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Town of Dacus, Montgomery County Texas
 

"Old Dacus"
by Narcissa Martin Boulware
This is a series of articles printed in the
Montgomery County News in 2002.
I've Been Thinking, Historical Account of the Montgomery Area

Old Dacus, Chapter 1

This article begins the story of the birth of a very important part of Texas history. As you will read, this part began just a short six miles northwest of the town of Montgomery, site of the courthouse, seat of all politics and political wars, site of the earliest churches and a continuous theme in Montgomery County history.

The life story of F.A.B. Wheeler, told in this family history, began the continuous line of descent which led to one of our popular Governors of the State of Texas. When Wheeler choose the place in all his land he acquired as a part of the Stephen F. Austin deal in 1823, to establish his home, he inadvertently, selected the area that became the home of the great grandfather of our later Texas governor, Price Daniel of Liberty, Texas. When F.A.B. Wheeler offered "free land to any who met his standards of character" he made no mistake when he accepted Allen Lowery to move near him, just west of the settlement first called Bethel. No doubt Lowery being a hard and fast Baptist influenced Wheeler, but when Lowery married Wheeler’s daughter, the bond and influence between Wheeler and Lowery brought many blessings to both families and to the rapidly growing community. The next man to join the circle of the greater "mover and shakers" of the little community was George Daniels, a young man who was baptized into the Baptist Church in Georgia when he was fourteen years old. When Daniels mother died and his father married again and started anther family, he caught a ride with other immigrants and headed for Montgomery County. He arrived in the Bethel-Wheeler-Lowery home area and was quickly welcomed into that group. Wheeler and Lowery had such influence and guidance that three years later George married Lowery’s daughter Sarah and three years later was ordained a Baptist minister.

Although the story of George M. Daniels is not to say that there were no more good men to help shape the Bethel and later "Old Dacus" communities, but the Daniels’ story is three generations closer to those of us today, trying to put together the birth, life and death of a very unusual settlement of people who created, prospered, contributed to their county, but lived in their own self-contained world.

Paul Martin, a native of the Bethel-Dacus area and his father C.L. Martin raised in that area have spent many hours helping to re-create this very unique church and post office, so near and yet so far from the mother town of Montgomery. Paul is a very busy young man, being heavily involved among other things as First Vice President of the very active Montgomery County Genealogical and Historical Society Inc., of Conroe, Texas located in the Montgomery County Library. Besides raising a family, holding down a job, he is very involved in his church work. His father C.L. Martin, being raised in that area and remembering everything he ever knew, heard or saw is usually the last word we need to complete a story.

As the narrator of this story I’m afraid it will be rather disjointed . Each bit of information would be so exciting I would hastily write it down, then would follow something to move along the years beginning in 1825 when Wheeler "came to town" and then another bit of news would come that applied to a chapter I had already finished and reverting back had to have an explanation and so on. Ignore any repeats, all the paragraphs have the basis of truth. Just poorly put together. The lives of Wheeler and Lowery have not been recorded nearly as fully as Daniels of course because Daniels lived longer and was researched fully because his grandson Price Daniels such a high office in the State of Texas. I did not have a very informative history of Geo. M. Daniels when I was writing this "Old Dacus" account. In fact, I was completely finished with the story when Paul Martin, not being satisfied with my spare mention, decided he would go to the best source of information on Daniels, the Sam Houston Regional Library and Research Center at Liberty, Texas. He invited myself and his father to go along. Although we were greeted nicely, we were politely told there was little we would find and that the real "inside" story was upstairs and closed for repairs. Paul is a very experienced "never say die" researcher and when we left we had several armloads of the necessary information.

Again I ask, forgive the repeats in this writing and any other errors. So much more could be written about the people, the church, the school and the community and if it was known it would be book size.

 

Old Dacus, Chapter 2

In modern real estate sales vernacular it is said that the three most valuable assets to a property are "location, location, location". Perhaps here the location of the subject property "Old Dacus-Bethel" should be defined in the present day ownership of the areas. Many hours of research helped by voluminous newsprint from the two communities by correspondents of the two separate locations seems to divide them thusly; Old Dacus seemed to have begun about where Dr. Henry Fields Carwile operates his ranch and laboratory. That land in the time of Old Dacus was lived on by the Stanley "Bud" Binford family. The families of Binfords, Carrolls and Bloomfields had homes there. Then we must go down the road between the Carwiles place and the Ruben Simonton ranch to take in "Gay’s Grove" a huge plantation. Here we are traveling north on F.M. Road 1097 west, this road in its beginning know as the Montgomery-Anderson road later Montgomery-Longstreet road, leaving present day Pecan Hill ranch (Simonton), we next come to the Uzzell homestead (circa 1835) and the location of the now destroyed Uzzell family graveyard. This can now be located by a new road called Watson Ranch road which leads to the large ranching property owned by the descendants of Russell Berkley, a man who wore many hats. We then come to the Evans home and land and the Archie Casburn homestead. This is the place Mollie Ward Ferguson, an aunt to Montgomery’s much loved Nellie Ward Weisinger describes as the George Mayfield Daniel home and the Hopewell School, this is also the location of the James Goodin store and where the post office was petitioned for, was obtained and was named Dacus. The post office petition was approved in 1889. It is my belief that the Old Dacus community ended about where the now existing Johnson Road takes off to the left off F.M. 1097 west. In the past, the Curling homestead, the Olivers, Bristers Casburns and many other settlers lived down Bailey Grove road which turns right off F.M. 1097 west and goes across land to come out on F.M. 149. Once known as the Montgomery-Huntsville road.

Many of those living on the 1097 west end of the Bailey Grove road brought their slaves with them when they settled at Bethel and the descendants of those slaves still live along Bailey Grove. Going north on 1097 west past the Bailey Grove road we past what was the Holmes brothers farms and homesteads, that being the families of the brothers Audrey, Sam and John Holmes. Next we come to Bethel Road which turns sharply to the left of F.M. 1097 west. This road in the past went in a northwest direction to Longstreet and Anderson passing the exit on the left of Bethel Road and still traveling north, we find the location of the first Bethel Church and school and the still very much loved and cared-for Bethel Cemetery. The graveyard and church/school is on the left side of the road and quite a few descendants whose families created the Bethel Baptist Church and school recall vividly the stories their parents or grandparents told of going to this first recorded church/school on the edge of that great "piney woods" forest. Using the records of the Montgomery County courthouse, various writings by both natives and historians stories told by individuals, census reports, names of families.

Now for those people who never knew of this little world-within-a-world ever existed, and for those who are interested in knowing and for those descendants of the first Dacus-Bethel settlers who never knew their beginnings and for those who always knew and want to revisit and refresh their memories, drive out F.M. 1097 west and locate the scene of a very important part of history of Montgomery County and the town of Montgomery.

 

Old Dacus, Chapter 3

When F.A.B. Wheeler chose the Old Dacus site to settle in Montgomery County in 1825, Grimes and Walker County were also a part of Montgomery County. Considering that the population of all three combined counties was only 1775 people, it is understandable that the Dacus-Bethel communities encompassed a large area. There were no roads, only trails made and used by the Indians, wild cattle, deer, wild hogs and the predators that searched for food at night. One time, the trails or crude roads hacked out by the settlers was the chore and responsibility for repairs and upkeep of the owners of the land that the road crossed over. In Montgomery County Commissioners Court minutes dated March 1st, 1838 to 1840, I find an order to Charles Stewart, Griffin, McNeil, Henderson and Patterson to "view and change the present road from Montgomery to Huntsville so as to intersect between Little Lake Creek and Caney Creek, the new road to be Precinct 13". This road would now be F.M. 149 and the intersecting road turning right and East is now F.M. 1375. From that point there is at that time an indefinable line to the north-Northwest if we were to travel past that intersection. It is certain that the settlers at the Old Dacus site eventually crossed over at that road through the forest to get to the settlement known as the Mount Pleasant Baptist Community to the east. For some reason the settlers seemed to halt settling north of the Bethel and Mount Pleasant communities for quite a while. The Dacus-Bethel and Mount Pleasant settlements consisted of families moving from the Eastern states, bringing relatives, friends, neighbors and many others seeking religious freedom, each area quickly founding churches, Sunday schools and school houses.

The road from the present day Dacus community, birthdate 1907 when the first train came through there following Big Lake Creek from Dobbin to the south, did not run along F.M. 1486 as it does today, the old road followed Big Lake Creek a short way south crossed the creek and went to Montgomery in a south-east direction. There at some point on its way to Montgomery the road would veer off northeast, perhaps on the vast Price Plantation and circle north east to enclose the first property we knew as the Carwile farm, ranch and laboratory. Thus both communities Bethel and Old Dacus established firm headquarters along the same road, barely three miles apart, each reaching out west and established strong holds on settlers as far away as Anderson, then known as Fanthorpe and the community called Applonia. Considering the evidence left us, both the written and spoken word, it is not hard to believe that the two communities had one thing in common, that being their love of their Baptist Church and its teachings.

Now that those, who read this know where you are in relation to the location of the site of Old Dacus, the story will try to move on to the little recorded years of our subject people in the before the Civil War period.

F.A.B.Wheeler the first recorded settler of Old Dacus, built his cabin close by where the private Lowery Cemetery is being kept well tended today. Allen Lowery was Wheeler’s son-in-law, dear to Wheeler’s heart, Lowery was a devout Baptist and in time became an ordained minister and as time passed, became the great grandfather of Price Daniel, a much loved Governor of Texas. It is believed that Wheeler is buried in his son-in-law’s burial plot which is located near the Bill and Della Binford homestead, a short way west of both Old Dacus and Bethel. When Wheeler’s daughter married Lowery and the Lowery’s daughter married George Daniel, a three-some strong family of Baptists was formed and the three families and their children built the foundation of the Bethel Baptist Church and served in any adjoining community that needed them. The book "The Centenial Story of Texas, Baptists" it was recorded that in 1835 there was only one Baptist Church in Texas and less than fifty Baptists and notes that the Mount Pleasant Church was established in 1838. This church would have been some six miles due east as the crowflies from Old Dacus with no road at all.

 

Old Dacus, Chapter 4
 

Under the Mexican rule all persons entering Texas had to take an oath to practice the Catholic religion. In the book "Centennial Story of Texas Baptists", I found this statement; "A Baptist minister, Isaac Reed, says it would have cost a man his life to have preached in any faith other the Catholic doctrines". As a result Z. N. Morrell, who came from Tennessee was so provoked that he was not to be allowed to pursue his Baptist ministry he was determined to move westward, and whether peacefully or with violence, plant the Baptist religion in the new land. Ministers were rarely paid a salary or even paid at all in those times and Rev. Morrell had tried his hand at being a merchant to support his family and enable him to preach. He was slowly moving into the southern part of Texas and while living at the mouth of the Trinity River, he decided he wanted to move to Montgomery County and establish the first Baptist church. He kept a diary of his daily life and work and later he wrote a prized book "Fruits and Flowers of the Wilderness, 1835 to 1871, or Thirty Six years in Texas". He traveled a round-about way to get to Montgomery County, but where ever he was, in defiance of the Mexican rule he spread the Baptist faith any where he was allowed to speak. In his journey\y toward Montgomery County he arrived in Old Washington, where he states; "I had some lots of merchandise that I proposed to sell but finding selling goods does not suit a preachers life. I cast about to find a buyer. Peter J. And R.S. Willis (my great uncle and great grandfather) were acting as my clerks at Old Washington and to them I sold my remnant of goods on a credit at a cost and ten percent. Taking business at hand they paid me promptly for the goods and by good management and hard labor have reached their present positions". NOTE: The Willis brothers then opened a store in Anderson and finally arrived in Montgomery to open their huge store in Montgomery in 1843, they built the homes Cathalor and Magnolia, both homes are still standing and on several times each year are opened to the public.

Back to Old Dacus, Z.N. Morrell had made his way to Anderson and organized and established with the help of other hard-shell Baptist workers in that area, an association known as the "General Convention of Anderson, Texas" Allen Lowery, F.A. B. Wheeler’s son-in-law and an Old Dacus resident was a charter member of this association. Morrell also established a Baptist Church in Anderson and began traveling to outlying communities urging the establishing of churches and Sunday Schools. Lowery took up the task at Old Dacus and found willing joiners and workers in some of the first Dacus families, such as those of R.F. Oliver, Burrell Anders, Lyndia Uzzell, Martha Oliver, Phoebe Rigby and John Thomas. These leading citizens were anxious to have their own church and school, there was no church in Montgomery the nearest trading post. The route across the forest to Mount Pleasant was too hard because of the creeks and heavy timber that buggies and wagons could not manage. Not to be defeated and urged on by Lowery, a group of Old Dacus residents, led by Elisha Uzzell, the above groups traveled to Montgomery where Elisha made the motion and submitted the articles of faith and thus in 1850, the present day, Montgomery Baptist Church was born.

Since the terrible hardships and pain the first settlers endured to establish the great state where we live now, I think any of the stories of those first people which tell of how they coped with their problems should be told and re-told because it is history and will never be done again. In the book Montgomery County History, compiled by the Conroe Genealogical Society, the first settler, about 1825, was Francis A.B. Wheeler, whose cabin was about forty miles from the nearest place to obtain ammunition and any other needs he could not glean from his land and forest. The only trading posts were at Old Washington, San Felipe and Nacogdoches. Wheeler went twice a year to purchase powder, lead, salt and coffee. Stories of those first wilderness families show they owned only the barest of necessities such as a gun, axe, one iron pot and perhaps some gourd or bone utensils.

 

Old Dacus, Part 5
 

In the Old Dacus story, no written record of a first settler in that area other than F.A.B. Wheeler in the 1825 period and so we will rely on his experience. His recorded experience tells of being attacked by Indians and his cabin burned. When the cabin burned, the family, if they escaped with their lives had nothing. They were then faced with walking great distances, dangerous in many ways, to hope to find another settler, one who had escaped the same fate. Wheeler had been given a large amount of land for military service and after the Indian attack he apparently established himself again. There is evidence of another settler in the area, Warren Goodin who bought land in that area in 1823. Wheeler wanted neighbors and he made an offer of free land to anyone who would be an acceptable neighbor. It is possible that Wheeler’s offer may have been the inducement that prompted Uzzell family’s migration. Mr. J. T. Montgomery writes in his family genealogy "Elisha Uzzell left Alabama in 1839 with a caravan of thirty families and moved to Dacus, Montgomery County. His brother, Major Uzzell followed in 1851". The settlers arriving in the 1830-1840 period saw a much better time that Wheeler and Goodin. As the cabins got closer together accounts tell of the settlers getting together to build their cabins or of borrowing an axe or a froe to make or smooth one side of the logs to use for the floor of the house. The "boards" were simply crude slabs of wood cut from newly a newly fallen tree, hacked out with an axe. Masonic Lodge records containing the names of their 1840 census show some of the earliest Dacus settlers. We find these names; Thomas Gilmore, Charles and August Janisch, Daniel McLeod, sometimes pronounced and spelled as "McCloud", William S. Taylor, James Thomas, G.M. Daniel, Allen Lowery, the Welch, Goodin, Forrest, Talley, Rigsby, Doyle, Carson, Fralick, Nugent, Moore, Heaton, Sheffer, and Uzzell families. The famous author J.Frank Dobie gives an illustration of those first families in the Dacus area in its beginning when he writes "our pioneer acceptance of circumstances beyond their control is shown when a frontier host says to a stranger passing through, ‘ you sleep on this buffalo hide and I’ll rough it on the floor’".
 
