THE INSTITUTE OF TEXAN CULTURES
ORAL HISTORY PROGRAM
INTERVIEW WITH: Thomas Earle and lola Gentry (G, IG)(N CtYlCj c::;\s "n _\\1: ­PLACE:
Conroe, Texas
DATE: December 8, 1986
INTERVIEWERS: Janie and Walter Sargeant
JS: I'm going to ask you some things that you've already
told me bu~ we wanted it on tape. Mr. Gentry, what is your
first name?
G: Thomas Earle.
JS: And when were you born?
G. May 9, 1896.
JS: That makes you 90 years old. You're going into your
91st year. That's great. Were you born here in Conroe?
G: I was born about eight miles north of Montgomery on an
old road that's now designated 149.
JS: Had your parents lived here long before you were born?
G: No, not too long. My mother was educated in South
Carolina and came to Texas to visit two aunts. They had
moved out here prior to the war. And met my father and
married him. My grandfather was a captain of ...
WS: What was this, Confederate forces or something?
G: Confederate forces. Captain of Troop F, fifth South
Carolina cavalry. And he was wounded badly and died shortly
GENTRY 2
after the war and left three daughters. And her uncle was a
Supreme Court in the state of South Carolina. He
educated her and after she was educated, she carne to Texas
to visit these two aunts and met my father.
WS: What was her maiden name?
G: Her name was Caughman, Antoinette Boozer Caughman. Her
father was Captain Augustus Caughman and he's buried on the
cemetery grounds of the Lutheran church in Lexington, South
Carolina.
JS: And how about your father?
G: My grandfather carne to Texas along with his brother,
Uncle Fred (Frederick Browder Gentry), out here and was a
boy fifteen years old. He caught up with Uncle Fred over at
old Montgomery. They caught up with Sam Houston's army, the
battle of San Jacinto.
My grandfather and two white slaves, two white boys,
and five negro slaves guarded all the livestock animals and
stock --(mules, oxen, horses) during the battle. You know
that was all black powder and within a few minutes of the
battle you could see nothing. But they knew that, so they
put all of the animals and herds in circle~ to save them
until the battle was over. Then he swam his little mule (he
rode a mule there from Tennessee), he swam across there and
saw Sam Houston layin' under a tree. My grandpa wasn't a
great admirer of Sam Houston. (laughter)
JS: I guess history books paint them a little better
sometime than people that knew them.
G: Yes, he did. And later on in years, I joined a Masonic
GENTRY 3
lodge, and he was a Mason then and held the lodge in the old
Montgomery building, which I later became a member of.
JS: Did he see Santa Anna? Did he ever say anything about
that?
G: No. Right shortly after the battle, he and Uncle Fred
left and went back to Tennessee for a very short time and
then they came back. My grandpa built his home in 1853.
It's in Washington county between Brenham and Burton. The
old home is still standing that he built; big two story
home.
JS: You said between Brenham and what?
G: Burton; the town of Burton. They're off about a
half-mile south of the new highway between Brenham and
Burton. It was eight miles out of Brenham.
JS: So you grew up on a farm outside of Conroe.
G: I grew up on a farm on 149. Papa was a road overseer.
Back in that day, they had no way of keeping roads up except
to assess five days of work on every man that lived on a
road. They appointed an overseer who had the right to
summons them. It was right out through the piney woods, you
know, where trees and things would fall across and have to
be cut out.
JS: What would that be ... five days a year?
G: They had to do five days a year of service. Of course
most of them did a lot more than that because a wind'd come
up and blow pine trees across. That all had to be cleared
out. But my father was the road overseer.
GENTRY
JS: Did he do any farming?
G: Yes. We had a little one-horse farm. Raised cattle,
hogs.
JS: And then how about your schooling? Did you have a
one-room school?
4
G: My mother was an educated woman and she had a sister just
younger than she that stayed in South Carolina and married
and had a son just a year older than I am. And in those
days you had to buy your books, you know. When he finished
a book, he sent it to mama. And mama taught me until I was
20 years old. In 1916, I went up to Huntsvifle, rode
horseback across from myoid place up there to Huntsville,
which is about 25 miles. And got a place workin' for a
professor for my room and board. I slept on a cot on the
back porch. I did the milking and taking care of
everything. Of course, I had no credits as far as gettin'
into college was concerned. Professor Estill, who was head
of the college at that time, lived just above us, and I
brought his cow back to be milked ... back and forth with my
I talked to him about it and he gave me all the
questions that would need to be answered in order to get
into the college. He gave me the books, and gave me the
books that had the answers in it to be sure that I made it.
