PROF A. W. ORR, Obituary, Smith Co, TX ***************************************************************** Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm ***************************************************************** Troup Banner, Troup, Texas, Thursday, November 27, 1924 PROF A. W. ORR CALLED BY DEATH MONDAY MORNING VETERAN EDUCATOR AND STERLING CITIZEN PASSES PEACEFULLY AT TYLER HOME; FUNERAL AT TYLER, INTERMENT AT TROUP; THOUSANDS OF HIS FOMER STUDENTS WILL MOURN HIS GOING; MOVEMENT AMONG STUDENTS ATTENDING FUNERAL TO ERECT MONUMENT TO HIS MEMORY. Prof. A. W. Orr is dead. Following a period of poor health of almost a year, and an accute affliction of some seven weeks, the veteran East Texas educator peacefully fell asleep at 1 o'clock Monday morning, Nov. 17. News of his death brings sorrow to all East Texas and causes to mourn for their loss the thousands of his former students who are now scattered thruout this state and many adjoining states. Funeral services were held at the First Baptist Church of Tyler, of which deceased was a member, at 1:30 p.m., Tuesday. His pastor, Rev. J. T. McNew, conducted these services assisted by Dr. Robert Hill, Pastor of the First Presbyterian church of Tyler. Henry Edwards of Troup, a former student and teacher-associate of Prof. Orr, delivered a brief address wherein he spoke of the attributes of deceased which made the beloved educator a sterling friend and peerless man. The pallbearers were those selected by Prof. Orr some weeks ago. They were all his former students, except the first who was a teacher in the famous Summer Hill Select School which deceased founded and for more than a quarter of a century conducted with such notable success. They were E. S. Gause of Mart, Clay Hight, N. W. Brooks, W. H. Hanson, R. W. Fair, H. A. McDougal and R. O. Collier. Following the funeral service in Tyler, the body was brought to Troup and interred in Bradford Cemetery, Dr. Robert Hill reciting a brief burial service and offering prayer. Many came from Tyler to the final rites, and at Troup another large congregation was present at the cemetery, most of whom were Prof. Orr's former students, and many of them having come from great distances. This writer loved deceased as a father, or as an elder brother. The thoughts that crowd into his mind now forbid that he try to offer an apprisal of the character of Prof. Orr, or to attempt an analysis of those great powers of mind and heart that for so many long years in the field of educational effort contributed so effectually to the enrichment of our great state and its educational social and moral advancement. Called to Dallas on ungent business notice of Mr. Orr's passing came in a telegram. Before the writer's return for the funeral he gave to the Dallas News the subjoined interview which is reproduced here, not because it is deemed adequate to the purposes we would have the Banner serve this matter, but to serve for the present. This paper hopes to publish next week a memorial page dedicated to the memory of Prof. Orr and the illustrious services which he rendered to mankind. ------------------------- From The Dallas News of Monday "Albertus W. Orr was born in Georgia in August, 1849. He obtained much of his education in the strenuous times following the Civil War, most of his advanced courses being obtained by hard study under adverse conditions and paid for by his own labors. He taught a term or two in his native State before he was 21 years old. Came to Texas 1874 "In 1874 he came to Texas and engaged for two years in teaching at Bellview, now known as Pirtle, in Rusk county. In 1876 he went to Omen, in Smith county, and established Summer Hill Select School, a private institution to which he gave the next twenty-six years of his educational activities. Summer Hill Select School served in its day the purpose of a higher institution of learning for all of East Texas. Many of the most distinguished men of this State were among its students. Governor Hogg, Senator Horace Chilton and Judge Robertson were among its patrons, sending their sons there to be educated. "The list of its students who are today distinguished in the affairs of State and Nation would be too long to chronicle. The late Federal Judge Smith of El Paso was a student of Professor Orr. So are Ex- Congressman James Young of Kaufman, Comptroller Lon A. Smith, Judge Ben H. Kelley of San Antonio, Stuart R. Smith of Beaumont, Judge P. O. Beard of Marshall, Judge Wright Moore and Will C. Hogg of Houston, George Chilton of Beaumont, Ben Chilton of Dallas. The city of Dallas and every other prominent community in Texas today have among their leading men and women of affairs students of Prof. Orr. Professor Wiley A. Parker, principal of Forest Avenue High School, Charles M. Moore, secretary of the Dallas Board of Education, are among his many students in this city. Judge M. N. Chrestman is another of his students here. Commissioner of Agriculture George B. Terrell and Secretary of State J. J. Strickland are among his old students at Austin. In fact, there is no field of professional or business activity in Texas but that contains many of Professor Orr's former students. On First Textbook Commission "Professor Orr was a member of the first Textbook Commission of the State, serving in that capacity in 1897 when the uniform textbook law first became effective. On of his associates was Walker King, now of the College of Industrial Arts. In 1901 Professor Orr was president of the Texas State Teachers Association, and it was largely due to methods of administration that he introduced that the body thenceforward functioned not only as a professional organization but as a business organization as well. Professor Orr also served during the administration of Governor Sayers as a member of "the State Board of Examiners." "Among the many illustrious women educator who did their parts to make Summer Hill Select School famous I now recall among the many who might be mentioned: Mrs. Joseph W. Bailey, who, as Miss Ellen Murray taught with Professor Orr at Omen. It was there that Mr. Bailey came to court his wife. Miss Kathrin Bell, sister of Judge Bell, at one time "Attorney General of Texas,: was another of the female teachers at the college. Another