This week’s article is going to be a little different. I have been searching a website called Newspapers.com and have found newspaper articles regarding Shelby County and some of its history. That is what I am sharing this week. One of the articles I am sharing this week was written by Mattie Dellinger’s Box 744 in 1978.  Enjoy!

Mattie’s Column

Shelby County is one of the original 23 counties of the Republic of Texas organized in 1837 after the Battle of Sn Jacinto. The county is in the pine belt of the most eastern part of Texas.

The Sabine River provides the east boundary line between Texas and Louisiana. Shelby County is adjacent to Panola County on the north and to Sabine and San Augustine Counties on the south. The boundary on the west is determined by the Attoyac River which separates the county from Rusk and Nacogdoches Counties.

The 819 square miles of Shelby County is approximately 170 miles northeast of Houston, 100 miles north of Beaumont, 60 miles south of Shreveport, Louisiana, and 185 miles southeast of Dallas. The county has an altitude range of 140 to 630 feet above sea level with a temperature mean of 65.7 degrees. (Much hotter than that right now). The county has an average rainfall of 50 inches with 245 days of growing season.

The greatest natural wealth of Shelby County at that time was its forest. Yet, little was done to utilize this resource until the railroads came into the county in 1885. A forestry estimation in 1880 assigned 425,600,000 board feet of longleaf pine standing in Shelby County: 1,884,000 board feet of loblolly and shortleaf pine in addition to numerous hardwood and heavy cypress growth.

By 1882, steam-powered cotton gins, grist and sawmills came into existence in Shelby County. The Houston, East and West Texas Railroad completed from the Sabine River across the northern part of the county to Houston in 1885 introduced rail travel to Shelby County citizens.

Timpson, Tenaha, and Joaquin sprang into prominence over the older towns like Center that were not included on the rail lines.

By 1890 the county’s population had spread to 14,365. There were 30 sawmills, a broom factory, a canning factory and 1,385 farms with some 45,000 acres in cultivation. About half of this cultivated land was planted in cotton producing 10,992 bales of cotton that year. There were some 33,000 head of livestock, including cattle, sheep, and hogs in the county.

E. B. Eddings owned the first grist mill in Shelby County at East Hamilton in 1872.

L.B. Palmer owned the only factory in the county in 1870, a loom factory at East Hamilton. In 1873 the first rock chimney was built at East Hamilton by Jim Payne. The rock was hewn out of larger rock. Until then, mud chimneys had been used. The first settler in this county was John Latham in 1817 at East Hamilton. In 1889 a college was established at Patroon with Leak and Bonner as teachers. The first drug store in the county was in Shelbyville owned by Dr. J.B. Bussey and John Rather, for whom Rather Cemetery was named.

The next article was found in the Light/Champion dated March 31, 2008

Speaking of the 1885 Courthouse, here is a description of its yard from a newspaper article in 1927. “There is not a county seat in Texas that has a prettier courthouse yard than Center. Other yards may be larger or smaller, but none are prettier. The writer has been in something like one hundred county seats in Texas, and nowhere is the courthouse yard as pretty as the yard in Center…” (Note: A search was made for this article but I was unable to find it)

“The sycamore trees in the courthouse yard were set out by Judge T.C. Davis, in the autumn of 1899. One night in the spring of 1901, a Billy goat belonging to a man named Hines got out one night and broke one of the tender bushes down-the one on the south side of the building. J.D. Redditt, who was an official at that time, went out, straightened the broken tree, placed in splints, tenderly cared for it and it completely recovered. The trees are now about two feet in diameter.

James E. Ferguson and Hon. Thomas H. Ball have both delivered political addresses under the spreading limbs of this tree, back in years that were reucus (sic) (Note: this is the way the word was spelled in the article. The word may have been raucous.) with the discord of partisan politics.

Shelby County, Texas swears in Officers

This information was taken from the Times (Shreveport, Louisiana) 8 Jan. 1927

Center, Texas, Jan. 7 – (Special) New officers have been sworn in for Shelby County. All officers are to serve for two years. F.C. Powell heads the county officials again, beginning his second term as county judge. His court is composed of J.J. Oliver, re-elected commissioner of precinct 1; Lee Creech, re-elected commissioner of precinct 2; G.N. Bagwell, re-elected commissioner of precinct 3, and Elmer Ross, who succeeds J.S. Taylor as commissioner of precinct 4.

Harry Burns was sworn in as sheriff, succeeding H.E. Holt, whom he defeated for the office. Walter Jackson of Joaquin was named as deputy and J.H. Hurst, jailer.

Other officers sworn in were Maurice Short, county attorney, succeeding E.F. McElroy, Tom A. Cook, re-elected county superintendent; C.E. Scates, tax collector, succeeding J.R. McCary; Dan Pullen, tax assessor succeeding J.T. McCauley; Wm. Beck, treasurer, succeeding George Brittain; B.M. Alford, re-elected county clerk; Clarence Sanford, re-elected county surveyor.

New officers for precinct 1, including Center are I.O.B. Parker, Justice of peace, succeeding J.J. Carroll, and George Estes, constable, succeeding S.L. Yeary.

Oldest Married Couple of Texas

This information was taken from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram (Fort Worth, Texas) Sat. May 7, 1927

Abilene, May 6 – The oldest living married couple in Texas reside in Sterling City. They are Judge and Mrs. J.N Kellis, who are parents of W.F. Kellis, editor and owner of the Sterling City News-Record.

Judge Kellis celebrated his one hundred and first birthday on April 20 last and Mrs. Kellis will be 97 years old next July. They were married in Shelby County, Texas, Nov. 20, 1848, and on their next wedding anniversary they will have been married 79 years.

Editor Kellis himself is past 73 years of age and is still actively on the job issuing the News-Record. The News-Record is one of the State’s oldest papers, having been established in 1902. The News was originally established in 1890 and the Record in 1899 and then they consolidated in 1902.

Arrested at Yuma

The information was obtained from the El Paso Herald, 25 Feb 1918

J.T. Swanzy, a special officer of Center, Shelby County, Texas, arrived in El Paso Sunday and left the same evening with Bob Rambin, wanted at Center, in connection with a complaint made by a firm in Noble, Louisiana.

The complaint was that 80 head of cattle were purchased from the firm and delivered at Center, Texas, where a check was given for $1665 in payment, according to Mr. Swanzy. This check, they said, was not honored at the bank.

Rambin was arrested some time ago by officers at Yuma, Arizona, and transferred to the county jail there.

When Harrison Was Made

This information was taken from The Marshall Messenger 18 mar 1921.

On a winter day, January 29, 1839, by the stroke of his nimble pen. President Mirabeau B. Lamar of the Republic of Texas signed the bill making Harrison County. Then and there it was born and then and there it went on the map as a county. It was cut from the ragged edge of old Shelby County. Texas has 23 original counties. This cut on Shelby made Harrison twenty-fourth. Maybe Texas has 258 now.

In passing, it is a pleasing bit of history to recite, too, that at the beginning of the Civil War, when young Harrison was just 22 years of age, she led all Texas in population, wealth, schools, and society. Her legal bar stood first, her doctors and preachers led and her educator’s ditto. Two things caused all this. First, the lass of her pioneer people, next, the opening of a new gateway into Texas.

Note: There will be an open house onThursday July 20, 2023, from 1-4 pm so everyone can see the new exhibit at the museum. This exhibit will showcase some early history of Shelby County and some of the builders of the 1885 Courthouse.  Be sure to mark your calendar for this new exhibit.  Hope to see you there!