But I, fortunately, didn't need 'em.
Then in 1917 the war came along and I went out. Well,
a short time, I had hurt my ankle and some of the boys went
on in and I taught a little school in Williams County. I
GENTRY 5
taught up there and right after that, why, the draft was
comin' up, and I reported back here and went into the
service in 1918. And I was in the service until 1919. And
was commissioned a second lieutenant during that time.
WS: What outfit were you with?
G: I was with the infantry; 40th Infantry.
JS: It's amazing that you can remember all these th ings.
And then when you carne back from the war, did you go back t o
teaching?
G: No. Carne back and my father's health had failed and I
t aught one school; a little country school ouOt there and
went to work. My father's health had failed. So I worked
and supported him. Then in 19 I was working for a big
sawmill company. In 1923, I met my wife and we were married
here in Conroe.
NO: What sawmill company? What was the name of the sawmill
company?
G: Delta Land and Timber Company.
JS: Had they been in lumbering a long time or was that
something that started up?
G: The lumber company was headquartered in Kansas City and
they carne down here and bought a lot of timbered land, you
see, and was cuttin' that off .
JS: Had that been a long time before you joined the
company?
G: Well, yes, I joined the company about 1919, I believe.
WS: Did they buy the land or just the timber rights?
GENTRY
G: They bought the land and later sold the land to the
government.
WS: Is that where the parks are now?
G: Yes. The
WS: I mean the federal parks.
6
G: It's where the big companies that owned ... The government
bought it.
WS: The Forest Service bought it.
JS: When did you start your business? I understand that you
had a business.
G: lola and I were married in 1923 . I was workin' at the
sawmill at that time. And her father was old and wanted to
retire. And they were in business, so they took me in down
there; workin' for them. We were married in 1923. I n
19 24 , I went to work for Everett and Sons. And I stayed
there until I retired and went into business for myself.
JS: What kind of business was it, a clothing ...•• ?
G: Yes. They had a general store but when I opened it up,
right on the corner next to the Crighton Theater. I later
bought that building on the corner . I had a men's clothing
store. All the men's merchandise. (Called Gentry's
Store.)
JS: Did you have employees? I'm sure you must have had some.
G: Yes'm. Shortly after I went into business, World War II
came along. I volunteered and went back in the army. And
was commissioned a captain. Commanded a company and went
overseas with 'em. This company was 491 First Military
GENTRY 7
Police Escort Guard Company. We guarded and transported
prisoners of war. I was there until, for 46 months, when I
got home. And lola, my wife , took care of my business for
me.
JS: I was going to ask you who took care of your business.
G: She put a big sign at the store "Credit and her husband
had gone to the war". (laughter)
G: And when I got back she didn 't have much merchandise, but
she had merchandise around and that's ______________ , you
know. (laughter) She certainly did do it.
JS: And so you came back from the war and ....
G: Came back from the war and went back into my business.
When we first were married, I joined the Conroe fire
department . And we didn't have anything but an old push
cart with two big wheels with the hose on. I got hold of
the Ci ty Council, one at a time, and sold 'em on buying a
fire truck. After they made me fire chief in 1925 , I got
'em sold on the idea of buying a truck and they bought a
good one. It was a big American LeFrance pumper and cost at
that time, I believe, about $12,000. Now they'd cost about
80 or 90.
And then the next year I was elected on the city
council, on the board of the council. That was in 1926, I
believe. Then the next year I was elected mayor, and I was
mayor then until I went into the army. And Bob Carter, who
owned Carter's Drug Store was mayor pro-tern and served 'til
I come back. And when I came back out of the army, we
needed another well and some small paving done. We asked
GENTRY 8
for a bond issue to be passed, and we passed a bond issue.
One of the last big wells we drilled is one up the I G & N
railroad, side of the road.
there.
It's a big water tower up
WS: What was the population of Conroe at World War I time?
Roughly, I mean.
G: About 22 or 2300, I guess.
WS: It's about ten times that now, isn't it?
G: Yes.
JS: What was the main industry here then?
