Ouachita Parish
LAGenWeb
P. M. Atkins, a former president of the Monroe Chamber of Commerce, is president
of the Monroe Hardware Company, a wholesale concern that has done much to
establish Monroe's position as a leading center for the distribution of
merchandise over North Louisiana. He is a son of the late L. A. Atkins, whose
fame as a merchant is a cherished memory over a large section of North
Louisiana,
The late A. L. Atkins was born in Claiborne Parish. As a young
man he studied law, and for one term represented his parish in the State
Legislature. Instead of practicing law, he founded, in 1885, the business known
for so many years as A. L. Atkins & Son. He entered business at Arcadia, in
Bienville Parish, soon after Arcadia made its start as a business center,
following the completion of the Vicksburg, Shreveport & Pacific Railway. A. L.
Atkins & Son were general merchants, and in time the firm became the largest in
North Louisiana, and all who had a relation with it recall the extent and value
of its service. Business was voluntarily liquidated in 1914. A. L. Atkins was
always known as 'White' Atkins, on account of the generous and lenient manner in
which he treated those who were in debt to him. He was in business at a time
when the mercantile system was entirely one of long extended credit. A. L.
Atkins literally carried hundreds of farmers and planters in his state
territory, often extending them financial aid beyond the most liberal terms then
existing, and while he prospered, his prosperity also signified the prosperity
of those who did business with him. His personal character and integrity
justified a system of business that is rapidly becoming obsolete in the South.
His death occurred in 1901, but two of his sons continued the business until
1914.
P. M. Atkins was born at Athens, in Claiborne Parish, was well
educated, and was one of the sons actively identified with the business founded
by his father. In the meantime, in 1909, he removed to Monroe and became
identified with, and took active management of, the Monroe Hardware Company, a
wholesale house. In its first year this company did a business amounting to
$100,000, while, in 1923 the trade volume aggregated $2,000,000. This is one of
the bulwarks of Monroe's trade and industrial life. Mr. Atkins is also vice
president of the Central Savings Bank & Trust Company, and a director as well as
former president of the Chamber of Commerce and is a Scottish Rite Mason and
Shriner.
He married Miss Alena Millsaps. Her father, the late Uriah
Milisaps, was one of the outstanding figures in the commercial and financial
history of Monroe, founded and developed a large prosperous mercantile business
and was also one of the founders and for three years president of the Ouachita
National Bank. Mr. and Mrs. Atkins have four children: Mona Lynn, Louise Getty,
Eleanor Lockett and Ruth Millsaps.
[Pages 307-308]
Chancey Clyde Bell is president and owner of the C. C. Bell Manufacturing
Company of Monroe. Mr. Bell has had a continuous experience since early youth in
the lumber industry, and knows every phase of the business from the expert work
involved in woods as a timber cruiser to the manufacture and sale of the
finished product.
Mr. Bell was born in what was at one time the capital
of the lumber industry in the Middle West, Muskegon County, Michigan, in 1880.
He was educated in public schools in the North and from boyhood became familiar
with the work of logging camps and lumber mills.
Mr. Bell came to
Louisiana in 1899 at the age of eighteen. His work as a lumberman was done in
South Louisiana until 1905. In that year at Huttig, Arkansas, he became
associated with the Frost-Johnson Lumber Company. This company is one of the
largest manufacturers of lumber in the South, with mills in Arkansas, Louisiana
and East Texas. Mr. Bell is still connected as a stockholder with the
Frost-Johnson Company. Mr. Bell is best known in the lumber industry as a timber
cruiser and estimator, and for a number of years that was his chief service to
the Frost-Johnson Company.
Early in 1916 Mr. Bell established the C. C.
Bell Manufacturing Company, with a plant in West Monroe. This is the oldest
millwork plant in this part of the state. The plant is equipped with all modern
machinery for the manufacture of sash, doors, stair and cabinet work, also other
special millwork. Besides doing a large business as manufacturers, the company
also carries a large stock of building lumber and building materials and
specialties. The company has recently completed a mirror and glass beveling
plant as an auxiliary to the main business, this plant being located in the City
of Monroe.