The greatest danger to those first people was the Indians. The unpredictable savage, silent attacks brought terror, and death to many of the first. Although the Wheeler family survived their Indian attack, another family the Taylor’s living in an area circled by the Anderson, Longstreet, Dacus communities in 1838 was attacked by roving Indians. They caught Mr. Taylor close by their cabin, close enough for Mrs. Taylor to know he had been killed and where his body lay and when she grabbed her small child by the hand to go to her husband in the hope of saving him, the Indians waylaid her and killed both her and the child. This aroused a group of settlers and banding together prepared to pursue the killers. Accounts say the group led by a "Mr. Kindred" probably a Mr. Kennard an early settler there, joined by Mr. Hadley and directed by Jeremiah Worsham (my great-great grandfather) the group chased but failed to capture the killers.
 
One of the first, (if not the first) Baptist ministers in the vast area between Trinity and Brazos river was Z.N. Morrell who wrote of his life there in his book "Fruits and Flowers of The Wilderness, Texas in 1835 to 1871" While living for awhile in Gonzales on his way to Old Washington, states; "Indian attacks were constant and it became the custom, since two of our men had been killed to take our guns wherever we went." A single family with only one gun had no chance. A few women were taken captive, but more likely an occasional child’s life was spared and then taken as a captive.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 6
 

Another recording of an Indian attack was that experience by a very prominent first settler closer to Old Dacus, is told in the General Land Office in Austin. When lawyer Theodore R. Smyth, General Counsel for Sam Houston sought to buy land near Dobbin, Circa 1843. He had applied several years before he finally acquired the land. The delay was caused by the killing of the surveyor of the tract by a band of Indians. Theodore Smyth a very educated man was the ancestor of many teachers and professional descendants, one of which lived her last years in Montgomery, Mattie Sneed, born in the Smyth family was one of the most beloved teachers ever hired by the Montgomery schools. Untold numbers of first and second grade students owe their successful entry into to education to this kind, loving teacher.
 
In 1828, the settlements were small and widely scattered. The area which was to become "Old Dacus" was described as being about six miles northwest of Montgomery on the Montgomery-Anderson road, later it was called the Bethel Road and the present day is 1097 West. My able, efficient, hard-working history detectives Charles Lee Martin and his son Paul are confident they are going to prove that this same road began out of Montgomery under the name "Leona Road" about the time the Wheeler’s, Goodin’s, Lowery’s and others were settling in the area. We can read from Mr. J.T. Montgomery’s account of the many trails used by the Indians in their summer-winter migrations in and around the Dacus, Dobbin, Bethel, New Dacus, Richards and Longstreet areas, traveling up and down Big Lake Creek, Little Lake Creek and Caney Creek.
 
Early travelers along the high areas both east and west of Lake Creek could look from the Longstreet-Bays Chapel area and from the high hills of Montgomery and Dobbin and see huge herds of buffalo, the mainstay of Indian life and of great importance to our early people. Although it is almost unbelievable to us today, from all accounts, our subject area was mostly prairie. Many areas were located by their names such as Shannon’s Prairie, Tillous Prairie, Mink’s Prairie, Decker’s Prairie, Lost Prairie, Prairie Plains and to the east a community still known as Tarkington Prairie.
 
William Boallert, an Englishman sent to the Mexican owned land called Texas, with an eye toward persuading immigrants to settle there, kept a record of his travels and of several visits to Montgomery and the area. On one of his trips here in 1843, he tells of meals served to him by the early families being "bear’s flesh and sassafras tea". He adds, "The yaupon leaves to my taste make a better tea. I shot a sand crane weighing thirteen pounds, good eating like duck, if well stuffed". This visit in 1843 tells of his host, Mr. Robson, entertaining him on hunts for fox, coon possum, squirrel, bear, deer, panther and leopard. It is believed that Mr. Robson lived southwest of Old Dacus in the vicinity of the present day William Berkley Ranch. Mr. Boallert also tells of visiting with a "Mr. Uzzell who told him of the abundance of buffalo in the Dacus area in 1844". Added accounts of the people living there in the 1830's and 1840's were given by Gustav Dressell, a traveler-author who told of trying to go from Huntsville to Montgomery and found himself on a cold, rainy night, unable to cross a stream (it was probably Little Lake Creek) at the regular crossing. He backtracked and spent the night with Henry Travis, a chairmaker who lived near Elisha Uzzell and Allen Lowery. Robert Montgomery names others of that area as being school teacher Evans, a Mister Stoner, Charles and August Janisch. Bessie Owen Prices tells of a chair that she saw and examined, that had the name "Travis-maker" found on the bottom of the chair seat. Mr. Montgomery tells of an interview with my uncle J. B. "Buck" Martin, who verified what Mr. Montgomery wrote of early life here. Statistics and written word reflects that more and more settlers were arriving in the area as life was becoming safer and easier.’
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 7
 

If our early Dacus settlers were fortunate enough to get land near a neighbor who had been there long-enough to have caught and tamed some of the wild longhorn cattle that roamed the woods and the prairies about, the new settler might obtain milk from their owner. One pioneer wrote, "I let the new folks use my cow on the promise that they would turn her out on the free range by day, keep the calf penned up till milking time and must not rob the calf of his share of the milk. I didn’t want my calf knocked in the head with a churn dasher". That meant the milker should not take all the milk, leaving none for the calf, thus taking more for the family to drink or make butter using the crock churn with the wooden dasher. He further states, "I don’t want them to make my calf a "dogie". The meaning of "dogie" is a starved calf, underfed, under nourished, thus stunting growth and making the animal much less valuable. In a book called "Reminisces" by Arthur Wright, he tells of his marriage in 1856 and says, "When we (he and his wife) put our possessions together, they consisted of two cows, one rifle, one axe, a drawing knife, one skillet to cook our meat and bread, two chairs and one homemade bedstead." It is safe to assume that the parents of this couple probably had much less. The town of Montgomery was advancing rapidly in every way although out in the Dacus area, land was cheap. In some cases, as in F.A.B. Wheeler’s offer, land was free and one offer for sale the owner wanted one hundred and twenty dollars for one thousand acres. The traveler Boellart says there were cotton gins about although the gin could produce only one bale a day. The Reverend Isaac Parks of Fanthorpe, later and still known today as Anderson owned and operated a gin of that period and most of the parts of the gin were made by hand from wood, mostly "green" wood, if a part broke they simply took their axes and found a suitable tree, cut it down and hewed out the part they needed.
 
In the story written by Fanny Kemble when she visited the gin on her husband’s slave-worked plantation in Georgia, she tells of a room with eight cubicles where eight men sat at foot-powered machines that stripped the lint from the cotton seed, thus preparing the clean bales of seedless cotton. Reading from "East Texas, Its History and Its Makers," we see in the absence of a cotton gin, the lint was picked from seed by hand. A "Shoefull" was a mighty stint for every member of the family or slave between supper and bedtime. In 1847, there were only 1775 people living in the then not separated three adjoining counties and only 263 could vote. Many of the first settlers brought slaves. Farming was the almost total occupation in the Dacus area we are writing about, cotton being the "Cash" crop, corn being the main sustenance of both human and animal life. There were cattle and hogs, a gin and sawmill or two, but with very few exceptions the way of life was farming. The town of Montgomery boasted of having everything it needed, even the Courthouse.
 
The German traveler Boellart tells of one of his visits to Montgomery, "I was taken on December 7th, 1843 to a race course," to see a much talked about horse race. Stanley (Bud) Binford a descendant of two of the earliest families, the Carrolls and the Binfords, remembers his father Bill Binford telling of two of his happy childhood playgrounds, one being what was known as the "old race track" located on a high ridge on what we now know as the William Berkley ranch. The other playground was up and down Uzzell Branch, now lost by name but without a doubt located on the first immigrants to reach Old Dacus, the Uzzell clan homestead near Old Dacus.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 8
 

Raising cotton, corn and food crops was a way of life for Old Dacus people, as in every new community developed, families arriving and sending back for their left behind kinfolks, citing the abundance of everything to be found. Corn was the staff of life for man and beast and the dependence on corn in their lives is plainly spoken worry even in the midst of a happy occasion as told by Andrew McWhorter of Grimes County in a letter he wrote on July 1, 1850. "On last Thursday my son, my grandson and Mr. William Shannon married the three McNair systers. It would seem they are not afraid of the scarcity of corn next year, although the crop looks bad!"
 
The years of history of our Old Dacus-Bethel communities between 1855 and 1875 have left little record facts or news. Certainly the Civil War had a terrible impact on everyone and every area. There are letters and written reports of conditions and their effects on the people in Montgomery and so, of course the situations would be the same six miles northwest of Montgomery i.e. Dacus-Bethel. Through all of this time, beginning with the advent of F.A.B. Wheeler, circa 1825, then the 1830's settling in of the Uzzell caravan of thirty families, the story of Allen Lowery, the stories given us in the diaries of Isaac Parks of Anderson and his activity in the Bethel Baptist Church tells us that probably from the time the Wheeler and son-in-law Allen Lowery came into Old Dacus area the drive to establish a Baptist Church had begun. I believe that church and school was being held in various homes, the desire, the need and the determination shown in other ways would have brought then together to practice their faith even in the face of great adversity. Written records of the advent of George Mayfield Daniel into the Old Dacus area should be true by virtue of the many widely recognized deeds done by his family following in his footsteps. George Daniel has been said to move into the Old Dacus area around 1863, two years into the Civil War when the true meaning of the effects of the Civil War was object poverty. There is evidence that when Daniel moved into Old Dacus there was instant rapport with Lowery, Uzzell, Forrest, Thomas, Bloomfield and some of the widowed pioneer settlers and the result was an immediate move to establish a church. It has been written that the Mt. Pleasant Church located a probable mile east as the crow flies in 1863. It is a fact that the citizens of Old Dacus-Bethel and many other adjoining groups attended and took part in the activities of the Mt. Pleasant Church. Most records beginning about 1862, the second year of the Civil War, during the Civil War and certainly during the terrible reconstruction period, there were very few schools held, of course meaning public schools. Though the County Court levied taxes for schools, cut the county up into school districts and hired people to open, run, operate, hire and pay for schools and teachers and supplies the sad facts are there was no money. In the book East Texas; it’s History and its Makers by T.C. Richardson he sums up the conditions of all Texas east of the Mississippi River where the Confederacy had been closed off by the Union Army less than a year into the war, all the seashore line from the Mississippi to Mexico was under Northern Blockade to Texans and so our subject two or three communities were reduced to self-containment. Goods from outside the towns and villages were soon used up and only occasionally replenished at great danger and expense. Crops were planted and harvested at first but as more and more men went to war, those families who did not own slaves were left with no one to plant, cultivate, harvest and store even the smallest of crops sorely needed for their food. The county tried to care for the wives and children and elderly left behind by the men at war but the county funds were soon exhausted. Little coin came in for taxes, script was issued there was confederate money offered in trade for necessities but by wars end, all proved worthless in value.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 9
 

I have no doubt that the over-powering urge to practice their Baptist beliefs and to help their fellow man to do so, was the motivation that led to both Allen Lowery and George Daniel to become Baptist ministers. Lowery joined the Baptist Convention formed in Anderson (Fanthrope at that time) in 1848. He was in fact a charter member and his association with Isaac Parks led to quite a few visits by Parks’ to the later established (at least by membership) Bethel Church; George Daniel followed Lowery’s lead by contract and association with the hard working Parks far reaching Anderson Church and soon after became Lowery’s son-in-law. It is easy to see that perhaps our first recorded settler F.A.B. Wheeler, in his offer to give free land to desirable neighbors, may have had a hand in selecting and gaining a son-in-law that would work for his religious choice. It did happen when Lowery became an ordained minister. In turn, when Lowery married one of George Daniels’ the combination of Wheeler and Lowery was what motivated Daniel to become a Baptist minister. It is not hard to imagine how pleased Wheeler must have been at the results of his offer of land to desirables neighbors.
 
In the published story "The Saga of Anderson" by Irene Taylor Allen, she writes of a letter written by one of Daniel’s daughters to her sister; "Papa (George Daniel) lived with Uncle Bob Jeter, no kin, but papa loved them and I think papa was living with the Jeters’ when he married. The Jeters’ lived at Piney Grove." Piney Grove was a church and community south of Anderson called Applonia. The saga story goes on to say that "George Daniel read, studied and listened. He was jolly and well-liked ( and must have been a practical joker). Once in the Jeter home he asked one of the young girls if she knew why a goose sometimes stood on only one foot? "To rest the other one, of course" she replied. George said "Well, I knew only another goose would know the answer." She got even with him though for the next time he came to visit to stay all night she got permission to get his bed ready and when he went to bed he found fourteen very heavy quilts on his bed!
The Reverend Parks at Anderson was a hard-riding tireless preacher and long distance from his home in Anderson to a location, he had targeted for a church did in no way stop him. His fourteen year (almost daily) diary tells of many visits from his headquarters of the Baptist General Convention at Anderson to quite a few of our Dacus settlers. Elisha Uzzell, Daniels, Lowery, Nugent and McCleod Parks visited them and later in 1871, he spent nights and ate at their homes while attending church in Bethel. Sam Houston was also a frequent visitor at Anderson and though I have not found proof that Houston came to church at Bethel, it is surely possible. Parks’ diary begins in 1861, one year into the war and from that year until 1871, Parks was in constant motion gathering people together to establish Baptist Churches. Many of them grew and flourished, but for some the sites are now "ghost town" churches, such as Fairview, just west of Richards where the prominent Brown and Haymie families were hosts to Reverend Parks. The Reverend’s diary tells of his visits to Pine Grove or Piney Grove at Applonia, home to some of the Uzzell family and to Plantersville where the well-to-do Montgomery family made him welcome and last but not least his visits to the Bethel Church. Parks tells of Sam Houston’s visits to his home and of going with him to minister several of his many churches even noting once that "Houston’s daughters are here for the night". His diary also makes notes of frequent visits to his home by some of our Dacus settlers. There can be little doubt that quite a few of our Dacus-Bethel citizens were wellacquainted with Houston.
 