G: We depended on the lumbering business, yes'm. And then
the oil business came here. But just before the oil hit, we
didn't have any Chamber of Commerce. And I was very active
in it at that time. Myself and two other boys got up a
petition and went around and got enough men together to
petition it and we got a charter to the Chamber of Commerce.
And I just can't remember the date of that. I was elected
secretary-treasurer. The first meeting we had, we elected a
man named Patterson to manage it. And we hired a girl
named ... her name has slipped me ..• for $12.50 a week to do
our stenographic work. I was elected, the third man. They
elected Mr. Simonton and then Mr. Hickerson and I was the
third president of the Chamber of Commerce.
JS: You were real active in the community.
G: ... my life .•.
JS: You've dedicated it to the community. That's great. I
just can't get over your memory; how you can remember dates
and names .
GENTRY 9
G: I've always heard an uneducated man is _________ _
(laughter) We had an old gentleman moved in here from
Arkansas; bought a place right next to ours. He couldn't
read and write. But he could tell you everything that had
ever happened in his life. He settled in his mind ____ _
JS: He depended on that because he couldn't read, I
suppose.
IG: Tell 'ern how you got into college.
G: Yes, I told 'ern that.
JS: Yes, he told how he worked for the professor and got the
book ..•
G: Didn't need it.
WS: You had something to do •.. your uncle was in the Texas
Rangers. Who was that?
G: My father. My father was born over here in the home that
Grandpa built when he took Grandma in, in 1853 . And Papa
was born there. As a young man he got up .•• of course,
Washington county was getting pretty far out at that time,
although it's only about 70 or 75 miles from here. I
believe I said they went back to Tennessee but came back
very shortly. My grandfather met my grandmother, who was a
Shannon and the Shan nons founded the towns of Montgomery and
Dobbin. He had a league of land in Washington and
williamson counties. My grandpa died early and left my
grandmother, and she was only about 15 or 16 years old.
Grandpa was 19 years older than she was when they married
and he took her in there.
GENTRY 10
And Uncle Fred then moved on out to Bosque county close
to Hamilton. And the Indians were pretty bad out there at
that time. The government wanted him as a kind of
lieutenant to raise a little bunch to defend themselves from
the Indians. The Indians weren't too bad; they were more
interested in stealing horses. Horses was the deal and
guns, if they could get them. But they lay around in the
woods in the daytime, and at night they'd run in and try to
steal horses and things like that.
As my father grew up, he joined the Ranger Company.
One of the first episodes that came up, they .sent him out in
the Panhandle somewhere, and it was snowing. Said there'd
been a killin' out there and to investigate it. He went out
there and all the direction they had was it was an old road.
There was no road in that country at all. All the direction
they had was to let the snow hit his, the side of his face,
and carried him to this little place where these men had
killed each other . Over a card game , just the two of 'em.
Evidently shot at the same time. And he came back and said
that he tried to protect Texas Had a lot of
riffraff; people that were stealing and trading; stealing
and dealing with the Indians. And some of his neighbors
around there, they caught ' em one day and hung ' em in a
little place called Carmine. Carmine is west of Brenham.
JS: Is that a little town today?
G: It happens to be the town that Raymond Hamilton first
robbed that bank; the first one he ever robbed.
GENTRY 11
But anyways, later on, they caught a bunch of these
fellows that were riffraff around there and hung about a
half a dozen or more of 'em. My father was in on it. They
were boys , sons, that he had gone in swimming with on
Saturday when they went to the grist mill. And he didn't
like that . Saturdays were the days that •••.. My Uncle Fred
built his mill around a little stream of water, the Bosque
river was in there; a little stream of water . Put a water
wheel on it to run his grist mill. It's a little place,
Norris; Gentry's mill site is still there.
JS : Is that right?
G: Uncle Fred and them . Anne and them were up through
there. I never have been to the place, but they were not
able to find Uncle Fred's grave.
IG: There ' s a Gentry's Mill cemetery there but we could not
find his grave.
place.
I imagine he's buried on his own home
G: That's what they used to do; were buried on their own
home place.
IG: Why don ' t you tell them about when Grandad was a Texas
Ranger and Temple Houston came through Amarillo and he had
to get him off the train?
G: That's right. I don't remember what town it was up
there. Temple Houston* came up there on the train for
someth i ng.
