Rusk County TX

Biography of Professor Charles Byron Smith

Professor Charles Byron Smith, principal of the Washington school at Muskogee, is a native of Rusk County, Texas, his parents being Lucien Drayton and Amanda Melvina Smith. The father was born in Buncombe County, North Carolina, and in 1852 re-moved to Texas. The mother was born in Tennessee and became a resident of the Lone Star state in 1836. Mr. Smith was a ranch-man farmer and early removed with his family to western Texas, where his son, Professor Smith, grew to manhood with scarcely any Church or school privileges but nevertheless was well instructed religiously and educationally, for when he … Read more

Slave Narrative of Johnson Thompson

Person Interviewed: Johnson Thompson Place of Birth: Texas Date of Birth: December 1853 Just about two weeks before the coming of Christmas Day in 1853, I was born on a plantation somewheres eight miles east of Bellview, Rusk County, Texas. One year later my sister Phyllis was born on the same place and we been together pretty much of the time ever since, and I reckon there’s only one thing that could separate us slave born children. Mammy and pappy belong to W.P. Thompson, mixed-blood Cherokee Indian, but before that pappy had been owned by three different masters; one was … Read more

Rosales, Manuel G. – Obituary

Manuel G. Rosales, 80, of Vancouver, Wash., a former longtime Baker County resident, died June 5, 2005. His memorial service will be at 11 a.m. Thursday at Evergreen Staples Funeral Chapel, 4700 N.E. St. Johns Blvd., at Vancouver, Wash. Manuel was born on Feb. 22, 1925, to Ben and Savina Rosales at Merkel City, Texas. He grew up in Anadarko, Okla., and attended school there. He entered the Civilian Conservation Corps camp in Oklahoma in 1941. In December 1943 he married his beloved wife of 61 years, Mary L. Castillo. They lived at Oklahoma City and then moved to Durkee … Read more

Other East Texas Indian Tribes

Of the location of remaining tribes we know even less than of the last, and can only record the few statements made of them by the early writers. Three leagues west of the Nasoni Joutel entered the village of the Noadiche (Nahordike) who, he said, were allies of the Cenis, and had the same customs. This location corresponds with that assigned by Jesus Maria to the Nabiti, and the tribes may have been identical. The site designated was apparently west of the Angelina River and near the southwestern corner of Rusk County. Similarly, the Nasayaya, put by Jesus Maria east … Read more

Biography of W. W. Harnage

W. W. Harnage of Muskogee is now living retired from active business but for many years was closely identified with farming interests. A native of Texas, he was born in Rusk County, on the 8th of January, 1852, and is a son of George W. and Nancy (May-field) Harnage, both of whom were born and reared in the old Cherokee Nation in Georgia but were married in Oklahoma, where they resided until 1847. In that year they removed to Texas, where they spent their remaining days and in the Lone Star state they reared their family of four children, of … Read more

Biography of Raymond Mills Spivy, M. D.

Dr. Raymond Mills Spivy, obstetrician and gynecologist with offices in the University Club building at St. Louis, was born December 25, 1880, in Henderson, Texas. His father, Judge William Wright Spivy, was a native of Alabama and belonged to one of the old southern families represented in Virginia, North Carolina and Alabama. The ancestral line is traced back to Aaron Spivy who came from Ireland prior to the Revolutionary war, in which he participated, being wounded in the battle of Saratoga. He originally settled in Isle of Wight county, Virginia. Judge Spivy removed to Texas with his widowed mother during … Read more

Slave Narrative of Phyllis Petite

Person Interviewed: Phyllis Petite Location: Fort Gibson, Oklahoma Place of Birth: Rusk County, Texas Age: 83 I was born in Rusk County, Texas, on a plantation about eight miles east of Belleview. There wasn’t no town where I was born, but they had a church. My mammy and pappy belonged to a part Cherokee named W. P. Thompson when I was born. He had kinfolks in the Cherokee Nation, and we all moved up here to a place on Fourteen-Mile Creek close to where Hulbert now is. ‘way before I was big enough to remember anything. Then, so I been … Read more