Mr. Bell came to Monroe in 1913. For two years he was mayor of
West Monroe, and has always borne his share of responsibilities in civic
affairs. He is a former director of the Monroe Chamber of Commerce, a member of
the Rotary Chub and is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason and Shriner.
He is also a member of the Lumbermen's Club, at Monroe, and a member and former
director of the Southern Sash, Door and Millwork Manufacturers' Association,
also being a member of the lumbermen's social organization, the Hoo Hoos.
In 1900 Mr. Bell married Miss Sarah Elizabeth Reive, of Muskegon, Michigan,
and they have one child, a son, C. C., Jr.
[Pages 303-304]
J. M. Breard, Monroe banker, is a member of a family that has been identified
with the history of this section of Louisiana since the first settlement was
planted there in the form of a military post by his ancestor of the Filhiol
family. The Breards have been in Monroe almost as long as the Filhiols.
J. M. Breard was born at Monroe in 1883, son of J. M. and Azema (Trouard)
Breard. His mother is still living. His father, who died in 1911, was a member
of the Monroe City Council for eight years.
J. M. Breard was educated in
St. Hyacinth's Academy, in Professor Bentley's private school at Monroe, also
attended the Louisiana Polytechnic Institute at Ruston, and graduated from the
Alamo Business College at San Antonio, Texas.
In 1911 he entered the
service of the Central Savings Bank and Trust Company as bookkeeper, was
promoted to teller, in 1918 to assistant cashier, and on January 1, 1924, became
cashier of this old and substantial bulwark in the financial history of Ouachita
Parish. He is looked upon as a banker of exceptional ability, and besides the
service he has rendered in the profession, he has been for some years prominent
in the public life of his parish.
Mr. Breard has been a member of the
Ouachita Parish Police Jury since 1915. During 1921-22 he was president of the
police jury, at which time plans were made for the erection of the new
courthouse, now under construction. For six years, from 1916 to 1922, Mr. Breard
was a member of the City of Monroe School Board.
He is a member of the
Monroe Golf and Country Club, the Lotus Club and Benevolent and Protective Order
of Elks. He married Miss Lottie Pritchard and has a daughter, Charlotte Olive
Breard.
[Page 215]
Milton Coverdale is a comparatively young man, but has had many years of
experience in public office in Ouachita Parish, of which he is now sheriff. His
parish contains the greatest natural gas field in the world, and its sterling
development and activity in recent years has imposed heavy responsibilities upon
the officials of law and order. Mr. Coverdale has proved adequate to his task in
every emergency.
He was born in Natchitoches, Louisiana, in 1891, to his
parents, George and Georgia (Pearson) Coverdale, being born in England and
shortly after their marriage came to America, locating at Natchitoches, later in
Vernon Parish, and in 1910 established their home at Monroe. George Coverdale
was a student and possessed of intellectual talents that enabled him to take up
and master almost any branch of learning. Much of his life was devoted to
education, and he taught at Natchitoches and other places in Louisiana. He died
at Monroe in 1918.
Milton Coverdale, under the inspiration of his father,
made wise advantage of the opportunities of his boyhood in school and home.
Since early manhood he has had experience in public affairs at Ouachita Parish
and Monroe. For some time he served as deputy parish assessor, and from 1913 to
June 5, 1916, was deputy clerk of the district court. From 1916 to 1924, a
period of eight years, he was deputy sheriff, and in June, 1924, entered upon
his duties as sheriff of the parish, having been elected in the regular election
of January, 1924.
He has made a splendid record for the enforcement of
laws and has aided in giving Ouachita Parish a high rank as a law abiding
community. Since the enactment of the Federal prohibition law and the
supplementary state enforcement law, the duties of the office of sheriff in all
portions of the state have been greatly increased, but in this situation Sheriff
Coverdale has discharged his duties with an alertness and aggressiveness that
have greatly diminished the violation of law. He has received high commendation
for his work by both the press and the public.