IG: He was trying cases in Denver and came back through
Amarillo and was drunk. And Grandfather had to take him
*Sam Houston's youngest son.
GENTRY 12
off the train. They wired him t o meet the train and get
Temple Houston off the train. And he was drunker than
Cooter Brown. Temple Houston gave my grandfather a
beautiful buffalo robe for taking care of him.
JS: For goodness sake! Isn't that interesting?
I'd like to get back to your memo ries of Conroe when
you were in business; first started business.
has changed now.
I'm sure it
G: Well, you know Conroe has been close to my heart almost
from the beginning. It was the first county seat and that
was the head of our government. I've loved our government
always. I had an uncle that had married, Yeager(?)
Williams, had married my aunt Louise. And she had two sons,
one about a year and a half or two years older than me, and
one about four years older, I guess. They lived in
Montgomery. They were both school teachers. Graduated from
Blinn college over in Brenham, which is still there. Aunt
Louise died in 1900; died from slow fever, which was typhoid
fever at that time. These two boys moved in with my
grandfather and grandmother and they lived on a section of
what's known as the old Stewart place, outside of
Montgomery. Captain Stewart was one of the signers of the
Declaration of Independence. In fact, the draft for the
Independence was drawn in a little log cabin on his place.
And they all gathered together over at Washington-on-the­Brazos
to ratify it. But it was drafted there at Captain
Stewart's.
My grandfather bought a place in 1889 or 1890, I just
GENTRY 13
forgot, he bought a place and moved from Washington county
over here. He loved to hunt and there was a lot of deer
here at the time. He first bought the place out where we
were living, about eight or nine miles north of Montgomery.
And then he moved down there to this place which is--they've
got a regular little shopping center on part of it across
the road down from the old home place.
JS: When you owned your business, I would like to know what
was your typical working day then?
G: I got up at six o'clock in the morning. We opened up the
store about seven o 'clock. That was before, ,when I first
went to work at Everett's. I swept out and cleaned the
fruit up and got the cheeses out, sacked up some sugar.
Sugar was all -- beans and rice and everything were in big
bins, you know. We'd sell anybody a dime's worth or a
dollar's worth. Then I stayed there 'til 1929. In 1929, I
sold out to my brother- in-law. He had a son who was comin'
into the business. And so I sold out and rented this
building on the corner and put i n this men's clothing
store.
I did the same thing. We got up about 5:30, 6:00
o'clock. I always fixed my breakfast and I went down there
and opened up; cleaned up. Washed the windows and
re-decorated. I did most of it myself. I had one extra man
with me.
JS: What time would you open up for business?
G: When I went down there to work.
JS: Early in the morning.
GENTRY
G: Yes, ma'am. And we closed up about six o'clock.
WS : Was Saturday night your big night then?
14
G: Yes. Saturday all day was our . •• we looked for Saturdays .
And I have lived to see the day it was the quietest day in
the week.
JS: It changed , completely.
G: Yes. People just ... they used to come to town. People
that had cars would come to town and park and watch the
people parade up and down the streets. It was a great
get-together.
WS: Did you have band concerts or anything, Saturday night?
G: Yeah. The way you could get together. We always had our
decorations. I remember I was in the Chamber of Commerce,
working my head off, and you know, we didn't have any police
department . We hired a patrolman. Every merchant put in
five or ten dollars a month. There was a boy named Reagan
Smith, they was in the business here, too, and myself and
one or two other boys. The first of the month, we'd go
around and collect our police money. So we could pay the
night watchman.
JS : Did you have many problems of robberies and that sort of
thing?
G: We had a good many problems.
JS: Is that right? I'm surprised. I thought back then ..
G: Well, it was just a sawmi ll town and people would come in
there broke. We'd catch most of 'em.
WS: Did you have a jail?
G: Yes sir, we had a jail sittin' right where the First
GENTRY 15
National Bank is settin' noW. The jail was on that .• and
the library.
WS: Is this the county seat? This is not the county seat,
is it?
IG: Not now. It was.
G: Yes sir. Before my time. The county seat was in
Montgomery. Conroe was a new town. This man that owned all
this land in here and they decided that Montgomery was too
far out of the center of the county. So they got up an
election. He went up there •.• and willis was a town, too.