I found these notations about the Bethel Church in Parks’ diary; June 2, 1871-went to Bethel Church, dined with Lowery. June 1871-stayed all night with McCleod (I think that this is the man who made the chairs in the Old Dacus area) and dined with Uzzell. June 27th- stayed the night with Nugent. June 30th- attended meeting at Bethel, then to Montgomery spent night Harris. July 1, 1872 went to Worshams (my 6th generation grandfather) at Montgomery, then to Harris meeting at Bethel, dinner at Geo. McCleod. It has been well recorded, thus well-known of the visits made by Sam Houston to Montgomery.
 
The following story in Texas highways verifies some of the tales told of his visits to Montgomery. This article by Kevin Young of San Antonio says, "Perhaps the most sought after soul in Texas was that of Sam Houston. He was rejected by the Presbyterians after he left his wife, Houston became a Catholic long enough to become a Mexican citizen to get into Texas. Houston, a notorious over-indulger, seemed to try to quit drinking after his marriage to Baptist Margaret Lea. Margaret and the Baptists won the bottle and Houston was formerly Baptized in Rocky Creek. When a friend asked Houston if all his sins had been washed away, he said: "I hope so, but if all of them washed away, the Lord helps the fish down below.
 

Old Dacus, Part 10
 

The terrible effect of the Civil War on our community and our surrounding sister communities began to come true in 1861-1862. I have found so far very few personal written records of our beginning Texas forefathers but general accounts all over Texas were the same as Montgomery and so of Old Dacus. Commissioners Court records show sporadic payments to public school teachers, one being sixty three dollars to a Miss Nannie Oliver as a teacher in a public school for the year of 1859. (Incidentally the term year, was probably for the months of November, December and January).
 
Oliver, is a name listed as one of the oldest settlers and teachers, at Old Dacus. Other teachers named in 1857 were Charles L.S. Jones, E.C. Dealy and Julia Morrell, could this lady be kin to the ever present Z.N. Morrell, the now famed Anderson based first Baptist crusader? But alas, in the same breath, 1857, the court report of T.W. Smith, County Treasurer says the school fund reports were destroyed.
There must have been much unrest and intense feelings about cessation talk and about slavery as early as 1855. Letters written to his family from Anderson, Texas in 1854 by Mr. A.S. Beardsly as published in the Grimes County History book says, "There was a bad cholera scare here when twenty slaves out of seventy and fifteen whites out of sixteen, all of them from the same plantation, died within a week of arrival from Georgia." Also he tells, "When not busy around the house or sewing, it takes the rest of the time to fight fleas, bedbugs and mosquitoes. War seems to be looked upon as inevitable, but for my part, I do not feel much alarmed." In spite of the Indians, insects, disease and the threat of an impending Civil War, our Dacus people had gained much in the way of worldly goods, but we must remember that as in the account in the Journal, "For a wedding present the "brides" father gave her a horse, a cow and a twelve year old slave girl." This was about the time around 1850, a bountiful start to married life.
 
Many stories of visitors or newly arrived settlers talk of the dirt and filth inside the homes. The women had nothing to use to combat these conditions. The use of lye soap, if they had it and hot water was the whole of the tools she had in her fight to keep home, clothes and body clean. The fight against ants and bedbugs was constant. One source of relief to the lady of the house could be found at the Kirbee Kiln, four miles south of Montgomery, a little southeast of the present day Lake 177 subdivision along F.M. 149, a.k.a. Old Houston Road. This kiln made quite a few much needed pottery products. Jugs of all sizes, all purposes and needs. One popular product was the several types of jugs needed to make home-style liquor. They made crocks for the milk, crocks to can or preserve foods and lard. The product of most value to the housewife was a small pottery saucer- like vessel, with a high rim around it to put under each bed or table leg. This cup-like article was large enough in width, that when filled with water or any bug repellent, created a lake that the ant, roach or bedbug must swim through to get to the table or bed. If the homeowner had kerosene, popularly called coal-oil, these leg-cups when filled with the oil or water were very effective.
 
It is a certainty that all Texas inhabitants had the problem of all manner of insects and with little or no manner of protection. The mosquitoes were the cause of several terrible sieges of yellow fever, killing thousands of people literally wiping out whole families. The flea could and did carry fatal disease in their bites. An account of a visit to Texas in 1852 in an East Texas Historical Journal states, "I am in good health save for bedbugs and tick bites. There is a little varmint here, a stinging lizard with a forked tail, a sting in each fork." A young lady moving to Texas in 1861, states, "Visitors coming to Texas should cover themselves in tar to ward off the ticks, redbugs, fleas by the millions, centipedes, tarantulas and snakes gliding through the grass."
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 11
 

The community of Old Dacus, as in all the new settlements around Montgomery and Old Dacus, were trying to live and prosper in spite of all the problems to be solved. One of the issues of the East Texas Historical Journal very aptly describes the terrible never-ending fight against filth, dirt, disease and death facing our forefathers. Water was the primary need, the source of life as well as the follow-up needs. Those who did not and could not live near a natural source of water, such as a creek or lake or spring-fed branch had to have a dependable alternative source of water. A hand-dug well was then a necessity or the water must be hauled from an available source to the dwelling. The housewife had to fight with not only the natural sources of filth, but also with the lack of water to clean with. Further on, in my account of Old Dacus I will tell of one of the wonders of Old Dacus, created by the settler Goodin when he created the wonderful well of water, enclosed in a concrete curbing, this cold, clear spring fed water becoming the source of life to many of the Dacus-Bethel inhabitants.
 
One visitor to Texas says, "the drawback to Texas is the lack of good water. The traveler or rider must find a waterhole and maybe drive away the copperhead or cotton mouth snake to get a drink."
 
This section of written records of our Montgomery, Old Dacus and sister communities tell of the next hardships, to overcome to live in Texas, the beginning of the Civil War, finally a reality, we have the privilege of reading from the always exact accounts left by the very first lawyer citizen of the town of Montgomery, Judge Nat Hart Davis. The almost total basis of the close personal details of the life in Montgomery were kept and handed down to his descendants through Judge Davis.
 
In the town of Montgomery 1861-1862, Harley Gandy’s book "A History of Montgomery County" he tells of interviewing Mrs. J.B. Addison the grandmother of his wife, Martha Gandy. Martha is a direct descendant of the famed Nathaniel Hart Davis. This Davis family have provided the major share of the written history of the town and County of Montgomery. A Home Guard Company was formed in the town in 1861 and some of the Davis family letters tell what the citizens were doing to help in the war. "The young ladies were making pants for Captain Oliver’s home guard taking the material home to sew,- another item; Davis and Ellis made rapid sales of their goods especially calico. Davis sold $1000.00 a day for a few day. Willis and brother (my own great grandfather and great uncle, prominent merchants in Montgomery) have nearly sold our. P.J. Willis (my great uncle) just returned from Alabama and Mississippi and says he will sell all his stock of goods he has left, as his main stock is already gone. He says he will not re-stock." (The Willis brothers moved to Galveston shortly after to build a much larger business and my mother was born there).
 
Another Davis letter owned by Mrs. J.B. Addison, nee Davis, "I think my household can squeeze along the next year in the war of clothes. I will wear osanburg pants next summer. I am not uneasy about clothes next year, but I fear I may not have enough to eat. I have no pork or salt. I believe I can buy and pay for salt and I have some hopes that some of those who owe me will supply my smokehouse, we ourselves have now have cornbread, beef, barley, coffee without sugar. We make some butter and have a pretty good garden. Times are growing harder and men are becoming more selfish."
 
The next chapter of this account will continue the Davis family account as written by Harley Gandy, a dedicated historian, strictly adhering to truth and proof in his historical research as well as excerpts from other citizens in nearby areas. Making do with what they had in those first years of the war. The writers of these accounts were already showing their despair and fear, little knowing the terrible conditions that would follow.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 12
 

To pick up where I left off in Chapter 11, I quote again from Harley Gandy’s book "A History of Montgomery County," and his quotes from the Davis-Addison family gives the history of one of the first citizens of the town down to the present day evidenced by a written and recorded paper trail and by the "Davis Cottage" and the Addison House, alive and well even into today. The Civil War as it was in Montgomery. "During the Civil War the Union controlled the East side of the Mississippi River and all of the Florida and Texas Coast as far down as Mexico. The provisions that were needed by the people east of the Mississippi and north of all the shipping ports, to the south could not be obtained, because of the Union Blockade. Shoes, clothing, salt, coffee and medicine were not to be obtained. Cotton was the economy. Freighters made the three month trip overland to Mexico to trade their baled cotton for the things they needed. The Confederacy made demands on the farmer for their cotton titled
 
"Tax-in-Kind" to support the Army. The Army took so much of the cotton that the government was about to collapse and the people struggling to grow the cotton were rapidity improvished and suffering for the barest of necessities."
 
The above information was taken from a 1964 edition of Texanna, the paragraph that impressed me very much reads as follows; "against State and Confederacy, some of the farm women measured their own needs and hi-jacked cotton haulers who were taking away the tax-in-kind cotton, throwing off a few bales to be sold on behalf of the growers."
 
The following letters were written to Nat Hart Davis or his wife Amelia in the beginning war years. The women of Montgomery were very busy spinning and weaving. In the town of Montgomery (as in Old Dacus) and more specifically in what was called the "Davis Cottage" existing today. The following letters sent to or received by the Davis family 1861. "The ladies have been busy the last few days making uniforms, grey trimmed with yellow, very pretty. Times are hard here, it takes all the money we can spare for the soldiers. I have raised many chickens this year, a fine garden and all kinds of vegetables. (1862) "Well how do you get on making cloth? I have made ninety yards and have another piece ready to weave. Plain white cloth is selling for fifty to sixty cents a yard and calico at twenty five to thirty cents a yard. I bought several calico dresses but have nowhere to go. No preaching for several months. I made a nice hat, dyed it black, out of wheat straw. I made Mr. Davis some shirts. (Reader do you noticed she referred to her husband as Mr. Davis? That was the custom of that day and time). 1863 Letter to Betty Davis from Fairfield, Texas, "We are all busy here, spinning some dresses, as we have to make our own clothes here. I would like to know what you do for cotton cards down there. They are very scarce up here and very high. Everything in the provision line is so high. Bacon is fifty cents a pound, corn two dollars a bushel. Neighboring counties have a few written accounts telling how the old-fashioned spinning wheel, loom and knitting needles were brought out by the women who worked busily through the day and far into the night to supply the soldiers and the dependent member at home needed clothing. For medicine we used barks, roots and herbs. For soda we burned corncobs and used the ashes. For coffee there were various substitutes such as parched sweet potatoes, rye and okra beans. Dry goods were found in very small amounts. Calico of good quality cost fifty dollars a yard, Confederate money." Jo Ella Powell Exley wrote the above story and she and Mathilda Warner wrote this addition for the book "Texas Tears and Texas Sunshine"; "Getting supplies was always a problem, we couldn’t get coffee at all and that was a big problem in the German household. We roasted rye and wheat. Roasted corn didn’t taste like coffee. We made our own soap from fat rendered from the hog and ashes cleaned out of the fireplace." This story will continue next week.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 13
 

This chapter is to continue the struggles of the households of the citizens during the Civil War. An account of how the women made their soap tells using their homemade ash hopper letting water drip over the ashes and the result was lye. ‘The test of the strength of lye was it had to float an egg. If the egg sank, it was weak. We made clothes out of the kind of cloth that made overalls. Two widths made a skirt. We had a calico dress for nice and two dresses of heavy cloth. Our stocking were made from thread spun on wheels brought from Germany, then knitted. If we had shoes, which was seldom, they were made at home.’ Eudora Moore says "father bought a side of tanned leather for our shoe soles, the uppers made of a heavy black material from an old cloak."
 
My own great grandfather established a tannery just East of Montgomery in 1843. He built it on Martin Creek, where the present day highway 105 and road join, high upon that hill where he lays buried. He operated that tannery until forced out of business from lack of supplies, mostly lack of salt used to tan hides.
 
To continue the Moore story she says, "we made pants out of a parlor table cover of wool, dyed with pomegranate juice. Hats were made of corn shucks or palmetto. We used pomegranate juice or green pecan hulls to make dye. Rebecca Adams says ‘We need wool cards but there is none in the county.’ I have nearly ruined the cotton cards trying card wool making the teeth straighten, we are behind on weaving, but hate to ruin my cotton cards. I traded one hundred bushels of corn for three hundred pounds of sugar, but had to give twenty one dollars for a coffee pot and four tin cups. Mr. Caldwell wants one hundred dollars for a calico dress." 1861 Mrs. E. Jane Moore writes; "The drought and grasshoppers destroyed our vegetables, corn and wheat, our dependence for our life gone. Our supplies of food and clothing are all gone. We had cows and so had milk, butter and beef and wool from our sheep, but no spinning wheels and wool cards. Our men began to make looms, wheels and cards and I set in to make our clothes. I made jeans, blankets, comforts, socks, flannel quilts, sheets, bolsters, pillowcases, towels stockings and linsey clothes for the women. Our shoes were made from Buckskin and our hats were made from rabbit, fox or wildcat skins or woven from straw. We knitted or sewed at night, using our homemade tallow candles for light. We suffered from lack of bread, our diet lacked coffee, tea, pepper, spices or salt. I made jeans suit for my husband and a good warm suit for my oldest son who was far away fighting for our beloved southland!"
 
These is no doubt whatsoever that the majority of the new settlers moving into Texas and certainly those who landed in Montgomery, Dobbin, Old Dacus and new Dacus areas worked hard to have schools and churches available for every citizen. The town of Montgomery was beginning to grow and in 1837, Dr. E.J. Arnold, the builder and occupant of our present day City Hall building and the Peel family forefather, along with C.J. Clepper, bought a lot and gave it to the town for use by the Masonic Lodge and a public school. In 1848 a charter was granted, a building was constructed and the legislature incorporated an academy in Montgomery. That 1848 building was replaced in 1895 in the same location. The building stood about where the Liberty Street and Hwy 105 join. I am proud to say that I started to school on that building in 1924. School was held on the first floor and the Lodge held their meeting on the top story.
 