Mr. Coverdale married Miss
Eleanor LaBume, a native of Monroe. She is a descendant of the Chevalier LaBume,
who was the founder of LaBume. The three children of the Sheriff and wife are:
Milton Jr., Harold and Mary Eleanor. The family are worshippers at the Baptist
Church, and Mr. Coverdale is a Mason, and a member of the Woodmen of the World.
[Pages 315-316] Note: The sketch is accompanied by a portrait of the subject.
Oliver C. Dawkins. A lawyer admitted to practice in Louisiana since 1886, Oliver
C. Dawkins, for many years has been a resident of the City of Monroe, and while
an editor and publisher there for some years, has been primarily engaged in his
law practice. It is doubtful if any other family in Louisiana has given more
prominent names to the profession of law and public life of the state than that
of Dawkins.
Oliver C. Dawkins was born in Union Parish, fourteen miles
north of Farmerville. in 1859, son of Duncan Douglas and Margaret
(Brooks-Thompson) Dawkins. The Dawkins family is of English ancestry. They first
settled in Maryland in Colonial days and from that colony moved out to the South
and Southwest. Duncan Douglas Dawkins was a native of South Carolina, and coming
west he first settled in Lauderdale County, Mississippi, later removed to
Arkansas, where he married Margaret (Brooks) Thompson, his second wife, and
finally settled on a farm in Union Parish, Louisiana, where their son, Oliver
C., was born.
A nephew of Oliver C. Dawkins is Judge B. C. Dawkins,
formerly judge of the Supreme Court of Louisiana and now federal district judge
of the United States Court for the Western District of Louisiana. An older
brother of the Monroe attorney was Judge R. B. Dawkins, who died in 1922 after a
conspicuous career as a member of the North Louisiana bar, practicing at
Farmerville and who Served as judge of the Circuit Court of Appeals of the
Northern District of Louisiana. Another brother was the late J. M. Dawkins, who
was clerk of the court for Union Parish, with home at Farmerville, where his
son, H. H. Dawkins, is practicing law,
Oliver C. Dawkins attended common
schools in Union Parish and finished his literary education in the University of
Tennessee at Knoxville. He taught school and read law in Union Parish, and in
October, 1886, was admitted to the bar before the Supreme Court of Louisiana.
The same year he engaged in Practice at Farmerville, the parish seat, and from
there on January 1, 1897, moved to Monroe. During the next nine years he gave
much of his time to his time as editor of the Monroe Evening News. Since 1936 he
has devoted himself without outside interests or interruptions to the successful
practice of the law. He is senior member of the firm of Dawkins & Dawkins, the
junior partner being his son, Joe B. Dawkins.
Oliver C. Dawkins married
Miss Jessie Thompson, of Union Parish. Their children are: Bruton C., a lawyer
at Alexandria; Joe, a partner of his father; Lamar, in business at Detroit,
Michigan; Frank, an electrical engineer with the New Orleans Public Service
Corporation; and Olive, wife of L. H. Trigg, of New Orleans, and 0. C. Dawkins,
Jr., a reporter on the News-Star of Monroe, Louisiana.
[Page 237]
David I. Garrett, present district attorney of the Fourth judicial District, is
a resident of Monroe, a veteran of the World war, having been an officer in the
famous Sixth Regiment of the Marine Corps, and represents the third generation
of the Garrett family in the law profession in Louisiana. Garrett is one of the
distinguished names in the law and civic history of the state.
David I.
Garrett was born at Monroe, November 15, 1893, son of Franklin and Lela E.
(Johnson) Garrett. His grandfather, Col. Isaiah Garrett, descended from a
prominent Virginia family, came from Tennessee to Monroe in the years before the
Civil war. He was an honor graduate of the West Point Military Academy, and a
delegate from Ouachita Parish to the Louisiana Secession Convention at New
Orleans. Exercising his privilege as a delegate, he refused to sign the
secession ordinance. For many years he enjoyed a high position as an attorney.