The railroad had come through, it come through early. The I
G and N railroad had come through. They advertised that
they were going to put the county seat at Willis and so
Willis voted with Conroe on it and they voted away from
Montgomery. And the next day they started to build a
courthouse in Conroe. ( Laughter)
JS: Didn't waste any time.
G: That's exactly the way it is. They stole it away from .•
I remember it very well. They later moved the post office
in the old courthouse building in Montgomery. And later it
burned.
JS: Thinking back over your terms as mayor, what would you
say was your greatest accomplishment? Getting the water
tower built and the water ••• ? How do you feel about it?
G: Well, I'll tell you. There' s so many things that so few
people were interested in at that time. I remember about
getting the light system. We had a man that had a big
GENTRY 16
generator here and you had to use little drop lights with a
pull on it or on the wall, you know. We finally got this
big company to buy it out and put in the modern electricity
as it is today.
It's a sad thing; it was a Louisiana company and they
give Louisiana one price and Texas another one. They're
having a lot of trouble now about it. But I think they'll
raise the price eventually and get 'em out of this trouble.
JS: About what year did they get electricity in?
G: Well, we had electricity when we married in 1923 but it
was just those drop lights. It was just a little one-horse
outfit. The man had bought a big generator, you know. When
I built my house in 1925, he had ..• they'd run two wires
along and drop down, you know, on your ceiling and drop
down. And they're still just like they were at home on the
corner, right on the corner of Nugent and Thompson, just a
block down from the First National Bank. Big pecan trees
all around the •..
IG: It is just gorgeous.
JS: Someone still lives in the house?
G: Yes ma'am. I have an old man and his wife I think an
awful lot of. I made him a special price and he takes good
care of it. Raises him a little garden right there on the
corner, across from the Baptist church.
(WS: We don't want to tire you out.)
JS: We kind of wanted to talk with your wife, the fire ••.
Oh, I wanted to ask you about the fire here.
GENTRY
G: That was before we married. Her father was here. I
wonder if you can get her in here?
JS: How about this fire in 1930? Did that involve your
building?
G: 1930? The fire that burned the town was in 1911.
17
JS: Oh, was it? 1911. Then you weren't in business then.
G: No. But Everett was; her father had a grocery business
in there and it burned out. Yes, it did. And one of the
insurance companies ..... (Tape turned o ff)
(Effort to get highway 105 built) Three engineers ...
(laughter) wanted to pay us for it. So we go up there to
Austin on highway 105, we'd go up there, ride up there, and
they'd call us up. Why they'd we had to sit there and
we'd have to wait and let Houston confab. We'd talk to
Houston about it and they said, "No, we want to have a town
of a million people." We just said, "You help us, we'll
help you." Oh , they wouldn't hear t o it at all. But we
finally got up a little more pressure, pretend to come over
from Beaumont and down that way and through here, through
Navasota , to get them to hire an engineer to at least make a
draft of it. We kept after 'em. They'd promise us they'd
make a draft and eventually did. A little at a time,
they'd ..• And finally, we went ove r there one day and this
man who late r became president of A and M college said, "You
know". Houston was at that time beginning to feel some
growin', you see and they were trying to build roads around.
They saw that had to be, of course. But to keep 'em out of
GENTRY 18
Houston, a lot of through traffic, was what they wanted.
So they told us to go and make a survey of the road
from ... we had it from Conroe to Cleveland. And they had it
from Cleveland to Dayton. Well, that was a r oad at that
time. So we had an engineer start in Conroe and straighten
it out like it is now. And one from Montgomery needed to
come this way. The people were giving the right of way,
tickled to death to get it to open it up. We had no trouble
to get a man's land, yes sir. The point is, they finally
got ready to come down here, survey it. Over here across
the river, we missed it by about 300 yards. (Laughter) So
we had to go back in there and let 'em re-route it and get
more right of way. And some of the Board didn't like it
'cause it missed the places, see ....
Things like that, you're helpless. Come on in, l ola .
(Tape off. lola Everett Gentry is Earle's wife. Her
mother was lola Boynton Everett.)
I G: ... when the Civil War was over and she had her own
slave, her own little body servant. She and her brother,
t oo . Isn't that interesting, so close to ....
JS: You mean your mother had her own body slave?
IG: No, her mother.
G: Her mother was about four years old. (Unintelligible,
tape trouble)
JS: When what came out?