I read in the Southwestern Quarterly, printed in 1946 that the Masonic Grand Lodge of Texas held their tenth annual meeting in Houston in 1847. The resolution to devote ten percent of their revenue to education was agreed upon. Prior to that meeting and prior to 1848 perhaps the first Masonic school in Texas was that fostered by Orphans Friends Lodge No. 17 at Fanthorpe, Grimes County. That town is known today as Anderson.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 14
 

Despite the terrible hardships, tragic deaths, disease, hunger, Indians, war and despair, the parent either alone or together tried hard to give their children at least a tiny bit of schooling. Some of the accounts of how they tried can be found in the diaries and stories written before, during and after the Civil War and during the agony of reconstruction. One of the early schools in Montgomery was the Jones Academy, the teacher being L. S. Jones which closed during the Civil War. The diary of Delia Rose Harris tells how her family moved to Columbus, Texas in 1833 and her family joined in the "Run-away-Scrape". Returning to their home " her father left hunting work and in 1838 a man came to our house trying to find a place to teach school, only long enough to get the money to return to the U.S. he offered to teach us three children for room and board". In 1823- Mary Rabb says, "I left Jonesboro, Arkansas for Texas, traveling with sixteen or eighteen cattle, that being two cows and two ox and three tolerably large ones that would make oxen. We traveled about a hundred miles and our cattle got sick and we had to stop driving them. We finally got home and when our uncle got there with the cattle there were only eight or nine head the "Mureen" had left. Samuel Burch built a tiny school house where he hired tutors for his and his neighbor’s children as his father had done before him. Ann Coleman tells of coming to Brazoria in 1832. Her father had already come there to serve the Bailey family as tutor for the children, arriving there from England before 1832. Amelia Beck tells of leaving home at sixteen to teach at a boarding school. Fanny Beck says that from the time they arrived in Texas in 1850 until they left in 1863, their greatest fear was the Indians.
 
In our story of Old Dacus and bethel, there is much evidence that there were schools, both in Dacus and Bethel. Written proof that the Bethel Cemetery shared a fence with the Bethel Church-school house. This combination church/schoolhouse at Bethel was later moved a short way south of the Bethel cemetery on land owned by the Holmes family. There is also evidence of a school at or near Dacus because the County Records show "Mr. Uzzell is appointed to hold an election in the building where Mr. Kenny teaches." The Galveston Daily Advisor ran an ad in 1842 for a teacher for an English and classical school near Montgomery in the Landrum neighborhood. In connecting this to Old Dacus, we find William Landrum with his Mexican Land Grant being a citizen living near Old Dacus and being a devout Baptist amidst a great many devout Baptists such as the Wheeler’s, Lowery’s, Daniels’ and the large Uzzell family and supported by the fact that H.P. Fullenwider was hired as the teacher and that teacher Fullenwider was in Montgomery before 1840, we put the school on William Landrum’s plantation. Now read this and think about this further proof. In the book "A Texan in Search of a Fight, C.S.A." the source of information in the book came from John C West of Hoods Brigade who tells of the Trinity River Classical School. West was admitted to the bar in the early 1850's, but moved to Waco in 1855 when he was appointed headmaster of the Waco and Trinity Classical School, this Baptist Institution was one of the finest educational facilities in Texas and one of the forerunners of our modern Baylor University. It was from this Waco Classical School that H.P. Fullenwider was hired to teach in the William Landrum home/school before 1860.
 
The huge Gay Plantation joined the Landrum land and the gay and Landrum family also became joined by marriage.
A Classical School means; a work, especially in Literature and art of the highest and of acknowledged excellence. Relating to the classes of the Roman people, hence the highest rank, the classics, Greek and Latin works or authors." The William Landrum Classical School via Waco, via soldier, lawyer West and thus teacher Fullenwider, the school required Greek and Latin for the children of Old Dacus.
 
There are still descendants living of the Landrum and Gay families in or near Montgomery.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 15
 

While trying to bring conclusion the struggle our forefathers had, to provide education for their children, mention must be made of the popular and highly acclaimed Markey’s Seminar at Plantersville. This was a classical school and offered Greek, Latin, French, geometry, syntax, trigonometry, algebra, orthography and natural philosophy. The sessions lasted four months. It is not known when the Landrum’s Top-of-the-line school ended, but perhaps during the Civil War. The soldier West, acting as headmaster of the parent school at Waco, was the man who would have sent Fullenwider to William Landrum at Dacus. The advice sent along via the teacher soldier West placed and directed to the pupils who studied under these teachers was "Study hard and get your lessons well, for an educated man can make a better soldier, a better ditch-digger and a more perfect gentleman than an uneducated one." And so in conclusion about schooling, tiny, long forgotten, even denial of its very existence, Old Dacus may have completely overshadowed big, fine, fast growing Montgomery. What with its fancy classical school, its race track, its own Don’t-need-you Montgomery post office soon to come, its center for very important political meetings at the Bethel Church, its little wonder that the Old Dacus-Bethel community played second fiddle to none.
 
There are still descendants of the William Landrum settler of 1831, descendants of the Gay neighbor and still descendants of the Gay-Landrum marriage calling still living in the Golden Triangle area. Anna Landrum Davis Weisinger, a wonderful historian in her own right. Perpetuating the lifestyle laid out for his family to follow, there is Landrum Gay still living on Gay Plantation land, still farming and ranching. As was true of all Gay and Landrum descendants, these several generations later families pursued and worked hard in all education endeavors. They have not dropped the ball. (Since this part of the Dacus story was written, Landrum Gay, a dedicated church member who practiced his religion in life had moved on to the next level of mans existence, enjoying its heavenly rewards). The school census of 1854 shows the names of Old Dacus residents. There is Elisha Uzzell, William S. Taylor, and Allen Lowery, Uzzell having three school age children, H. Mitchell with three, G.M. Kinney two, Major Uzzell three, G. Dean four, Jos. Heflin three. In 1855, the parents with school age children were Broomfield, Talley, Welch, Gilmore, Rogers, and the Uzzell brothers. Other names who played a large part in the growth and life in Old Dacus that are named in the 1860 census are J.G. Cobb, M.E. Fralick, R.F. Oliver, T.J. Welch, E.C. Uzzell and W.S. Taylor. In 1870 we add the names Heaton, James Steed, Hannah Nugent, W.W. Forrest, J.B. King and James Jones.
 
In an account of life in Montgomery, Linnie Gilmore Bradley, daughter of Thomas Gilmore who came to Texas 1845, Linnie tells of her life after she had to leave her parents home near Longstreet, when she was ten years old she became an orphan and was sent to live with her Aunt Nancy Gilmore Gay. The Gay farm and called Gay’s Grove, was nearer to Old Dacus, but the only post office at that time was in Montgomery. She tells of dancing lessons learning the Square dance, the Virginia Reel, Heel and Toe Polka, the Waltz and Mazurka. Linnie remembered a big barbecue in Montgomery on July 4th, either in 1857 or 1858, when Sam Houston made a speech in which he kept saying "Stick to the Union, Stick to the Union."
 
In the "New" Montgomery County designated "New" as opposed to "Old" when Montgomery County was also a part of Walker and Grimes County. Commissioners Court in an 1854 session ordered that the county be divided into districts to establish public schools. We then must suppose that all schools before 1854 were established and supported by the community because the Court ordered taxes imposed and collected in 1854.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 16
 

The beginning of our present day school system probably began in 1854 when Montgomery County being a "new" county acting only for itself, established a school tax to support public schools. The county was ordered to establish school districts, at that time through number seven. Our subject areas Old Dacus and Bethel were in District Three, there was a special election in 1854 to elect Trustees. Taken from the school news printed in the Conroe Courier in 1930, the article says, "In 1836 the beginning practice of settlers to educate their children where the distance from the homes was too great to travel back and forth each day, was to hire a teacher in some ones home near the greater number of pupils. Sometimes the families took turns boarding the teachers. Also there was an occasional home owner who felt qualified to teach and thus opened their homes to day students or maybe one or two boarders." Three such boarders I know of were Linnie Gilmore who attended Gilmore School northwest of Old Dacus, Mollie Ferguson of Mt. Pleasant who boarded at the G. M. Daniel home and attended Hopewell School at Old Dacus. Lastly, Morgan Price, west of Montgomery who boarded in the home of Texanna Snow in the town of Montgomery.
 
In the special election ordered by Commissioners Court in a special term in April 1854, "Be it remembered on this 24th day of April, 1854, came to be acted upon the division of this Montgomery County into districts." Here the metes and bounds of the Districts one through seven are described and the court ordered an election to be held in District Three, Old Dacus-Bethel in May 1854. "The election will be held at the schoolhouse in which Mr. Knight teaches school." Elisha Uzzell was appointed by the Chief Justice to hold the election and since we have established with certainty where the Uzzell homestead was, we assume that school district number three included Old Dacus in the Bethel district. The State Census shows then the first distribution of school funds was made in 1854-1855 and the whopping sum was sixty-two cents per capita. Now compare those school days to that of today and it seems hard to believe. The total of the children the parents listed was nineteen in District Three as being of school age. On the 18th of November 1856 the court ordered the collection of funds to support the school. Prior to the court order for a public school system, the practice was that whenever someone who thought they were qualified to teach or hold a school they prepared a place in their home or building adjoining their home and set up a school. In the "History of Grimes County", David Thomas Jones and Newton Jones tell how it was done. They are descended from Thomas Gilmore who built a house on the edge of Grimes County called the Gilmore School and until a better building for the church was obtained, the Gilmore School was also used as a church. This was a common practice and was the way the Bethel Church-School was conducted. The Jones brothers remember "the children studied by candlelight or oil lamps and misbehavior at school meant two whippings. One at school and one at home." In the same "Grimes County History", Azalene McDonald Shead, tells of her family moving to Ulmer, Texas, "Just up the road a’piece of "New" Dacus". (Ulmers Switch was the location of a large community founded on large farms and a huge sawmill). Mrs. Shead tells, "at the age of sixteen, after completing the seventh grade. I passed the County Certification tests for teaching and taught one year at Pine Grove School at Applonia with Miss Eva Hill. The pay was $40 a month. Twelve dollars and fifty cents of this went for room and board."
 
While attending the Gilmore School, Linnie Gilmore tells of sitting on rough wood "slabs" on legs, using chalk on slates, studying reading, writing and spelling, all three subjects from one book. Later she had the now famous Blueback Speller, and the dictionary was also used as a schoolbook! As opposed to the unreadable writing of today, handwriting in that period of time was beautiful.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 17
 

Almost without exception, stories told by immigrants from other states, say schools and schooling stopped during the Civil War, and especially during the terrible reconstruction period. We know that George Daniel, forefather of one of our Texas Governors, came to the Old Dacus area about 1873. Although court records show that school districts were put into place and businesses were taxed for schools in 1854. And we know there was a community school in the Bethel area, I have not been able to prove a school in Old Dacus, but do have two clues. One is the story of the Nellie B. Ward Weisinger family of the Mt. Pleasant community, a few miles east of Old Dacus as the crow flies. Old Dacus had a large group of settlers by the time Mollie Ward was born in 1873. Old Dacus was beginning to pass Bethel in population by that time, but Bethel still had the only church and school that we have proof of for sure. But then we have the Mollie Ward story, "I attended Hopewell School where Archie Casburn’s home is now located (In explanation of this statement, Archie and Joyce Casburn lived in 1981 on almost the exact location of the future Goodin store and future Dacus Post Office, also very near the George Daniel homestead)she says; and boarded with the Reverend George Daniel family." While I branch off on related subject matter, don’t forget to remember the Molly Ward story of Hopewell School and George Daniel.
 
From W. N. Martin’s "A History of Montgomery"; There were 42 members of Austin’s Colonies that got land from the Mexican Government; William Landrum and Zachariah Landrum-1831-William Landrum wife, Nancy Gilmore Landrum, William Landrum and wife’s father were veterans of the American Revolution. William Landrum and wife Nancy Gilmore Landrum gave their daughter Mary in marriage to G.B. Gay of Gays Grove, a neighboring plantation. Another daughter Melissa, married Ilia Davis, the grandfather of Anna Davis Weisinger, Montgomery’s leading lady. Masonic Lodge records of 1840 lists William Landrum as owning 1-PALL-LAND T38000-the other property-3SL-35CATTLE-1WOODCK. I don’t know how to read the above except perhaps the 3SL means three slaves. It also lists the William Landrum survey in the Old Dacus area. In pre-Civil War days Gays Grove in the Old Dacus area had many slaves. There were at least twelve families of black people living in the Old Dacus-Bethel area in 1880 as found in the Montgomery County Library records. They were: R. Thompson and wife Lu, Henry English and wife Jane,son Henry and grandson Andrew. Jim Bailey and wife Amy, daughters Lulu, Dinah and Ann, Viney Sites and daughters Ann, Bell and Lora; Jeff Jefferson and wife Sue, and daughter Ella; R. Williams, Kit Jefferson; Pete Jackson and wife Lara; Brother Richard and sister Mollie; Dick Hughes and wife Rachel and daughters Rachel, May and Mollie and son Dick. Boarders were; J and Hugh Hamilton; M. Pinchback, H. Williams and wife Fan and two daughters Gus and Mag, two sons Sean and Lon. (1900 Census) Rob Cook and wife Lee; Tony Davis and wife Pearl; Henry Hutch and wife Carrine and son Erwin; Ben Linton and wife Mollie and sons, Mark, Prince and Charles, daughter Eva; George Jackson and wife Leona and sons General, Ardell, Ward and Willie, daughter Rhody.
 
There is no doubt these were descendants of slaves brought to the Old Dacus-Bethel area by the first settlers coming from many different states East of the Mississippi. In the book "The Cotton Kingdom" by Frederick Law Olmstead, I found this item, In the period from 1852 to 1860, food for slaves and tenant farmers was figured to be $7.50 a year. Citizens without means to build homes and slaves of wealthy land owners went out into the swamps and forests to make "Boards" which meant slabs or planks which were hewed out with an axe, the only instrument available. Slaves were only sent to make boards on Sunday the only day off from the farm work.
 
Next week back to the new clue which I hope will finally prove there was a school in Old Dacus known as the George Daniel Hopewell School.
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 18
 

Reliable information about the Old Dacus-Bethel area can be gotten from two old-timers still living in that area. One is S.T. (Bud) Binford born and raised there, as was C.L. Martin, both still living there. In my hopes of proving that Old Dacus had a school as well as Bethel I had originally had only two clues, one was Molly Ward Ferguson’s story and later on there will be the story of George Daniel, while applying for the establishment of a Post Office at Old Dacus, gave his address as George Daniel, Hopewell, Montgomery County, Texas. Now Paul Martin and his father C.L. Martin always working found another clue. Questioning Bud Binford about his parents’ schooling, they found that Bud’s mother, Della Heaton Binford was raised within sight of the Bethel Church and school. She got all of her schooling at both the First Bethel church school which adjoined the Bethel cemetery or in the second Bethel school location a little further down the road on the Holmes land. Bud’s father, Bill Binford was raised at Old Dacus, some three miles south of Bethel, Bud’s family land was in sight of the Goodin store which housed the Old Dacus Post Office. To add to all of this exciting disclosure, Bill Binford attended a school, but he never went to the Bethel school where his wife went. To add all this up, we know Bill Binford went to school, we know he lived across the road from what George Daniel gives as his address and we know his family lived close by George Daniel. Now add the Molly Ward story and we are convinced there was a Hopewell school at Old Dacus.
 
