Hunt Co., TX - News: George W. Childress, 1962 ***************************************************** This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb by: Sarah Swindell USGenWeb Archives. Copyright. All rights reserved http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm ***************************************************** George W. Childress Cast His First Texas Vote For Late Speaker Sam Rayburn By Lois Lacy Lewis A familiar and colorful figure in our town is George W. Childress, eighty- three year old retired farmer, part-time politician, and ex-Texas Ranger, who has made this section of the state his home since he came to Texas before the turn of the century. "George," as he is familiarly called, is seen daily on his short walk to the post office and in his favorite spot in the stores or on the sidewalk benches. His walk is slowed. The vigor, strength, and enthusiasm, until the past few years a definite characteristic, is less evident. Despite outward appearances, Mr. Childress is still very much alert to things civic in his town and country. He is a good parent and a good neighbor. His eyes kindle with enthusiasm as he speaks of his children and grandchildren and their activities. He visits his nearby neighbors and asks about the health and welfare of his friends. George likes to talk about the past, but he depends to a great extent on his good wife, Bessie, for the bothersome details of dates and places concerning their lives. George and Bessie Childress moved into town into the rambling old Aunt Tinnie Tatum house that they purchased in 1956. It is on busy "Main Street" near the business district. The place has room for visiting relatives. The house has a screened east port for comfortable sitting. Large shade trees surround the spacious place. A small garden is in the rear. The Childress couple extends their vegetables and flower plantings to the spaces outside the walks. Beds of flowers on the east side of the drive give pleasure to the residents and to the passersby. The seventeen hens in the Childress’ chicken yard were taking "sort of a rest" on the day the couple was visited for a talk. When contacted to tell about his colorful life, George said, "Well, let me take these five eggs out of my pockets." (The familiar dark blue overalls have roomy pockets.) George Washington Childress came to Texas from Ozark, Arkansas, and settled in the Pike community as a farmer. He returned to Arkansas and married. Two children were born before his first wife died of typhoid fever. George returned to Texas for a few years and lived with his mother in the Dulaney region—on the "Old Uncle Tom Harris’ home place. In 1908, he returned to Arkansas and brought back with him a bride, who was Miss Bessie Barnes. She was a native of the town of Barnes, Franklin County, Arkansas. The town and post office were named for her father, who was postmaster. Bessie was an assistant in the post office and George, while living there working as a rural mail carrier, met her. The young couple found good friends and happy days along with hard work that was a part of rural living in those days back here in Texas. George spoke of cutting wood in the Arnold Creek bottom with and for the late J.H. Lewis for $1.00 a day. Sawing huge trees into cordwood was strenuous work—and he learned the art of using a cross cut saw expertly. George remembers that the loan of a milk cow from the late E. C. Lacy, Sr., helped him and his young family when he arrived in Texas. He recalls that he lived on the Duff farm near Dulaney. George and Bessie have five children. They are Mrs. Joe Leggett, Greenville; Jess Childress, Celeste; Ferguson Childress, Mesquite; Charles Childress, Celeste; and Mrs. Bonnie LeBlanc, Memphis, Tennessee. The first Mrs. Childress was the mother of Cecil Childress, Grand Prairie, and Mrs. Ethel Vulgamore, O’Donnell. There are seventeen grandchildren. Older residents remember Mr. George Childress as a spirited speaker at political rallies. Politics were "hot" in those days in local, state, and national elections. The governors’ races remembered, to put it mildly, were controversial. No town, hamlet, or red schoolhouse was too small to draw a crowd to hear the virtues and vices of all candidates expounded. Mr. George has always been a Democrat. When he chose a candidate, he was voluble in promoting that candidate’s good points as he saw them. He talked of the days when he stumped the state for Joe Bailey, Jim Ferguson, and Mrs. Miriam Ferguson. He mentioned that the first vote he cast in Texas was for Sam Rayburn against Randall for Rayburn’s first election to Congress. George has been a supporter of the late Honorable Sam Rayburn all the succeeding years. He tells with pride of the time that he came home late one night, while living with his brother, Joe, at Pike and found a stranger in his bed. George crawled in and next morning learned that he had slept with a candidate for Congress, young Sam Rayburn. Mr. Rayburn was canvassing the country by horseback and as night caught him far from his Bonham home in the Pike community, he accepted an invitation to spend the night. Politics took hold on young George Childress. (And make strange bedfellows.sss) Mrs. Miriam Ferguson appointed George a Special Texas Ranger, a term for four years, with all the obligations and duties assigned to that office. Childress has many admirable traits known to his friends. He speaks feelingly of the useless habit of swearing. He knows the Bible and has been able in the past to quote whole chapters. In Arkansas, George belonged to the Freewill Baptist Church; at Pike he joined the Methodist Church, and later moved his membership to the Alliance Methodist Church, now disbanded. Mrs. Childress is a Baptist. Lives are too full and too complicated to attempt an adequate description. Mr. George’s life is such a one. Seven children to educate, his farms to work, Red Cross and other drives to sponsor in his community, election judge, and many other civic and family responsibilities have been his duty. It is little wonder that Mr. Childress is ready for quiet retirement. (August 31, 1962, The Celeste Courier)