Story of Mechanicsville, Smith County, TX Submitted by Audrey E. Pool, Madera, CA - September 10, 2003 (Anniversary to Ray W. Pool - Thirty eight (38) years today) Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm *********************************************************************** Story of Mechanicsville, Smith, TX Source: From notes of Harold O. Pool, dec’d, GRAVEYARD IS ONLY THING LEFT AT MECHANICSVILLE, GHOST TOWN By Ray Cooper (1939) Once Metropolis of East Texas has vanished. Utter and complete desuetude now haunts the site of Smith County’s best-known ghost town – Old Mechanicsville. Not one trace remains today of the thriving little manufacturing center that once contributed such a vital share to this section’s growth during the decade prior to, and the few years of reconstruction following the Civil War. Frisky squirrels by day and sly foxes by night now inhabit the hills and hollows of “Terrapin Neck” Creek, and the Mourning Dove whistles to his lovey-dovey where once the whine of the ripsaw and the scream of the planning mill joined their treble notes to the deeper diapason of a chattering flour and grist mill and the muted drone of a furniture factory in chanting a paean of prosperity for a busy little community which enjoyed a healthy payroll and was a recognized “metropolis” before Dallas was conceived. FOUNDING IS OBSCURE Long lost in the nimbus of dis-remembrance as O. Henry might have said, the year in which Mechanicsville was founded is obscured by contradictory recollections of persons now living who remember Mechanicsville only as it appeared immediately after the Civil War. It is generally agreed, however, that the partners, Messrs. Moore and Carter, put in the first sawmill there about ten years before the war. Old records have it that along about that time, there was a general hegira from the older states to the booming frontiers of Texas. Finding in Western Smith County a vast stand of virgin longleaf pine, the partners proceeded to install one of the largest steam engines west of the Mississippi and set about doing themselves a lot of good financially. It is quite in keeping with the assertion of many old timers that Moore and Carter gave the new community the ambitious name of Mechanicsville in honor of the Alabama town by that name from whence they came. The further fact that many artisans from Alabama, Georgia, and Southern Tennessee were to find ready employment in the mills, lends credence to the story of how Mechanicsville got its name. PROSPERITY FROM THE START From the very start, the new community prospered; thousands of acres of virgin pine, thick as bristles on a razorback’s flank, and as pristinely vestal as on the day of creation, awaited the coming of the axman. Towns were springing up all over the State almost overnight, and the cry was for lumber – and still more lumber. One of the early settlers of Mechanicsville was Uncle Johnny Barron (John Wood), and through the roster of those employed at Mechanicsville and the early settlers in that section, runs a long list of Barrons – mechanics, farmers, and in the case of Uncle Johnny, freighters. Mr. Barron found it highly lucrative to make the long haul over the Dallas-Shreveport road. He made many trips to the growing hamlet of Dallas, driving three and sometimes six span of oxen to the immense wagons of the period, loaded with East Texas heart pine lumber. Later, he added flour and furniture to his loads, but that’s getting ahead of our story. LUMBER FOR DALLAS CHURCH Lumber for the first Methodist Church ever built in Dallas was hauled from Mechanicsville in Mr. Barron’s wagons. These trips, old-timers say usually required about three weeks for the round trip. Sometimes three or four wagons made up the train and always the chuck wagon went along. The Texas and Pacific Railroad had not yet been built west of Shreveport and the ox wagon’s sole competitor was the Trinity River Waterway. Naturally freight rates were high and after every trip the comforting jingle of gold coins in his saddle bags compensated mightily for whatever hardships Mr. Barron endured on the trail. And overhead! –Well, there wasn’t any hardly, because after being outspanned each day, the oxen promptly refueled themselves off the lush grazing afforded by the prairies of Kaufman and Dallas Counties. SURPLUS OF POWER Finding themselves possessed of an over-abundance of power, their steam engine was a marvel of brutish strength in those days, and, according to descriptions, must have developed all of fifty horsepower, the Messrs. Moore and Carter began to branch out. The demand for finished lumber suggested a planing mill. It was built. Still they were not using all their power, so before the War, San Tucker, uncle of Mrs. Bertran Castle of Mount Sylvan, erected a flour and grist mill. During the Civil War, this mill was a bulwark of strength to the Confederate soldiers and it was zealously guarded against sabotage. Legend has it – but the chances are the story is pure fiction – that enough powder to blow the mill sky-high had been hidden in a secret place with instructions to destroy the mill should the Yankees ever draw near enough to threaten its capture. Mechanicsville was sufficient unto itself during the Civil War. Besides the mills, we have told you about, there were two tanning yards, the largest operated by a Mr. Herron (Herring) – (his pool of clear water was used for many a baptizing), and a smaller tannery run by Seldon McSpadden. Both were thriving industries and made this entire section independent of the eastern states in the matter of leather products. PR0FITABLE SHOE MAKIN The Human brothers, George and Jesse, were expert cobblers, and were very profitable employed in boot and shoe making. During the war, boots and shoes went ‘sky-high’, a pair of boots