We exist because we are on the trail leading into Texas; the “gateway” into Texas for the colonists. In fact, not too long after the American Revolution, Thomas Jefferson was already sending scouts to check out this very area which is now Franklin County (1806).
Contrary to the sign at the City Cemetery, no one was buried in Mt. Vernon in 1800, several generations of pioneers were already buried in this county before the cemetery was established but we’re proud of it. (Note that we see a very different City Cemetery today since the wrought iron Victorian fencing was removed during the scrap-metal drives of World War II.)
Geocaching "Better than Botox"If you have not become involved in the new world-wide craze, now is your chance to get started. We have a cache hidden on the grounds of Dupree Park. You can locate it by tracking a GPS. Lots of people have GPS readers. They get out and walk and locate the cache, sign a logbook, take a small "treasure," and move on. * It is a promotional effort for us to get people off the Interstate and into Mt. Vernon and Franklin County. The name of our cache is "Better Than Botox, " and it includes as treasures cups with that logo and pens from local businesses. * If anyone in our membership is interested insetting up another cache, it could only help further our efforts. We could probably hide a small cache on the depot grounds and at the West End Preserve. BF Hicks will take care of registration if anyone wants to volunteer to monitor a chache (checking in every couple of weeks to make sure all is in order.) * Locate our information on the internet at: http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=7cb16324-c26a -4b0a-8078-fd690e019a0d