Franklin Garrett, a native of Monroe and a graduate of the University of
North Carolina, served as a useful captain in the Confederate army in the war
between the state's and afterwards attained distinction as a practicing attorney
at Monroe. He was for a number of years a member of the State Board of Education
and is remembered as one of the founders of Monroe's school system. Captain
Garrett died in 1896. His widow is still living and is a member of a prominent
Ouachita Parish family. She is a descendant of the Ball family of Virginia,
which included the mother of George Washington, and she has membership in the
Daughters of the American Revolution.
David I. Garrett was educated in
the Monroe City High School, graduated from Tulane University at New Orleans in
1914, being president of the student body for that year, and took his law degree
at the Louisiana State University in 1916. He had about one year of experience
as practicing attorney at Monroe before America entered the great war.
Early in 1917, the president of the Louisiana State University having designated
him as specially qualified for service in the United States Marine Corps, he
joined that organization and was commissioned a lieutenant at Paris Island,
South Carolina. In the spring of 1918 he went overseas with the marines,
becoming part of the Second Division, and saw active service in the greatest
engagements in which the expeditionary forces of America were engaged including
Belleau Wood, Soissons, St. Mihiel, Champagne and the Argonne. His abilities and
service brought him deserved promotion to the rank of Captain. He was executive
officer of the American Patrol on the Rhine in the Army of Occupation. Captain
Garrett had two years of active service, coming home and receiving his honorable
discharge in 1919.
He immediately resumed his law practice at Monroe, and
in 1920 was elected district attorney of the Sixth Judicial District (now the
Fourth). This district comprises Ouachita and Morehouse parishes. In 1924 he was
re-elected without opposition. His service as district attorney has been one of
vigorous and fearless enforcement of the law. He is also engaged in the practice
of civil law, being a member of the law firm of Newton, Garrett & Newton.
Captain Garrett married Miss Lessie Madison of Bastrop, daughter of Hon. H.
Flood Madison. They have one son, David I., Jr.
[Page 232]
John R. Golson is an earnest business man whose services have been of great
value to Richland Parish since he became a member and president of the parish
police jury. Mr. Golson is president and chief owner of the Economy Drug
Company, operating stores at Delhi and Oak Grove.
He was born on his
father's plantation southwest of Monroe in Ouachita Parish, January 18, 1889,
son of David Postel and Elizabeth Virginia (Young) Golson. His father was a boy
when the family moved out of Alabama to Louisiana, and his own individual start
in life was on a place of forty acres. From that modest beginning, he has
developed a plantation of about two thousand acres, is a planter and also a
stock raiser and timber dealer. Since the age of twenty-one he has been a member
of the Masonic Order, his lodge membership being at Cadeville. He has been a man
of great industry, proved honesty and probity, and has well earned the
confidence and trust of his fellow men. He is a member of the Methodist Church.
He is now sixty-two years of age and his wife, who is fifty-three, was born in
Winn Parish, this state. They have a family of ten living children. The sons
are: C. 0. Golson; F. K. Golson, who was educated in home schools and the
Louisiana State University, and is a teacher in the schools at Monroe; John R.;
A. D. Golson, a shipping clerk for the pulp plant at Monroe; D. C. Golson, a
garage man at West Monroe, and Thomas A., at home. Four of the sons were with
the colors during the World war, F. K., attending an officer's training school
at Fort Monroe; A. D. was on the Mexican border and on the battle lines in
France and subsequently with the army of occupation in Germany, while D. C.
Golson was in the Student's Army Training Corps at Tulane.
John R. Golson
received his early education in high school, the State Normal School and the
Louisiana State University. He played football on the team at Louisiana State
Normal College. For five years he was a teacher, being principal of the Forest
School in west Carroll Parish. He left college just a short time before he would
have received his degree. When America entered the World war, he joined the
Officers' Training Camp at Funston, Kansas, resigning to enter the aviation
service and was trained at Austin, Texas, remaining there until the close of the
war. Soon after the war he bought a drug business in Delhi with a branch store
at Oak Grove.