In reading and writing about the first settlers to Texas it would be a hard call to say whether school or church came first to many of the people moving in. One of the accounts of a visitor to our subject area I found in a book titled "Daniel Lipscomb, a Journalist in Texas, 1872, Gospel Minister and Guiding Light to Church of Christ Congregations". He wrote and spoke to a vast readership and audience. He came from Tennessee to Texas, not to settle but to observe. In 1872, Lipscomb paid a visit to Texas still a frontier land, lacking many things, but determined to gather in small congregations to spread and strengthen their Christian beliefs. This Texas visit is a true account of Texas following the Civil War. In the story of the birth, growth and death of the community of Old Dacus, there were many people who could make with their own hands and limited tools, most of the things they needed to farm, own cattle, hogs and fowl and to raise their families. Lipscomb seconds this in his Texas visit saying "Each settler seemed to be his own Jack-of-all-trades and man-of-all-work falling back on their own resources for everything they needed," Reverend Lipscomb noted that Texans had a habit of carrying and using pistols and not uncommonly took the law into their own hands. This was probably true of our Dacus-Bethel area according to County Court records. I’m sure Lipscomb description of the people of the communities going to church is exactly the was our Old Dacus-Bethel people went to church in 1872. Lipscomb says, "It’s all very interesting to watch the buggies, carriages and wagons winding their way from different directions going to the meeting house. It was the fashion to go to church in a wagon, six, eight or more people in each, seated in chairs. Although we do not know of a building used only for church, Sunday school or school in the Old Dacus area, there certainly were meetings held in private homes. In a community that was home to such varied preachers and laymen such as Lowery, Wheeler, Daniel, Welch and Uzzell. I am certain as least prayer meetings and Sunday Schools were held. Preacher Lipscomb began one of his Texas trips on July 11, 1872 taking the Great Northern train to Willis, he traveled 10 miles further to Montgomery "A town of five or six hundred inhabitants with the finest crops of cotton and corn. Montgomery (and certainly our Dacus and Bethel area ) has land out of town priced at fourteen dollars an acre, and has berries, peaches, apples, pears and lots of milk and butter. Montgomery and surrounding areas grow an unbelievable number of insects such as mosquitoes, flies, gnats, ticks and fleas being the worst."
 

Old Dacus, Chapter 19
 

In the last chapter David Lipscomb, a Church of Christ minister and visitor to Montgomery and I believe Bethel gave a list of some of the good things and some of the bad in our area. The last part of his list of bad things ended with "a sly dig at religion other than his own," when he stated that all the insects we had, he thought the worst was the fleas, he added, "I have heard of the fleas breaking up a Methodist meeting, but I suppose it was before they got up a full head of steam, otherwise even the fleas could not have put out the fire." Other chapters in his book are "At Montgomery there is a small lifeless body of disciples, we say this of them as a body, though there are exceptions, especially there are some true and earnest sisters." Search of the records show that several men of the Dacus-Bethel area were in the committee that began the Baptist Church in Montgomery in 1850. The motion to establish the Baptist Church in the town of Montgomery was made by Elisha Uzzell, one of the earliest homesteaders in Old Dacus. Others of Old Dacus attending the church organization were R.F. Oliver, Allen Lowery and Burrell Anders. The true and earnest sisters that Lipscomb wrote of were Martha Oliver, Lydia Uzzell and Phoebe Rigsby. The lady that never let the beginning Baptist Church die at that time was a Mrs. Simonton of Montgomery. Lipscomb says "There are two brethren very capable of teaching and who have done much good in former years. Brethren Linton and E.C. Chambers. They have allowed their minds to be taken up with other things to the loss of interest in church. There are accounts of bear hunting, horse racing, politics, gambling, and more saloons than any other business. The Baptist offered me the use of their house, that of the brethren, not being well seated in which we preached several discoveries of the Church of Christ to small audiences."
 
Next comes the most interesting chapter of Reverend Lipscomb trip. "We went by private conveyance six miles out (the exact distance of Old Dacus) to a congregation called Bethany. We preached twice here to an interested congregation of young people. This group was built up chiefly through the labor of Brother Green Ferguson. The brethren gave us a good list of subscribers to the ‘Gospel Advocate’, the religious journal of the Church of Christ. Since the distance from Montgomery to Bethel is six miles and since the Ferguson family moved to Montgomery from Bethel and since one of the Ferguson boys, Everett married a Bethel girl, last name Curling and since the Ferguson-Curling couple had a son who became a Church of Christ preacher and twice preached in Montgomery and had his picture hanging on the wall of the Baptist Church in Montgomery." I feel all of that should prove Lipscomb was at the Bethel Church.
 
There was a great many huge impact happenings going on in our subject area at the time of Reverend Lipscomb’s trip to Montgomery and Bethel, a settler in the Old Dacus area named Warren Goodin bought his land there in 1838. Another Goodin, John L bought there in 1853. I found no information about either of these men, but they were probably the reason another Goodin, named James L arrived in Old Dacus in 1872 from Louisiana with his two sons Jimmy and Willie and bought land in Old Dacus. James had dissolved his marriage in Louisiana, leaving two daughters, Marvetta Rudd and Mrs. Elizabeth Holt with their mother. The Goodin family of Old Dacus left the most telling account of the settlement there through the descendants living today and their wonderful stories are ours to read. Paul Jernigan and Verna Johnson of Houston, grandchildren of James L. Goodin have given us much history. James Goodin’s land is just a "whoop and a holler" north of the land settled by the Uzzell brothers, Elisha and Major Uzzell. In that time, 1832, through 1880 maybe longer the road was known as the Montgomery-Anderson Road. One of James’ sons, J.L. Goodin lived within the memory of some us today. He worked as a clerk in the "Pet" and Lester Peel store in Montgomery. James Goodin and his wife E.E.A. Goodin and children created holdings in Old Dacus that would be called a mall today.
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 20
 

James L. Goodin and his two sons arrived in Old Dacus around 1872 about the time Geo Daniel was establishing his home and family in the same area. Records show that James Goodin married a lady named Moore, a descendant of large land holdings in that area. This lady had a mind of her own and signed her name all her life as E. Eddings Ann Moore. Her grandchildren have no explanation of why she always included the whole string of names. No one knows what the first single letter E stands for. All records of the family were lost when their beautiful stand-out home established by James Goodin and wife E. Eddings Ann Moore Goodin, burned to the ground.
Immediately after their marriage James set about to build a business complete with every facility to serve the farming and timber harvesting community needs. He built in time, a store, grist mill, tin shop, blacksmith shop, cotton gin and a sawmill. It seems reasonable to believe that the Goodin-Daniel families became friends and perhaps even business partners. Meanwhile E. Eddings Ann Moore Goodin began building the beautiful home they lived in and establishing garden, both flowers and vegetables. Their hospitality was extended to everyone and widely known and praised. The huge curbed well of cold, sweet water was on the side of the road in front of the store and every person was welcome to use the water. Talk of this spring fed well of water at the Goodin store is still repeated today, one hundred and thirty years later. The curbed well was still in place by the side of the road until a few years ago. When the widening and paving of FM 1097 W was scheduled to obliterate the well. Archie and Joyce Casburn objected to the destruction of the community land mark. Archie was one of the many old settler descendants living on the very location of the James Goodin various business sites and he and Joyce insisted that some recognition of the life giving well of water be made and their request was honored. In talking with Joyce Casburn, she vaguely remembers a visit by a lady years ago who came to her house and said she once lived there and remembered the well and the crepe myrtle trees. Joyce did not remember if the lady said she was one of James Goodin’s daughter who was left behind when he came from Louisiana or if she was a daughter by E. Eddings Ann.
 
The insistence by James Goodin’s to always sign all the initials caused quite a few mix-ups, but she prevailed for all the life we know of her. She was postmistress for the Old Dacus post office, but twice at different times and one time the Postmaster General thought she was a man mistaking Eddings as Edward. There is evidence of a family named Eddings and a family named Moore, but still no one knows what the E. In her name meant.
 
From 1872, James Goodin and his two sons began building their huge plantation style operation and certainly during that time they were joined in many parts of it, by the George Daniel family. Records prove that the Daniel family were of the same metal hands-on typed, determined to promote Church and school affairs in the fast growing community. Recovery from the horrors and subsequent poverty slowed or stopped altogether the desired business and social progress.
 
By 1885 though the Goodin enterprise was huge including his son Willie’s sawmill, adjoining his dad’s property. It is apparent that George Daniel, the father of ten children, born in that community taking note of the increasing number of settlers moving in, realized the trials of depending on the town of Montgomery for some of their vital needs. One of the most desired benefits the community wanted was regular delivery of their mail. Although Montgomery was only six miles southeast, the many streams during the cold winters and spring run-offs including Uzzell Brand and Town Creek, caused the mail to be delayed sometimes a week at a time. Since all the settlers left family and loved ones behind when coming to Old Dacus, this was the need felt most deeply. This is the point at which George Daniels decided he would add one more contribution to his community and friends.
 

Old Dacus 1872,  Chapter 21
 

The desire and need for regular mail delivery to the growing settlement known as Bethel and the rapidly growing Goodin Store enterprise was the first prompting for George Daniel to take action to ask for a permit to establish a post office in the Goodin Store. I feel sure that the death of the regular mail carrier from Montgomery to Bethel in an accident caused by a run-away team, while making a delivery helped to make up Daniel’s mind to act on the application.
 
Mr. Thomas a member of one of the first settlers was killed while trying to cross Town Creek, just north of Montgomery is believed to be the true account of his death.
 
George Daniel made the application to the Postmaster General in Washington, D.C. Although Daniel does not show on this application. The exact location where the Post office would be housed, we know it was planned to be in James Goodin’s store. Also in the Daniel’s application he boldly states that E.E.A. Goodin is the proposed postmaster, who we now know was Mrs. E.E. Ann Moore Goodin, or Mrs. James Goodin. It is obvious in further records that the Postmaster General always thought he was hiring a man! Also in the application he proposed the name Dacus for the new post office. I have not been able to prove why Daniels chose this name, but many records exist that show J.B. Dacus, a member of a very prominent Montgomery family had many and varied business interests in and around Montgomery. Mr. Dacus took a great deal of interest in the social, economic and political activities in the town and county of Montgomery. Daniel’s application suggesting the name Dacus may have been a dent of a common business relationship, prompting Daniel to name the growing community center after a friend.
 
There is a record of a business agreement between J.B. Dacus and L.E. Dunn, these two men were related and the partnership applied to a tract of land in the newly named Dacus area, where Dacus is to cultivate a crop growing on Dacus owned land in a manner for the best interest in both parties. Dunn is to pay half of the hire of three hands for five months beginning Jan. 1st, 1875. When the hands are idle, Dacus may use them to clear land. Thus, by this record we can deduce that Dacus was involved in the Goodin store area several years before Daniel obtained the Post office permit and there was in all probability both a business and social connection between J.B. Dacus and George Daniel, hence the honor of the name for the important addition to the new community.
 
The value of the proposal for a post office in the Goodin Store could not be estimated. All roads of that period were a problem. Each land owner that had a road or part of a road crossing his property by common agreement was expected to keep that section of road repaired. Spring branches and water run-off, creeks that overflowed their banks made high water a problem both winter and summer. Black land made bogging down mud for the horse or the team of oxen and dry deep sand also created problems for the ox, mule or horse used to pull the wagons or buggies. There is no record where the mail was delivered by Mr. Thomas before the post office was established in Old Dacus, 1888, but we know there was a designated mail drop a few miles north of the Bethel Church named "Guyler".
 
I was told of this mail drop along F.M. 149 by a wonderful lady, Mrs. Reed, who was raised a few miles north of the Bethel Church-Schoolhouse, although Guyler was perhaps four or five miles north of Old Dacus, about the same distance away as Montgomery, the route to Guyler may have had less bad weather hazards. Mrs. Reed said the mail route was called the "Star Route" and included the Longstreet postoffice which lay along the roads that eventually ended at Anderson, Texas.
Since the Dacus post office was not a reality until 1888, story of the progress of the Goodin empire and the people who made it so, should be told first since the James Goodin, his family and the first settlers who came before him and those who followed created and made the Old Dacus community a "self-made man" community long before Daniel added to its comfort and convenience. Not withstanding the bankruptcy at the end of the Civil War, James Goodin and fellow citizens starting with the Goodin’s arrival in the area circa 1873, built an unbelievable empire by 1888.
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 22
 

As James Goodin and his sons began to make their place a soure for all the needs of his family, friends and neighbors. I think the proper telling of his rapid climb to be the leading citizen of Old Dacus should be told by their great grandchildren, Verna Johnson and Paul Jernagin of Houston and his neighbor and good friend, Della Binford of Bethel. The following is the Lou Eddie Goodin Jernigan story.
 
James L. Goodin was born on Aug. 17, 1835 in Louisiana. He and his two sons, James, Jr., "Jimmie" born Aug. 29, 1854 and W.E. "Willie" (later known as W.L.) Came to Texas. Records show that James bought some land in Old Dacus in 1872. Earlier records reveal that Warren Goodin bought land there in 1838 and John L. Goodin bought land in 1853. No doubt there is a relationship between these Goodins, perhaps influencing James to come to Texas. James had dissolved his marriage in Louisiana leaving two daughters, Marvetta Rudd and Mrs. Elizabeth Holt with their mother. Around 1872, James married E. Eddings Ann Moore who was born in Alabama on Dec. 13, 1844. Her family were early settlers in the Old Dacus area. She was a half sister to David and Willis Scheffer.
 