IG: Gone with the Wind. There was a little boy named
Wade ...•. "The Yankees are coming, the Yankees are coming."
Everyone had their own little hide hole. She said hers was
GENTRY 19
behind a big chair. And the silverware was buried in the
back yard. Some of the darkies, it was much more genteel to
say "darkies" than to say "nigger" and they thought so too
then, but not now .....•.• Must have been about her age,
about four years old. She didn't get much of an education
because after the war, a l ot of the fine old mansions that
weren't burned down, were taken over for young ladies'
schools. Private schools. It wasn't much more than a high
school diploma. She had to write a little speech for
graduation .••..• After the war all the mansions were turned
into sorority houses. The different colleges just grabbed
them up.
WS: What town was this again? I forgot.
IG: Georgia.
WS: What area in Georgia?
IG: South Georgia. I don't know the nearest town, big
town.
M: Cuthbert and Americus, and right around there.
IG: Small town. Cuthbert.
JS: We were talking with your husband about this flu
epidemic and he said that you would know about that in
Conroe.
IG: Yes ma'am. I don't know if my son had a mortuary here
then. I remember seeing bodies being carried through the
town on wagons. And there were lots of people died.
END OF TAPE 1, side 1, about 43 minutes.
Tape I, side 2
JS: About this flu epidemic, what kind of treatment did they
have for it?
GENTRY 20
IG: ...... The statistics said the flu killed more people in
1918 than our people were lost in the war.
JS: Is that right?
IG: ..•.... , ether, •..... kerosene ••..• put a rag over their
mouth. We took one of the grandchildren of course
we were not sick at the time. Kerosene was always the
disinfectant, they knew about it .•••••••... around our nose
and face.
WS: How about sulphur? Seems like my folks used to talk
about sulphur. Did you ever hear of that?
IG: •...•..• We got a big dose of sulphur and.molasses every
spring. (Laughter)
?: Whether you needed it or not, you got that.
WS: I was born in 1917 so my folks told us about the ••.. Up
in the New England area, up in New York state.
JS: That must have been nationwide then.
WS: Oh yeah.
JS: Strange that it would go like that.
IG: My father (tape noise) at the end of the war.
JS: How about the fire that burned the center of town? Was
that about the same time?
IG: That was in 1911. I was quite a young girl then. It
burned nearly everything in town. I had a lot of curiosity,
I wanted to go to the •... but they made me stay on the
courthouse square. I took off my cape, I had a lovely new
cape, was so proud of ••••• They brought all the sales slips
out of every store to save them, you know. (Accounts
receivable)
GENTRY 21
I couldn't get excited about the fire.
G: Her father owned the Everett store. And if they 'd lost
their accounts receivable they'd have been out of business .
JS: What started the fire? Does anybody know?
IG: Started in Dr. Hooper's office .
G: Dr. Hooper had ... people were sick , and he was up late at
night and they had a wood stove, that's before we had gas,
had a wood stove , and the wind was blowin' hard from the
north and that's where it started, I believe.
WS: You said they burned wood. They didn't burn this pine,
did they?
G: No, they have oak wood, you know.
WS: That's right.
JS: And did they start rebuilding .• ?
G: Some tractors come in there and they went to buildin '
brick bui l dings right away.
?: What is now known as the Gentry building was the first
one built after that fire.
IG: That was 1911.
G: It belonged to A. L. Koonce.
IG: It was just like phoenix rising from the ashes. The
whole town would be built pretty soon. Had to, you
know .. nothing else to do.
JS: I wonder how long it took them to rebuild so they could
get back into business? A matter of months or a year or .• ?
IG: I don't know how long it was.
G: It'd surprise you how fast the buildings went up. I
guess the building where your father moved back in •.• He
GENTRY 22
built a building around on Main Street out of wood. Right
around there where the Ferguson building was, is. And
Randolph, a Huntsville man, who had some money •.. he built
the building where Everett is now ... ort one part of it. I
was with them the time they paid the last note on that
building.
IG: My father was the original Everett. I'm the last one
that is left of the whole Everett family.
WS: Would they have insurance coverage back in those days?
G: Yes, sir, they had some but a lot of the insurance
companies went broke. They didn't get it b~t they had .•.. I
don't remember what insurance company it was but they paid
off on most of the buildings.
WS: How about hurricanes? Do you ever get hurricanes up
this far from the coast?
