Paul Oliver Moss, Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana
Submitted by Mike Miller


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Paul Oliver Moss gave a third of a century of his active lifetime to the 
public service corporation known as the Lake Charles Railway, Light & 
Waterworks Company, and individually he contributed an important 
measure to the splendid record of public service made by that company.

Mr. Moss represents a family of pioneers in Calcasieu Parish, and was 
born at Rose Bluff, February 27, 1866.  His father, Oliver R. Moss, was 
horn in the same locality in 1836, and is a resident of Lake Charles at 
the venerable age of eighty-eight years.  He was a Confederate soldier 
during the war between the states, and for many years in business as a 
merchant at Rose Bluff.  He also served on the police jury, was public 
spirited in his attitude toward all community progress, and is one of the 
most highly esteemed citizens of time parish.  He married Marie R. 
Pujo, a native of Calcasieu Parish and also living.

Paul Oliver Moss acquired his early education in private schools, and 
graduated from St. Mary University at Galveston, Texas. During his 
early manhood he had a brief experience in the saw mill business, and 
spent two years as deputy sheriff under 0. J. Reid and two years as 
deputy assessor under C. M. Richard.

In 1890 Mr. Moss went with the J. A. Landry & Company, which 
subsequently became the Lake Charles Railway, Light & Water Works 
Company, Inc.  The Landrys held the controlling interest in the 
corporation, J. A. Landry being president and D. J. Landry vice 
president and treasurer.  The company has operated the Lake Charles 
Electric & Street Railway System, the water works, manufactures 
artificial ice and has also maintained the fuel yards for dealing in coal.  
It has been the corporation which has come closest in point of vital 
service to every citizen of Lake Charles.  On August 1, 1924, this 
business of long and prosperous standing was sold to the Stone & 
Webster Syndicate, which owns scores of public utilities all over the 
country.

Mr. Moss had an active part oil the various committees handling the 
war program during the World war.  From 1910 to 1912 he was a 
member of the State Board of Education under Governor J. Y. Sanders.  
Without seeking office, he has been prominent in the democratic party 
of his parish and state, serving on the parish executive committee and 
on the state executive committee.  He has been president of the Lake 
Charles Board of Trade, a director of the Association of Commerce, a 
member of the Knights of Columbus and the Catholic Church.

He married at Lake Charles Miss Corinne Landry, daughter of Dr. J. A. 
Landry, of West Baton Rouge Parish.  Eight children were born to the 
marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Moss:  Paul A., manager of the City Delivery 
company, handling ice and coal in the City of Lake Charles, and 
married Edna Hodges, of Ennis, Texas; the second child is Miss 
Vivian;  Claire is the wife of Harris Craddock, of the Lake Charles 
Electric Company, and they have two children, Harris and Marie;  
Marie was married to W. D. De Bordeleben, who is in the steel 
business at Birmingham, Alabama, and they have a son, William; the 
fifth child is  Miss Corinne;  Francis is with the Lake Charles Electric 
Company, and the two youngest are  Berenice and Eileen.

NOTE:  The referenced source contains a black and white photograph 
of the subject with his/her autograph.

A History of Louisiana, (vol. 2), pp. 31-32, by Henry E. Chambers.  
Published by The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New 
York, 1925.