Freestone County, Texas History Dallas Morning News Sept. 15, 1968 edition Section: A; Page 27 Tolbert's Texas Bradley House Restored to 1860 Magnificence by Frank N. Tolbert "After I bought the Bradley House back in 1939 one of the town's oldest inhabitants asked me if I'd seen the ghost of Old Man Bradley walking around at night." said Lester Lee Col[e]man, who lives on Coleman Street in Fairfield, Freestone County. "Did you?" I asked. "Nope," said Mr. Coleman. "Yet you'll find some older citizens in Fairfield who say they wouldn't spend a niht in what they call The Haunted House." Mr. Coleman is now settled down in a new masonry dwellin next door to the 1860 model, Greek revival, 1-story, shining white frame called the Bradley House. L. L. Coleman sold the Bradley House to the History Club of Fairfield. And an energetic committee of History Clubbers, led by Mrs. Hugh Steward, organized something called the Bradley House Restoration Foundation and restored the place to its original 1860 magnificence. The Bradley House is more a jewel-like creation, not a mansion, although the ceilings are 16 feet above the broad planked floors. And it really should be called the Moody House. For, according to the History Club's records, it was built in 1860 by one of the Southwest's great 19th century financiers, W. L. Moody, who later founded the Galveston dynasty of multi-millionaires. W. L. Moody I was a well-educated young lawyer from Virginia when he rode into Fairfield one day in the 1850s. He settled there for a while because his horse died. He turned from the law (his first law partner in Fairfield couldn't read or write) to merchandising and made a lot of money. He built the showplace house on what is now Coleman Street for his bride, Phereby Elizabeth Bradley. W. L. Moody Jr. of Galveston, reputed to be one of the 10 richest men in the U.S. when he died in 1954, at the age of 89, was born in the Bradley House. Mrs. Steward and the other women on the restoration committee (Mrs. C. N. Williford, Mrs. Hugh Whitaker, Mrs. Tom Bonner, Mrs. Hubert Reynolds, Mrs. E. C. Parker, and Mrs. H. L. Wooldridge) have been puzzled by a carving on one of the two galleries of the house which reads "E. Moody, A. 22 1/2." I suggested that the former Elizabeth Bradley might have carved the letters after she married W. L. Moody and moved into the house at the are of 22 1/2 years. Maybe so. Anyway, the Moodys left Fairfield in 1866 for Galveston. And in 1869 Moody sold the house for $2,800 in gold to his father-in-law Francis Meriwether Bradley. Mr. Bradley died in the house in 1876, some time after his marriage to a third wife. Wife No. 3, about whom not much is known in Fairfield, lived in the Bradley House for many years. Then she just vanished for a while. "She left the house as if she were coming back the next day. A dress was flung on a chair and a bonnet hung on a bedpost as if she'd left in haste," said Mrs. Steward, who did much of the research on the history of the house. "There were groceries in the kitchen, sugar in the sugar bowls. An apron hung from a hook. Only she didn't return." Was she frightened away by some sort of apparition? Anyway, it was during this period, when the old house was completely furnished yet vacant, that it became known as The Haunted House, brooding in a grove of massive oaks, hackberries, and cedar. It turned out that Mrs. Bradley No. 3 had moved to Corsicana, where she died in 1913. To motorists driving through the perils of Highway 75 (on the last unfinished gap of Interstate 45 between Dallas and Houston), Fairfield is just a row of service stations and resturants. However, off the highway, the capital of Freestone County is neat and attractive. On Sunday, Sept. 29, starting at 2:30 p.m. the Bradley restoration will be dedicated and a historical marker will be unveiled. And after that the former (it is hoped) haunted house will be the History Club's museum and headquarters.