was Miss Annie Hubbard, a relative of the late Gov. Hubbard, now Mrs. A. L. Brooks of Harlingen. "Prof. Orr was a member of the Baptist Church. He served for ten years as County Superintendent of school in Smith county after his retirement from active college work at Omen. He married Miss Pattie Cross of Mississippi on Jan. 8, 1883. They had no children. For the last eight years he had given most of his attention to his property intereste in Tyler." --------------------------- The Negro Race Loved Prof. Orr Prof. Orr was a friend of all mankind. His hope for the advancement and moral betterment of the race lay in his hope that all should in time have a fair and equal chance to be educated. To the bringing to fruition of this hope he gave his best thought and best energies. In him not only did the boys and girls of obscure rank find a friend, a protagonist for their cause, but the Negro race as well loved him. At the graveside a poem was read by the wife of Prof. W. H. Hackett, she as well as her husband being prominent teachers of the colored race in the county. We hope to-------------------poem next week and tell of its origin. --------------------------- Old Students Will Erect a Fitting Monument At the graveside, which was banked with numerous floral offerings, some of which came from other states and many of which from sections of this state, some of Prof. Orr's old students informally conferred immediately following the interment, and it was in the minds of a number of them, a kind of spontaneous thought with many apparently that his students should erect a suitable monument to his memory. Space forbids that we here set down the names of those proposing this step or participatingin the informal meeting at the grave, even granting that we had all their names. But within a few days steps will be taken to get in touch with all the old students of Summer Hill Select School to the end that organized and concerted action be taken whereby the men and women of Texas who attended Summer Hill Select School shall have the opportunity to testify their love for their old teacher in the form of a memorial that will recall to this and future generations his life and his services to mankind. Loved Ones Surving Prof. Orr Prof. Orr is survived by his wife, two brothers and three sisters and a number of nephews and nieces. His brothers are C. P. Orr, Troup, Dr. J. M. Orr, Union Springs, Ala. His sisters: Mrs. D. P. Jarvis, Fort Worth; Mrs. Ida Pace of Troup, Mrs. Mary Turner of Gilmer. All were present at the funeral except Dr. Orr, the condition of whose health fobade his coming from his Alabama home. These are the children of Captain and Mrs. I. W. Orr, a prominent Georgia family who came to Texas and settled at Omen in 1876 shortly after Prof. Orr, then a young man had come to Texas to engage in the teaching profession. The parents lived to a ripe old age, passing only within the past few years, and their remains now resting within the City Cemetery of Troup. The death of Prof. Orr is the first to break the circle of six children. -------------------------------- PROF. A. W. ORR, DEAD (From the Rusk County News) News was received in Henderson Monday morning of the death of Prof. A. W. Orr which occurred in Sunday night. The passing of this man marks the ending of the earthly career of one of the most useful men that ever lived in this part of the State. He was born and reared in Georgia, and came to Texas in the early part of 1874, and taught his first school at old Bellview - now Pirtle - in rusk county. After teaching here for a short while he located at old Canton --now Omen -- in Smith county, and it was at the latter place that he organized what was well known as "Summer Hill Select School," a private school strictly under his management and control; and from the very beginning of this school it grew by leaps and bounds and was one of the really great colleges in East Texas. This school was patronized by people from number of counties, reaching far out into the western portion of the State. For twenty-five years or more, this school functioned in behalf of higher education and drew to it innumerable boys and girls who craved higher education, and thru the personal instruction of Prof. Orr the village grew into quite a village of educational renown, and many are the boys and girls that attend this school, who caught the glimpse of higher ideals of life and received stimulated ambitions to go afield in the different avocations and professional pursuits of life and achieve success that have redounded to the upbuilding of the country and thereby honored this man and the institution which lay as close to his heart as his very life. It has been a constant source of pride and satisfaction to this educator that many of his old boys and girls have made good in life, and his ever watchful eye was constatntly on his old students, and he rejoiced with them in their successes and wept with them in their failures. The influence of this man will live on in the principles he instilled into the lives of his pupils, and today, there weep all over Texas former students of "Summer Hill Select School," who give this man credit for what they have achieved in life, and his going closes one of the most wonderful careers of the early educators of this part of the State. His devotion to his life work was so marked that none could impute selfishness to his purposes or ambition. Let it be said that he fought a good fight, that he ever kept the faith, and that the life of service he rendered to his country will ever stand out as a beacon light to those who would come after him, and that, like the snow-flake--he has left his mark upon the sands of time, but not a stain. "Tell me not in mournful numbers, Life is but an empty dream, And the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem; Life is real, life is earnest, And the grave is not its goal, Dust thou art, to dust returneth, Was not spoken of the soul." ----------------------------- Editor's Note: -- The matter in these two columns and in the bottom part of the next column appeared in The Troup Banner of Nov. 20. It is reproduced here because it is desired to send this sheet to all of Prof. Orr's old pupils whose addresses can be obtained.)