James and his wife accumulated quite a bit of property. They built a showplace home, well known for the beautiful flower gardens and good water available to the public. It was located on 177 acres out of the William Steward Survey on the west side of the public road, they built and operated a general store, Post Office, a tin shop, blacksmith shop, cotton gin and gristmill. They also built a sawmill on adjoining property, which belonged to Willie. James and E. Eddings had three children, Carrie, who died as a small child, Lou Eddie, born Sept. 2, 1874 and John Louis born a few years later. Willie married Lizzie Steed and had three children: Foye, Glynn and Margaret. They moved to Houston between 1910 and 1920. Jimmy married Emily Pittman. They had seven children: Carrie, Flora, Clara, Herman, Ruth, Lewis and Sadie. They moved to Bedias in 1903 and then to Houston in 1919, with some of the children settling elsewhere. Jimmie died Sept. 20, 1939. Emily, who was born Mar. 22, 1864, died July 5, 1962. John Louis married and had one daughter who moved to Houston. Lou Eddie married on Nov. 9, 1903 to Willis Wilkerson Jernigan who was born Sept. 24, 1879 in Overton, TX. Willis was the step-son of E.E. Ann Goodin’s sister.
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 23
 

When Lou Eddie Goodin Jernigan’s father James Goodin died in 1904, Lou Eddie and husband Willis Jernigan were living in Fort Worth. Lou Eddie inherited the homestead and the couple moved to Old Dacus to take over the estate for her mother. The house was large and beautiful, furnished with the finest of the day. The twenty years they had spent there were filled with good and bad experiences. They were very active in Bethel Baptist Church, the school system and many other civic endeavors. After two crop failures and the home burning to the ground there seemed no way to make a come-back even though the whole community rallied to supply them with the necessities until a new home was built. Discouraged, the family moved to Houston in 1925. Willis Jernigan died in 1953 and Lou Eddie died in 1955. Both were buried in Bethel Cemetery where all their family members were buried.
 
Lou Eddie’s father James Goodin donated the land for the Bethel Cemetery. In spite of all their troubles and sorrows they lived beautiful lives and were respected and loved by all who knew them.
 
Paul and Vera still have a genuine attachment to the Old Dacus homeplace and wish to submit this history in honor of their parents and grandparents. A wonderful version of the James and E.E.Ann Goodin lifestyle is written by Della Heaton Binford born and raised almost within arms length of the Bethel Church, schoolhouse and cemetery. Only a beautiful woman, beautiful in both physical and spiritual way, also the mother of a very large, wonderful family, who loved everything beautiful, as her letter will show. Her husband Bill Binford was raised about three miles south of her where the James Goodin family lived and where Old Dacus officially became Dacus. Both Heaton and Binford descendants still live in the Bethel and Old Dacus area. Another pioneer resident of Old Dacus who lives on the old community of Bethel and obituary of Mrs. Lizzie Brister who’s home was midway between the two communities.
 
06-20-1957, Mrs. Lizzie Brister, Montgomery County’s oldest resident passed away at 2 pm, Thursday at her home on Route 2, Montgomery, near Dacus. Mrs. Brister died in the home where she was born, one hundred and eight (108) years ago. Her father John Thomas was born and lived his entire life in the same area. Mrs. Brister, a member of the Montgomery Baptist Church had been in ill-health for many years and had been bed-ridden for the past twenty years. (If I remember right, Mrs. Brister was one of the group of Old Dacus settlers that converged on the town of Montgomery to help finalize the formation of the Baptist Church in Montgomery. I am sure she was a charter member there and though she lived very close to the Bethel Church and was a devout Baptist she did not move her membership.) Funeral services were held at the graveside in Bethel Cemetery, near Dacus. Survivors include two daughters Mrs. Pearl Treece, Conroe and Mrs. Mattie "Ellen" Davis, Montgomery. (Although a Montgomery address is given, most of Mrs. Brister’s descendants still live in either Bethel or Old Dacus, but their mailing address’ had been changed from Old Dacus to Montgomery at the time of her death.) One son, Jack Brister, one step-son, twenty one grandchildren, thirty one great grandchildren and four great great grandchildren. Her pallbearers were all from the first settlers of Old Dacus, close friends and neighbors and like Mrs. Brister have left many behind still living in that area. The Brister, Casburn, Binford, Johnson and Oliver families never left home.
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 24
 

The united citizens of both communities pushed the Montgomery County School District until the Commissioners Court recognized the areas as separate. Bethel was called public school district #12 and Dacus was designated as district #39. The two communities had not been recognized as separate in 1878 and a list of schools receiving public school funds show Bethel or rather it is listed as Bethel Church receiving $68.94 for the school year for 1878. The Montgomery Academy got $59.43 getting less than Bethel Church school proving the efforts of Bethel to be as "good as anybody". The Willis school got $187.72, the probable reason that George Daniel and Clinton Nugent moved to Willis around 1895, the given reason for the move was to give further and better education to their families.
 
By 1885, the Goodin enterprise was huge, including his son’s sawmill adjoining his dad’s property. It is apparent that George Daniel noting the growing number of settlers who had gathered in the twin areas and also very aware of the lack of regular mail delivery from Montgomery, especially during the long, cold, rainy winters of swollen creeks and mud, hit an idea to help the whole population. George decided that there was a great need and desire for better mail service. The next step up was the creation of their own post office. Being a long time friend of James Goodin, in all probability a sometimes business partner, what better place to have the post office than friend Goodin’s store. The store, already the hub of any business or livelihood matters, this would be just another event in the everyday life made much easier to take care of on the trip to the store or gristmill or tin shop or blacksmith shop or sawmill or just a social visit to Mrs. Goodin. I’m sure Mr. Goodin appreciated George Daniels efforts to further consolidate his holdings into the complete answer to all of the needs of the two communities. (According to all of the research I have proven there was a school at or near Goodin’s Store some three miles south of the Bethel Church school.) The Ferguson-Ward-Wiesinger family story in the Montgomery County Historical Book tells us of a young lady, Mollie Ward born in 1873 in the Mount Pleasant community says; I attended Hopewell School where Archie Casburn’s home is now located (1981). This home is also located where Goodin’s store enterprise was located. To continue the Molly Ward Story; "I attended Hopewell school and boarded with Reverend George Daniel and family." A bit of interest of the social life of that time is her telling of being baptized in Caney Creek. This Caney Creek was a great barrier at times between Dacus and Mt. Pleasant communities and again became a problem for the two communities and later the Camp Letcher community. Molly tells of her brave disregard of the risks she took to teach school at Camp Letcher sawmill community. She tells of her marriage to Larkin Ferguson who was woods foreman for the Rice-Hardesty Sawmill, located in the town of Montgomery next to the "New" cemetery, on the Powell family land and the sawmill boarding house still standing. To stop the side track history, to get back to the wonderful story of Miss Molly Ward, who became Mrs Larkin Ferguson, the ceremony was performed by Elder Allen Lowery of Old Dacus, the son-in-law of F.A.B. Wheeler, the 1825 first settler of Dacus. It is all adding up to the Uzzell, Nugent, Lowery, Goodin area being known as the Hopewell School. I only have definite proof of the Goodin store area being known as a definite, all-of-its-own location and that is the copy of and granting of George Daniels’ application for a post office in which he lists his address as Hopewell, Montgomery County, Texas. As a conclusion a man who became prominent in more ways in one, had a school, boarding house, gave his address and the name of the school as Hopewell and the post office application contains affirmation, as required by the post office department by O.O. Foster, Montgomery, Texas Postmaster, that George Daniel lived at Hopewell, Texas.
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 25
 

The following is a copy of the beautifully written letter of Della Binford to Paul Jernigan, grandson of James and Ann Goodin. Only Della Heaton Binford cam make us see and almost smell the roses growing in Old Dacus one hundred and twenty-five years ago.
 
"Della Binford Letter"
 
Dear friends, Ada and Paul,
 
I was sp pleased to have a lovely Christmas greeting from you. We have, all these many years, counted the Goodins and later the Jernigans as special friends.
 
I can remember so vividly the beautiful, large farm house where the grandfather and grandmother Goodin lived with their two children, "Miss Lou Eddie" and John Lewis. They had a "garden", not just a common "yard" like most families had. A garden with framed beds, filled in the kind of dirt and whatever else it took for plants to flourish inall over that front yard. Mrs. Goodin had a pair of long snippers to cut roses and other flowers with. My sister and I sometimes went down there with our cousin, Mattie Scheffer, who was a niece of Mrs. Goodin. Mrs. Goodin ran the Dacus post office and general store there also. We’d go there for the mail, to buy different commodities (I don’t believe it was a grocery store). We usually went on to the house for short visits. I was in my early teens. "Miss Lou Eddie" was near the age eldest sister. She and her mother had a row of sweet violets that grew and bloomed each spring alongside the porch and a yellow rose vine, a Marshall Neil rose (if you please), that was the largest, sweetest yellow roses anyone could wish for. Honestly, that yard would make Avon never smell so good! The front gate had an arched trellis over it. In springtime, it was one cluster of pink roses from top to bottom. With the long garden shears, Mrs. Goodin would cut and snip off one for each of us-and was that way with all who shared the beauty of her flowers with her. I can’t remember what year Miss Lou Eddie and Mr. Jernigan got married, but of course I remember when they married. She was the type of young lady who had the grace and poise befitting a princess or queen and hew "handsome as a Greek god".
 
After that, 1910 on Christmas Day, Bill and I married and we saw one another weekly at our Bethel Church. Then finally, they were gone on to Houston. "Miss Lou Eddie" wrote to me and I wrote to her, not too often, but now and then. She got to visit with me once after she moved, and I visited with her and Mr. Jernigan one day in their Houston home. Both were in bad health then, but I did love that day.
 
I remember no dates, but from my early teens I do remember so many things, such as the death of Grandfather Goodin who talked to his wife by slate and pencil mostly. She was very fond of him and the least thing she’d write on that slate seemed to please him so much. In some of our visits there, I saw that too! I remember grieving with them when they lost their eldest and youngest sons. I was home with a house full of babies then or I would have gladly gone to them.
 
After I was about grown and Mr. John Lewis was a handsome you man, he asked me for a date. I was pleased, but my mom said I was too young, so I never did get to buggy ride with him.
 
Again, in answer to your request, oh yes I remember so well so many things about their marriage and years before and after. Anything I can tell you further, I’d be glad to.
 
Happy Christmas to all of you. I love every one of you.
 
Della Binford
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 26
 

When F.A.B. Wheeler decided to make Old Dacus his home there was no settlement near, no people and many dangers and obstacles to overcome. He had his family with him and he immediately got word back to Virginia, his home state that free land was available in his part of Texas. Settlers from all the states along the way heard and decided to join Wheeler. One of the newcomers was Allen Lowery. He came with a grant of land and after serving in the war against Santa Anna, he found, courted and married Ann, the daughter of F.A.B. Wheeler. Lowery quickly joined his father-in-law wheels in worship in the Baptist belief, he was very devout in his religion and was a charter member of the Baptist General Convention organized in Anderson, Grimes County, Texas in 1848. Allen Lowery and wife, Ann Wheels had two sons and two daughters the youngest child being a daughter Sarah Elizabeth, but by later request from "back home" relatives another name was added she became Sarah Elizabeth Virginia Lowery in honor of the grandfather Wheels family in Virginia. When Sarah E.V. Lowery was eleven years old the Civil War began at the same time, 1860, in Floyd County Georgia, George Mayfield Daniel, a boy of 14 years was baptized in the Chatahoochie River, Floyd County lay directly in the path Sherman’s target. Researching the age of sixteen and the Civil War in its third year, George joined an Alabama regiment and served until the war ended. His mother died when he was small and his father re-married , a second family of children hastened the departure of the first set. George, now past eighteen arranged with several families to come to Texas and had chosen to locate in Montgomery County. We have to believe they chose Old Dacus as the spot, because roads, travel and communication were non-existent and because within the third year of his arrival, he met, courted and married Miss Sarah Elizabeth Virginia Lowery. George already baptized into the Baptist faith was an ordained minister by 1873. The ordination sermon delivered by Rev. McJunkin also served to ordain George’s father-in-law Allen Lowery and presided in the same manner . When George and Sarah’s fifth child, son Carey was pronounced an ordained Baptist minister.
 
We have many accounts of the life of James Goodin was creating for himself and family in Old Dacus, but the only true person-to-person account I could find of the life of George and Sarah Daniel in their early days in Old Dacus is the family account, "The George Mayfield Daniel family in Texas" by Mrs. I.H. Devine, she includes a letter from the minister son Carey serving at times as a Baptist missionary in North China. It reads; "The following is part of my birthday letter to my beloved good father, just thirty-five years ago as a farmer-preacher was living in a log house in the forest of Montgomery County, Texas U.S.A. Seven years he had lived in this place and four children had come into his home during these years. By light of a pine knot fire he studied much during the hard yet happy years in the forest frontier home. God bless him and his companion with health and enable them by hard work and close living to keep "the wolf" from the door. The awful war of 1860-1865 had deprived them of an education. The child that at this time came into their home was the fifth and was during the coming years by five others. With a liberal heart and an energetic hand he labored to provide food, shelter and clothing and also education for his children and at the same time was used of God to supply spiritual teaching and inspiration to multitudes of people in every direction. This man was to one of his children a mighty man. He could build houses, clear forests, assess taxes, run a store, cultivate fields, was a school trustee and an earnest soul in preaching. He would sometimes punish a disobedient child but more often was blind to the wrongs or was patient in reproving with words. George Daniel only went home to Georgia to see his aged father. He came home to tell of the train how fast it ran and of the new day and new world outside. No one ever doubted the love of G.M. Daniel for his family; many times he called the youngest, when guests were present and proudly announce, ‘this is number ten’ he was proud of his family’s health. Once when he though he had pneumonia the doctor came and George said ‘this is the first time we ever had a doctor for disease’. All childhood diseases and malaria, so common were cured by home remedies."
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 27
 

The Old Dacus story seems to tall in the end that the two men most important in the story and most influential in the unity, good will and good spiritual life of the communities was James Goodin and George Daniel. They both landed in the Bethel-Dacus area about the same time and there seems to be many small items of news that connect the two men more ways than we know. George Daniel’s minister son Carey wrote a wonderful tribute to his father. He also wrote a beautiful letter of love and appreciation to his mother, and I being a female think her side of the story in Old Dacus should also be told. George Daniel, no doubt was all and more than his son gave him credit for, (but wait a minute, he didn’t have ten children!), he was a father and a good father true enough but being the mother of ten children is another story.
 
I’m going to print this son’s view of his mother here just because I think it’s fair.
 
Son Carey says; " Someone said that behind every good man there is a good woman" surely even George Daniel could not have raised ten independent, self-supporting sons and daughters without the help of a faithful wife, small in body, powerful in achievement, genuinely refine woman, meticulous in her manner of eating, careful in speech and carefully courteous in the manner of her day. She addressed her husband as "Mr. Daniel" to her children she referred to him as "Your Father" or "Your Pa".
 