G: No.
? or M: She remembers the storm of 1915.
IG: The storm of 1915, my brother and I were staying at
home. My mother and father had gone back to Georgia for a
visit. And it was storming so bad, he got up on the bed, I
think, to nail the windows shut and I had -to hold something.
And I got to laughing, he was on the bed. He threatened to
throw me out in the rain.
M?: The wallpaper was saggin' and just festooned allover
because the water was comin' in and she took an umbrella and
poked holes in it. He threatened to spank her.
IG: When I was going to get married, I did the same thing
GENTRY 23
to him. He was driving me to Houston but the river was
flooding out of the river bottom. There wasn't any good
road t o Houston then; dirt roads. On a Sunday I was going
down to Houston, getting ready to get married, or
arrangements ... I was going to shop, you know. I had to go,
I thought ... He was kind of just doing everything wrong ...•.
not meaning to. So he drove right into the river. The
water came up on my legs. He carried me out over his
shoulder just like a sack of flour. (Laughter) And I got
to laughing. I knew if he could see me laughing he'd say,
"I'll throw you in this river."
Afte r we got home, dried my clothes off as best I
could. There was a train that would go down to Houston in
just a little bit if I hurried. So I dried my shoes off in
the cook stove oven ....• crack, right away ..•. wore my cracked
shoes to Houston ... hat with red cherries on it dribbling
down on me. I got to Houston. I got my wedding c lothes--
that minister we were married. I've been a member of that
church longer than any other person living in that church.
There's old ladies in that church, but they haven't been
members as long as I have.
M: I have to tell you what my uncle said. He went to
Houston with her and when they were on the trestle
overlooking the flood, going to Houston now on the train,
they looked down in the river and there was his car in the
flood . And somebody said, "Look , some damn fool drove off
in that flood!" (Laughter) He was the cutest damn fool.
GENTRY 24
JS: I'd like to know what the social life was like here in
Conroe about the time you all were married.
IG: Tea parties and showers and literary clubs.
JS: Literary clubs?
IG: Yes ma'am. I was a member of the old 20th Century
Literary Club. Married an old country boy. One day we were
supposed to bring an original piece or be fined a dollar. I
couldn't stand that dollar. Couldn't afford that dollar.
Fine clothes, fine food, money right then. So I had to
write a poem, an original , to save the dollar. That was the
old 20th Century Club. It lasted a long time. We had good
clubs then; really, the clubs were better than you'd think.
Because we depended on the members.
M: Tell about your theater group.
IG: (Noise on tape ..• unintelligible)
M: Fosteria, Cleveland, Waukegan ... (confusion of several
voices)
M: I read something about a Molly(?) Bailey circus.
G: Dog and pony show.
IG: I thought Gentry was a dog and pony show.
M: It was.
G: Gentry Brothers had a dog and pony show. They had a few
elephants and monkeys and that. Barnum and Bailey Circus
was .•••
M: There was Monroe Hopkins Family tent show.
IG: And they were marvelous. .......... . and
church on Sunday and they wore yellow pants.
they went to
And they
GENTRY 25
looked so funny.
M: Because times were hard. And they wore their costumes to
church. Because that's all they had. And they would also
get out and sell candy during the acts, run up and down the
aisles selling candy. Sure did. Set up the tent and helped
do it all.
G: Remember this old fella that owned the show? every
Friday night? What's the name where this Grandpa Jones •••.
Hee Haw. Grandpa Jones was born, his mother and father were
playing in one of those circuses. Never knowed anything
else all his life.
M: Chautauqua.
WS: Oh, I've heard of that.
IG: Chautauqua used to corne here and that was great
entertainment, too. Held outdoors on the courthouse lawn.
Old hard benches without any backs to them. . • • • • .. was so
cute. He taught us to sing, you know. And I could recite.
Now I want another of those Dutch? (Noisy tape, unable to
understand the words.)
JS: I hate to end this interview, but I think we've taken up
a lot of your time.
IG: ? said, "I bet you old timers knew everybody in
town." I said, "Sure we did. More than that, we knew
something on everybody."
JS: We thank you for your time.
G: You're more than welcome.
IG: I don't think we've done anything.
GENTRY 26
W5: Well, you have. You've done very well.
(End of tape I, side 2, about 17 minutes.)