costing as much as $25. Shoes were proportionately priced. Those able to pay these prices went shod; pore folks went barefoot. And it was along about this time also that one Franz Lang, variously described as a ‘funny-talking German’ or ‘some other kind of furriner’ drove into Mechanicsville with not a great deal of worldly goods but possessed of a marvelous aptitude for furniture making. From all accounts, Mynheer Lang must have been somewhat of a promoter also, because it wasn’t long until lathes, planes and saws were turning in Mechanicsville’s newest enterprise – a furniture factory – equipped to turn out chairs, dressers, tables, looms and (they used them in those days) spinning wheels. Many a frontier home was furnished with solid oak or walnut furniture made in Mechanicsville – furniture so ingeniously dovetailed and put together with wooden pegs as to be almost indestructible. A few of these fine examples of hand craftsmanship are still treasured in the homes of pioneer families of Smith County. Some are still useful long after the 1880 products of Grand Rapids, Michigan – the “elegant Mahogany veneer” pieces with their “solid Marble” tops – have succumbed to the decadence to which all such flimsies are destined. JUST UP AND DISAPPEARED Little is remembered of our friend Lang who “up and disappeared after the Big Fire”, except that he was “handicapped” by a large family of girls. His life was gladdened, however, with the birth of a son, Theodore, in 1866. But his happiness was shortlived because little “Teddy” died November 3, 1874. Mr. LANG elected to bury Theodore in his back yard, which his neighbors thought was almighty queer. Notwithstanding, there was a Methodist Church in Mechanicsville, the family didn’t use it on this said occasion. A Catholic service at the grave, coupled with Mr. Lang’s explanation that he was burying “Tee-o-die” where he could always be close to him, further substantiated the belief on the part of his Protestant neighbors that the simple old German was slightly “teched in the haid”. Today the lone grave, tended occasionally by a Negro family living near by, is the sole physical reminder of the once thriving Mechanisville. Time as effectually effaced every other trace of the town. The land now is owned by the Mayfield Estate of Tyler and by Robert Yarbrough of Longview. But, as we shall see, Mynheer Lang’s avowal that he would live and die in Mechanicsville near his beloved Theodore is lacking in clairvoyance for it was only a year or two then until disaster swooped down upon Mechanicsville and wiped it off the face of the earth. Fire swept over 2,500 acres of virgin pine and, thought hundreds of men battled the flames for two days and nights, when the holocaust was passed, Mechanicsville lay in ashes. ALL WENT UP IN SMOKE Built close together as they were – to utilize the central power plant – the furniture factory, flour mill and saw mill all went up in smoke. They were never rebuilt. For a number of years after that, however, the community continued to hold together until, one by one, the families moved away to seek employment. Spasmodic efforts were made to revive the lumber industry but with so much timber destroyed by fire and also because the town was off the railroads which had been built by that time, the village gradually fizzled out and became a legendary town. Although more that a hundred men were employed at various times in Mechanicsville with payrolls running into several thousands of dollars per year, the town was never important as a retail business center. Old-timers attribute that state of affairs to the fact that the mills conducted a huge commissary which “discouraged” individual initiative in several feeble attempts to open general stores in the town. Mill hands bought from the commissary – or else stores in the town. MANY PROMINENT FAMILIES The largest families in Mechanicsville were the Barrons and the Tuckers. A list of their descendants now living in Smith County, kinfolks of affinity and consanguinity, would fill a bulky volume. For instance, to name but a few, there are the Smith, Starnes, Bradshaws, the Cates, Parkers, Coopers, Gimbles and Beasleys, the Niblacks, Laniers, Gibsons, Stanleys, Kellises and the Wootens, also the Carters, Dickerts (getting bored), Pools, Morrises and Rays, the Howards, Adamses and the Castles – well, one whale of a big family that would be mighty powerful politically if they’d ever get together. However, Mechanicsville attained considerable importance from an educational and social standpoint. The school and church were the scene of many gatherings when people came from miles around to attend camp meetings or singing school. MORE TRAGEDY Mich Ferrell and Runnels Knight, known all over East Texas as singing teachers par excellent, regularly conducted singing schools in Mechanicsville long after the mills had burned down. It was at one such gathering that tragedy blighted the happy social life of the community and marked the final decline of the settlement. Miss Onie Tucker, beautiful 17-year-old daughter of Jerry Tucker, one of the pioneer settlers of Mechanicsville, was organist for the singing school. She was engaged to be married shortly to a prominent young man of the community. On the night of the singing class, in 1891, Miss Onie was seated at the old-fashioned organ as Mr. Ferrell led the singing. One of the group, in turning the sheet music for her, accidentally tipped over a kerosene lamp. In an instant she was covered with flaming oil. She lived but a few hours. The site of old Mechanicsville is about three miles west of the New Harmony settlement. Gone are the mills and the fine homes. Dense underbrush hides the scars of the disastrous fire. Only miasmic memories of things long mouldering keep the tryst at Smith County’s old ghost town.