In the yard she made her laundry soap in a large iron kettle. In the Fall this kettle was used to heat water to scald the dead hog to easily scrape off its hair. The meat was used to make the most delicious sausage, hand ground, seasoned, packed in cloth tubes, hung from rafters to smoke and cure. She had spare ribs, head cheese, hams and bacon. She canned fruits and vegetables in their season’s. The sewing and the mending was done by hand (remember there were ten children!). Carey writes; "Just thirty-five years ago today there lived a little woman in a log house on the banks of a large creek. The place was hid away in the forest’s of Montgomery County, Texas, a.k.a. Old Dacus. This little woman was a native of the frontier. She had seen the wild animals in plenty, roam about the forest and her cabin. She had just reached young womanhood when a young man caught her fancy and her heart. She was a five foot dainty blond, he was of medium height and brunette. Soon she became the wife of a poor homeless farmer. Soon her husband felt it was his duty to preach. These were not idle years for this good woman. She was the mother of ten children."
 
"Radways, Ready, Relief" and "peach-tree-tea" were favorite medicines. A stomach-ache got Radways medicine and a stubborn will got the peach tree switch. A toe itch got parched (roasted) sweet potato leaves, or sulphur, and lard. She practiced cleanliness and ten thousand childish cares and sorrows were lost at mother’s knees or in her lap. Always prompt with fresh "done up" clothes for her preacher husband to go to his appointments on Friday evening or early Saturday. She prepared three meals a day for her hungry crowd. Guests were unfailingly welcome and the patching and mending endless. She sang at work and Carey reveres the times he lay on the floor while she ran her sewing machine given to her by her husband’s Baptist flock. He remembers the old songs "In the Sweet Bye and Bye", "Nearer My God to Thee" and "Rock of Ages".
 
There were many more of those kind of mothers in that day in Old Dacus, but none could have received a sweeter more heartfelt tribute.
 
I feel sure there was a close tie between George Daniel and James Goodin in the Bethel-Dacus communities. Goodin’s store was the common ground meeting place for matters outside the church and school. Daniel was the minister among others in that area and in his son’s tribute to his father he lists some of the things his father was good at and one was "run a store". Goodin had a store and a friend George Daniel. In light of more story and evidence to come, I think a strong bond formed between these two men. All evidence points to both men being without parallel as to being a neighbor and community leader. Both men were blessed with the wife selected. By Mrs. Binford’s account, Goodin probably had a stroke and may have lain bedridden for a number of years. Carefully and lovingly tended by his wife. George Daniel surely helped as a minister.
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 28
 

In Chapter Twenty-six of this story we quote from George Daniel who raised ten children, saw them all grown and he himself lived in spite of all the beginning hardships lived to be seventy two years old, his wife lived ten years longer after his death, being eighty at death. In those days, life expectancy was much shorter than today and as quoted before, when George and Sarah received guests he would call in his youngest child, a girl named Zonetta and proudly announce "This is number ten". Descendants of George and Sarah Daniel are the authors of much of my material on the Daniel family. Their story tells of one of the few times, maybe the only time, a doctor was called because Father George was threatened with pneumonia, he said, "This is the first time we have ever needed a doctor for any disease.: Since the Daniel family moved from the Dacus-Bethel community to Willis about 1892 and since George would have been fifty, six years old, they were probably living in Willis when he got sick. While on the subject of disease, which George Daniel and family were just one family of many family living in the twin communities experiencing and coping with the same health conditions at the same time, all childhood diseases and malaria then very common were cured by home remedies, while childbirth is not a disease there were few options for women at that time, and for many families the children were born at two year intervals. Having the facts before me courtesy of the McDaniel descendants George and Sarah’s ten children were born in 1780, 1872, 1875, 1876, 1877, 1880, 1881, 1885, 1887, and 1889. All born in Old Dacus, six or more miles northwest of Montgomery a doctor from Montgomery, if called to attend a birth, would have traveled by horseback or buggy that is "if the Good Lord’s willing and the creek don’t rise." quoting from the written and recorded story of the Daniel family is the same story of all the other families of Bethel Dacus. To quote one from of the home remedies I read an article titled "Texas in 1840 the immigrants guide to the new Republic by an immigrant; cure for the bite of a rattlesnake".
 
Naming some remedies; as communicated by a physician and based upon his own experiences, "To the freshly bitten surface he applied a bright coal of fire on the end of a burning hickory stick and kept it there long enough to produce a deep blister. This cure was performed on a soldier’s leg and next day the man could march. As soon as the person is bitten the wound should be scarified with a lancet or perhaps penknife and any alkali rubbed in to it, relief is immediate. This must be the forerunner of using kerosene on the bite. It would be well to drink freely of weak lye and take a cathartic."
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 29
 

The article titled "Texans in 1840, or the Immigrants Guide to the New Republic --by an immigrant". Gave the remedy and cure for snakebite as communicated by a physician and based upon his own experiences. This "cure" had no touch of reality and perhaps was never read by our early settlers some parts of the "cure" were still believed and practiced well into the twentieth century.
 
I want to include another passage of the Immigrant’s seemingly great knowledge of Texas and the diseases of Texas. In all probability the settlers of our widely spread communities never read or even heard of this Immigrant Guide. I’m sure if they had they would feel as I do? What planet did this Immigrant live on?!
 
This article was written by the editor of two of the newspapers in Texas in 1840, probably the only two, The Texas Register and The Telegraph under the title of one of the paragraphs called diseases the editor/author states:
 

"The diseases incident to the climate of Texas are few, and generally yield easily to a judicious remedial course. Intermittent and remittent fevers are the most common disorders, and generally prevail during the months of August, September, and October; the rest of the year is quite healthy. These fevers are chiefly induced by long continued exposure to the sun, to great bodily fatigue. Occasionally by severe labor or by the use of unwholesome food. When the remittent fever assumes a congestive type, it is quite dangerous and is commonly denominated congestive fever. Females are but little subjected to these disorders as their avocation enable them to be almost constantly sheltered from the sun and they are seldom required to endure fatigue. Travelers who rashly venture to cross the prairies of the country under the scorching noon day sun are very liable to contract them. Those who travel early in the morning and toward the close of evening are seldom subject to those attacks and remain healthy. Male immigrants during the first year after their arrival in the Country are subject to these attacks owing generally to inexperience and carelessness. The immigrant too often immediately after his arrival engages in labors and subjects himself to privations ten fall more severe than he had been accustomed to at home."
 

The only reason to include this ridiculous writing is to have a laugh about what would have happened to this editor if he had undertaken to really immigrate to our early day Republic of Texas.
 
In 1872, when James Goodin and his sons began building their huge plantation style operation there was a large number of dedicated families who’s primary aim was to promote education and the progress of their church and social well-being. We know the names Wheeler, Lowery, Daniel Sr. and Daniel son of Carey were all ministers in the Old Dacus-Bethel communities as well as the husband of Elizabeth Uzzell, a Baptist minister named P. Greene. Then there was Rev. M.M. Welch born in the community and spending sixty plus years, plus visiting many out-of-the-way churches or home gatherings to deliver the Lord’s word or to conduct a wedding or help someone meet death. He was a mainstay at Bethel Church, but he could be called upon at Montgomery, Dobbin, Magnolia, Scott Ridge or any where he wanted or needed. All of Dacus-Bethel spawned ministers did duty at one time or another at the very determined community of Mt. Pleasant, a few miles east of Old Dacus and Bethel.
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 31
 

The Old Dacus-Bethel community seemed to produce more than its share of circuit riding preachers. All of those men were ministers and missionaries who worked hand-in-hand with their citizen charges to keep their spiritual life and care above average. Dacus-Bethel has another thing to be proud of perhaps because of the "Vigilance to duty" by the ministers, no record has ever been found of a saloon or place where spirits of any kind could be bought. Montgomery was the nearest town and it had the reputation of having a saloon in every other building in the town. Even David Lipscomb, the Church of Christ minister when traveling through Texas described the town of Montgomery as "a small and lifeless body of disciples. The very capable brethren have allowed their ministers to be taken up with other things to the loss of interest in the church," Drinking? Gambling? Politics?
 
Certainly politics were of great concern and interest in old community. Those members served on Juries, served as Road Commissioners, filled county seats and served as teachers and school trustees. There was much interest in political speakings and the candidates. The Bethel Church site was a popular spot for political speaking. One such gathering in 1878 was described by a Mr. Renfro, a barbecue was held, during the speech of a very unpopular candidate guns were drawn, knives were flashed but the speaker was allowed to leave still alive. By all accounts the second goal of the community was education for every child, the best they could obtain. In researching County records, it was shown that although all the inhabitants were not invited in the Baptist religion but written accounts of individual families shows a solid joining of minds as to education. One such account reads: Clinton W. Nugent was born on a farm six miles N.W. of Montgomery (Old Dacus) on 9-15-1865. He attended the county school for 18 months taught mainly by his father and lived there until twenty years old 1885. He was the main support of a large family. He married into the Carson family, large planters and stock farmers of Montgomery. Nugent departed from the "norm" of Old Dacus being a Methodist among Baptist. This account of C.W. Nugent and his early life in Old Dacus as written by a member of his family certainly shows that there was more than one school there. The general rule was to try to have some sort of teaching every three miles, about the distance a first grader was able to walk. The age of the beginner was different then and the first grader had to be seven years old before the first of January. The Uzzell clan, two brothers and their families moved just south of where the Goodin Store would be built in the future, both men playing a very prominent part in all aspects of the life in Old Dacus.
 
James Price sent me a copy of the County Court records for the year 1847 when the leading citizens of the town of Montgomery acting on the provisions of an act of Congress of the Republic of Texas, organized a church and school association. James H. Price, great grandfather of our local James Price was elected president. Old Dacus was too far to effect the community at the time and were still having to hold school in their homes. Reading accounts left us, about the effects of the Civil War, education both private and public had to be put on hold, but not our never-say-die Bethel-Dacus leaders. These twin communities kept on keeping on and later demanded recognition as public schools.
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 31
 

I have found no written record of when the residents of the Old Dacus Bethel community joined together to erect a building and designated a spot beside the building for a cemetery. In the book "Centennial Story of Texas Baptists" their story says there was only one Baptist Church in Texas in 1835 and less than fifty Baptists. Since we already had that date such men as F.A.B. Wheeler, son-in-law Daniel and the loudly devout Uzzell family in our story area, we have to believe Bethel Church, Bethel school and Bethel cemetery was more than a dream. The above book also states the Mt. Pleasant Church was established in 1838. During this period, the town of Fanthorpe, now Anderson was the nearest neighboring community to the west, was visited by Rev. Z.N. Morrell, a Baptist minister acting in defiance of the Mexican rule, visited Fanthorpe in 1842 and organized a church there in 1844 and pushed on to establish the Baptist General Convention in 1848. Without delay, Wheeler’s son-in-law, Allen Lowery became a charter member. This was perhaps the founding of the Bethel Baptist Church, though the church was not to become official until 1864 when it was admitted to the Union Baptist Association in Plantersville in 1864. The Rev. Isaac Park was the Circuit Rider type of preacher and was in charge of the Baptist Church in Fanthorpe-Anderson and General Convention at Anderson. Because Rev. Parks was very devout and earnest in his duties, he showed a great interest in the Bethel Church matters. He kept a daily diary from 1861 to 1875 about fourteen years spanning the years from the beginning of the Civil War through the hard recovery years. He tells of his visits to the Baptist Church at Bethel. Although the Bethel Church was not an early member of an association, it is proven that it was one of the very first gatherings of Baptist Believers.
 
Searching records I find that several men and women in Dacus-Bethel were in a committee that began the Baptist Church in Montgomery in 1850. This indicates to me that the residents surrounding the Bethel Baptist Church were strongly united and confident of the strength of their little church, so much as to feel they didn’t need to be recognized by anyone else. The motion to establish a Baptist church in the town of Montgomery was made by Elizabeth Uzzell, one of the earliest homesteaders in Old Dacus. Others of Dacus attending the organizing were R.F. Oliver, Allen Lowery, Burrell Anders, Martha Oliver, Lydia Uzzell and Phoebe Rigby. (Look back in recent chapters in this story of Old Dacus and read the obituary of Mrs. Lizzie Brister, died at age 108; died at her home near Dacus) which means Old Dacus. Mrs. Brister died in the home where she was born, Route 2, Montgomery. She was a member of the Montgomery Baptist Church. Certainly she became a member when her family member R.F. Oliver was there to organize the church. The Burrell Anders listed above is still talked about today by cattle and hog ranchers in the area, citing a well known location in the National Forest area as the Old Anders field a hundred and fifty years later.
As surely as there was a very first Baptist Church in Bethel just as surely there was a school in that building. When the county divided up into school districts, Bethel and the yet unknown officially Dacus was called District Three in 1854. The State Census shows school funds in 1854-1855 to be sixty two cents per capita. The Archives of State of the State Library of Texas shows District Three to have nineteen children of school age in 1854. Possibly the nearest school-church that has a recorded story of the way of life , is the Gilmore school, near Longstreet, north of Old Dacus. David and Newton Jones tells us that whenever someone in a community thought they were qualified to teach or hold a school, they prepared a place in their home or adjoining their home, and set up a school. The Jones Brothers were descendants of Thomas Gilmore who built a house and called it the Gilmore School. This building was also used for church services until a church was organized. By all accounts the pattern followed by many communities during those beginning years and certainly true of Bethel Baptist Church and school.
 

Chapter 32 missing [jhs]
 

Old Dacus 1872, Chapter 33
 

The community known as Dacus some six miles northwest of Montgomery was officially designated a "Post Village" in 1889 when a post office was established there in James Goodins store. Old Dacus had a twin community just three miles north up the road. It was named Bethel, we know that Old Dacus laid claim to post office, a wonderful well of water, used and loved by people for miles around, a store, a cotton gin, a blacksmith shop, a couple of sawmills, a grist mill and a beautiful showplace home with flowers of every kind, while Bethel owned the school and the Baptist church with many dedicated members. The two communities, so near and yet so far if you traveled by horseback or buggy or "rode" "Shank’s mare", the phrase used at that time to mean you walked.
Each community carried on their separate but everyday lives, separate yet joined and it seems happily self-contained. The different blessings made the different communities even.
Mrs. Della Binford ‘s letter of her memories of the store say she does not remember a grocery part of the store, most people of that day and certainly of a rural area such as Dacus, raised most of their food, a trip to a grocery outlet would have meant buying in large amounts such as by the barrel or hundred pound sacks. As in my own family, a trip to the markets in Houston was a twice a year affair by wagon, a camp out in Houston for several days while they sold their home-raised stock or produce and returned with a six month supply of their needs. When Montgomery County Commissioners Court ruled in April 1854 that Dacus-Bethel were united as school district three a special election was ordered and held in district three the site was to be in the "school house where Mr. Knight teaches school" no clue as to that location, but Elisha Uzzell was appointed by the Chief Justice to hold the election and since we have established with certainty where the Uzzell homestead was a good mile south of the Goodin store location. That should prove there was a large school in Old Dacus, surely it was the Hopewell School. The first division of school funds was made in 1854-1855 and was a whopping 62 cents per child. In that year, 1854, there, there were nineteen children, and the funds allotted was $11.78. To compare our schools today with yesterday is mind-boggling. As usual money, or the lack of it was ever present a copy of county court records owned by Mr. and Mrs. Harley Gandy show the County not only totally out of funds in 1888 but badly in debt. Only one person in the county was able to pay a penny in taxes that year that person being C.B. Stewart which he duly paid. One of the school fund records I found noted in an after-thought manner stated " schools receiving operating money in 1878 including Mount Pleasant, white school receiving $83.21, Mt. Pleasant black school receiving $147.41". If you locate the community known as Mt Pleasant today, you will not be able to vision there being that many people of each race ever being there. The Longstreet colored school got $113.12 and the Yell colored school got $95.10 both these reflecting the large population of descendants of pre Civil War slaves. Montgomery Christian Church only got $78.45 while though I believe there was a school in Old Dacus as equally large as Bethel, this account does not list a school district separate from Bethel and does not list funds for a Dacus school, it does list Bethel as receiving $68.94 listing it as being Bethel Church. On the Clinton W. Nugent story of his life in Old Dacus, there is the statement that The Montgomery County School District recognized the areas as separate Bethel being school district 12 and Dacus being District 39.
 

Old Dacus 1897, Chapter 34
 

Bethel School/Church building 1897, Dacus, Texas, January 4, 1897-Antonio Frank Jr. , teacher.

There are thirty three pupils and a teacher in this picture of the Bethel School. We must remember that a post office had been established in Old Dacus about three miles south of Bethel in 1818 some nine years before this photo was made. This makes me even more positive that there was a Hopewell School well in force by 1897 in Old Dacus. In light of the huge establishment created by James Goodin and wife at Old Dacus, there surely were many more school age children than those shown at the Bethel school. What with George Daniel, an ordained minister giving his address as Hopewell and with Molly Ward’s account of attending the Hopewell School, boarding with the George Daniel family added to the fact that Dacus and Bethel were later separated into two districts seems to prove my point. Then George Daniel applied to the Post Office Department in Washington to establish such, he said the post office would supply a population of 500. Of certainty the office would supply Dacus, Bethel and many more outlying homesteaders. An interesting note to this population number is the fact that when a petition was made to the Post Office Department to move the Old Dacus post office location to the new location across Big Lake Creek where the new railroad was coming through, the move being made some twenty years later, the petition said the new location would serve about 100 people. Although my able helper researcher Paul Martin never could "prove up" the Hopewell School. Paul interviewed Stanley "Bud" Binford, descendant of the first families of Old Dacus and the son of Bill and Della Binford, Mrs. Binford’s letter describing the Goodin Mall has been included already. Della Binford was born a Heaton whose family adjoined the adjoined the Bethel Church and Cemetery. Della went to school at the Bethel Church/Schoolhouse. Bill Binford her husband was raised in sight of the Goodin Store, three miles south of Bethel. Bud’s father went to school but he never attended the Bethel School. Both Paul and I believe Bill Binford attended Hopewell School at Dacus. That’s my story and I’m going to stick with it and now move on to the new post office and the exciting life of Old Dacus afterward.
 

Old Dacus 1897, Chapter 35
 

Old Dacus 1904

I will now attempt to trace the route of the Old Dacus post office as it traveled cross-county from 1899 to its end in 1953, when the New Dacus post office was closed and the mailed delivered from the Montgomery post office. Records from the National Archives concerning the Old Dacus post office tell the slow death of both the Old and New Dacus post office, which began with the death of James Goodin in 1904.

From the time in 1889 when the post office in Old Dacus became a reality, the social activity in both Dacus and Bethel grew at a rapid pace. Goodin’s Store where the post office was located had a double drawing card, but the Bethel Church had both a strong religious draw and became widely known for its strong stand and activity in political matters. Life in both communities seemed to be good and the habits of self-sufficiency was the rule of life. Church, Sunday School. “Dinner on the Ground” political rallies, “play parties” where the girls packed special box suppers that were bid for by their would-be boy friends. Protracted church meetings, brush-arbor meetings held by religious groups other than the totally Baptist Bethel Church, as to school activity accelerated, the local county paper, now known as the Conroe Courier encouraged writers of the two communities to relay the news of those residents and although none of the writers revealed their names, one of the reports in that paper around 1900 had two reports on the same page one was “Dacus Doings” by Richeliu, dated 1902 which told that the “singing held at W.L. Goodin’s on Sunday evening was enjoyed by the young people, that the cotton boll weevil had already appeared on the cotton, but the sweet potatoes, sugar cane and the vegetable gardens were doing great! On the opposite side of the same page of the Conroe Courier in August 1902 there was the news item titled “Bethel Bits” by Special Correspondent. It tells us that Miss Belle Lowery and father have returned to Falls County: Mr. McLeods family were troubled with a mad dog last week, the dog attempted to bite Mr. Jones; Mr. Welch will preach Sunday and Mr. Jim Singleton ran away last Sunday, Robert Singleton found him near Dacus. Other Dacus Doings to appear in the Courier were; C.P. Welch who has been attending the Normal at Rosenburg arrived home Saturday. There were a goodly number of visitors at Bethel (Church) Sunday two many to list. Mrs. Atterberry and Miss Belle Pool were baptized Sunday, M Welch officiating. Mrs. Bell Lowery and son spent several days last week visiting, Mr. Tom Fost of Sulphur Branch is tearing away his gin (once known as Grey Brothers gin) and moving it to Bedias in Grimes County. J.D. Binford, who has been clerking in a dry good establishment in Tyler is at home for a rest. A young lady arrived at the home of Mr. and Mrs J.H. Goodin’s, Aug.2. mother and babe doing well. Quite a crowd of young people attended the dance at Mrs. Foster’s near Montgomery Friday night, they must have had a huge time as it was daylight Saturday morning when they arrived home. A report from the Bethel Bits says that continued rains had all the creeks on the rise, fences washed away, cattle drowned and the bridge on Lake Creek washed away. Also some of the Belles’ were out persimmon hunting Sunday afternoon, no report on how many they found. Mr Jerningan son-in-law of James Goodin has a nice new buggy. A report from the news source tells of the marriage of Miss Annie Bell Binford and the closing of the school in Bethel. A much later news item dated 1924, the Bethel news item tells of Dr. Covington of Montgomery visiting the sick, among them being Mr. John Holmes and Leslie Curling. Also a Mr. Wells of Iola will teach a singing school at Bethel in July and a church protracted meeting will began in July. The newspaper items show that the two communities, so near or so far to walk ride horseback or wagon/buggy carried on their everyday lives separate yet joined and happily self-contained.
 

Old Dacus 1904, Chapter 36
 

Records from the archives reflect the tragedy and its effect when James Goodin died in 1904-Reports from people who knew or had been told show that Mr. Goodin probably was bed-ridden and had lost his speech. Mrs. Goodin nursed him around the clock and talked to him by writing on a slate with chalk. Reports say he got great comfort from her attention. James Goodin was sixty nine years old when he died and E.E. Ann, his wife was the same age. When it was all over for Mr. Goodin, the store, the post office, the grist mill, sawmill and many other types of services were left to her at close to seventy years old. She knew she could not take care of it all and the first move she made was to prevail on a friend who had a close tie through the sawmill business, to take over the Dacus post office. Walter T. Taylor operated a large sawmill "Town" two and a half miles west of Goodin’s Store. The mill site was near the Bill and Della Heaton Binford home. Their son, Bud Binford, living on the old homestead site, often took his boys to visit the old Taylor sawmill site and found a brass post office box key probably the one piece of evidence of the existence of the Dacus post office still around. Archive records show Walter Taylor operated the post office from April 1904 to Jan. 1907. Apparently John L. Goodin decided he wanted to be a postmaster and took over Dacus still situated at Taylor’s Mill. He only lasted from Jan. 23, 1907 to April 24, 1907. At that point his mother E.E. Ann Goodin. Stepped back into the job. She seemed to have gained some strength and energy, but I’m sure the deciding in again assuming the job of "postmaster" again was in the marriage of her daughter, Lou Eddie to Willis Jernigan. They were married in Montgomery and Mrs. Binford describes the wedding in her letter in previous chapters. The couple married in 1903 and lived in East Texas, where Mr. Jernigan was born. When Lou Eddie Jernigan’s father died in 1904, they knew they should move to Dacus and take over the huge Goodin’s enterprise. Since the brother John L., didn’t want to be postmaster, his mother took over that job and turned the rest of the Goodin business over to her daughter and son-in-law. Mrs. E.E.A. Goodin operated the post office at the Taylor Mill site from April 24, 1907 to April 6, 1912.
 
There were many changes in the Old-New Dacus area. In the history of Grimes County by James L. Montgomery, he writes: Richards a town several miles north of the New Dacus post office was born July 1st, 1907 when the first Trinity and Brazos Valley (T&BV) passenger train came down the line from Dallas. There had been a few earlier freight trains to struggle down the line and even one previous interrupted passenger train as early as Jan. 28, 1907, but there were bridges to repair and track to re-engineer before that momentous day in July, when the uninterrupted trains came down the track from Dallas. This event and the foregone knowledge that rail transportation was a certainty was surely the cause of Walter Taylor moving his sawmill business from the East side of the treacherous Big Lake Creek to the safe from the overflow and mud slides west of the coming railroad. In rainy seasons and in winter Big Lake Creek kept those people west of Lake Creek cut off from mail delivery for days even weeks at a time. Eleanor Denn Lane says her aunt, Mrs. Carrie Denn tells of her brother Chesley Hyde trying to deliver mail from the Taylor Mill site of Old Dacus to people on the west side of the new railroad during the period between 1907 and 1912. On April 20, 1909, Walter Taylor made an application to move the Dacus post office from his mill site location near the Binford home on the east side of Big Lake Creek to the site of the new rail road west of Big Lake Creek. The post master general took awhile to approve this move, perhaps tired of handling the always on the move facility and because the nearest post office was more than three miles away and the most deciding factor being that the new location would serve more than three hundred people.
 

Old Dacus 1907-1953, Chapter 37
 

Records show that an application to move the Dacus post office from the Walter Taylor millsite near the Binford homeplace was made in April 1907. The application was not signed but states that the desired new location would be three and one half miles northwest. Evidently the post office department took their own good time because there is a second request to move the Dacus office dated June 20th, 1909, and this time the request was signed by Walter Taylor although he scratched out the words postmaster or proposed postmaster under his name on the application. Records seem to indicate that Walter Taylor served from 1904 to 1907, then turned the office over to John L. Goodin in Jan. 1907 then John L., turned it back to his mother E.E.A. Goodin that same year, April 1907. In April 1907, an application to the post office department styled as "Candidate" and signed by Walter Taylor applied to move the post office from Binford home Taylor sawmill site to a proposed new site being one and quarter miles west. Taylor also stated that the nearest post office would be at Vance, Texas. Apparently the application was filled out in June, 1907. This application required a map and gave the proposed site as being two and one half miles northwest. This second application did not require Taylor’s name, evidently planning to use Taylor’s first application after corrections were made. The first application said that one hundred or over population would be supplied. The second application two months later said that about three hundred would be served. Incomplete records seem to show that Walter Taylor held the office at its new site on the T&BV railroad and west of Big Lake Creek until the next postmistress was appointed in April 1912 a lady named Amanda Lipscomb. This lady was in office from April 6th 1912 to January 23, 1913 when George E. Denn took over. This fine man served from January 23, 1913 to February 21, 1918 when Felix Anderson took over Anderson acted as postmaster from 1918 to 1924 and moved on for Louis Lipscomb to take over, he served from March 1924 to November 1927 and gave the office over to Henry L. Montgomery in 1927, serving in that office three years Montgomery moved on and Willie B. Whatley took over in December 1930, Whatley served until 1932 then Louis Lipscomb took over again, apparently Lipscomb was in for the long run because the records show that there was no change of postmasters in the New Dacus post office until Mrs. Carrie A. Doyle took over September 1942. Records show that Mrs. Doyle served from 1942 to 1946 and that William M. Doyle assumed charge in 1946. The records show that William M. Doyle was appointed by the post office department in February 1947. William M. Doyle served the New Dacus post office until November 23, 1953 when the New Dacus post office was officially closed and the mail was routed to the community through the Montgomery post office.
 
The move of the "Ghost Town" post office quickly saw many changes in the community on both sides of Big Lake Creek. Those on the East side were connected by a rural route out of Montgomery and that ended at Big Lake Creek on the East side. That creek could be depended on to stop traffic cross many times a year because of overflow or washed out bridges. The finishing of an all time travel road from Dobbin to "New Dacus" to Richards brought mail to those on the West side of Big Lake Creek either through Montgomery post office or by the train. There was a depot, a railroad workers boardinghouse a train watering station complete with a huge water tank (where the local teenage boys slipped by all the "watchdog" officials and their parents and went swimming) this Dacus post office both the old and new created much growth, pleasure, convenience, created a much larger social and financial era to a new group of the population of our rural areas.
 
The T&BV railroad and the trains that traveled it were blessings and also caused many problems. Animals, humans and vehicles fell victims, for lack of fencing along the tracks and because there was no stock law cattle and other livestock were killed. For a time, the mail carrier out of Montgomery carried mail all the way to New Dacus crossing Big Lake Creek whenever the creek would permit. A real tragedy took place in New Dacus when the carrier Jeptha Jep Davis, a member of a fine Davis clan prominent in many ways was killed by the train on the T&BV delivering mail to New Dacus. To describe this terrible incident I quote from a story in the Montgomery County History given by his son, Jeptha Boone Davis, he writes: "Papa was a mail carrier and delivered mail 30 or 40 years on a rural route out of Montgomery sometimes by horseback sometimes by car Papa was killed by a train while on the job delivering mail on December 3, 1936 at Dacus, Texas. His salary began at $100 a month." Mr. Davis left many strong, true citizens to the town of Montgomery still living in the Montgomery area.
 
This last page of the story of Old Dacus is to say good bye to a time and era forever gone and last I’m very glad my lifetime was spent in that era for I benefited beyond measure a benefit that is unexplainable and so unbelievable by the generations that have followed.

 

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