Mr. Golson Has proved a very capable and successful
business man. He served on the town council at Delhi two years while the water
works and sewerage system were being constructed. In 1924 he was elected a
member of the police jury and was chosen president of the jury. He has
introduced a system into the business that has been responsible for much economy
of administration. Mr. Golson married Lillye Smith, daughter of W. E. Smith, a
wholesale feed merchant at Delhi. The only two organizations Mr. Golson has ever
joined were the United States Army and the Ku Klux Klan.
[Pages 374-375]
Albert Horuff has been a resident of Louisiana for fifteen years. He located at
Monroe temporarily, but found the environment and opportunities such as to
attract him, to permanent residence. He is one of the able business men, bankers
and one of the most active public spirited citizens of that locality.
He
is a native of Madison, Indiana, but he was reared and spent his early youth in
Indianapolis. He acquired a good public school education and for several years
was in business at Cincinnati. He came to Monroe in 1910. After a year spent on
the special business missions that brought him, he decided to remain, having in
the meantime recognized the great possibilities of Monroe and Northern
Louisiana's future. His judgment in this respect has proved to be good, since
Monroe and this section in the last few years have grown beyond all past
conjecture. This is due in part to the opening up of a great natural gas field,
with the resultant bringing in of many large industries, and the expansion of
the city in all directions.
For several years Mr. Horuff had intimate
business relations with the Central Savings Bank and Trust Company of Monroe,
and on January 1, 1923, was made one of its officials, assigned to the duty as
cashier. In January, 1924, he was made active vice president, and is giving his
best talents and ability to the success and growth of this splendid institution.
Mr. Horuff in 1924 was honored by being elected president of the Monroe
Rotary Club, a work in which he is greatly interested. He is vice president of
the Monroe Chamber of Commerce, is a member of the board of directors of the
Golf Club, and public matters in general enlist his hearty co-operation.
Mr. Horuff married Miss Mabel Dell of Indiana. They have one daughter, Marie
Dell Horuff.
[Page 220]
Frederick G. Hudson, Jr. This is a name that has been a prominent one in the
legal profession of North Louisiana for a great many years, having been borne by
father and son. The elder Hudson died in 1912, leaving a distinguished record as
a member of the legal profession and also as a man and citizen.
He was a
native of Alabama, and came to Louisiana in 1880. His first location was at
Rayville, where he became law partner of the late Judge Potts. The two lawyers
subsequently removed to Monroe, and established a firm whose successors are
still members of the Ouachita Parish Bar. Frederick Grey Hudson, Sr., was
regarded as a scholar not only in the law but in many other fields, and had the
special gifts and talents that make a ready and resourceful public leader as
well as lawyer. He was admitted to the practice by a special act of the
Legislature and for several terms served as district attorney.
His son
Frederick Grey Hudson, was born in Monroe in 1885, and had an extended period of
educational opportunities preparatory to the real work of his chosen career. His
education is the product of several of the leading colleges and universities. He
spent several years in Yale University, pursuing the literary and classical
course. In 1907 he received his Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of
Virginia, and in 1909 was granted the Master of Arts and Bachelor of Laws
degrees by Tulane University at New Orleans. He also studied law at the
University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. Mr. Hudson since 1910 has been active in
the practice of his profession at Monroe. He is a member of the law firm,
Hudson, Bernstein & Sholars with offices in the Ouachita Bank Building.
Mr. Hudson is assistant general attorney of the Missouri Pacific Railroad and
general counsel of the Arkansas, Louisiana & Missouri Railway. He is
vice-president of the Consolidated Ice company, Monroe, assistant secretary and
director of the Arkansas, Louisiana & Missouri Railway; director of the Virginia
Hotel Co.; president of West Virginia Oil and Gas Company; food administrator,
northern Louisiana, 1917-18; colonel on staff of Governor John M. Parker,
1920-24; vice-president Louisiana Bar Association, 1916-1921; president, 1922,
and has been a vice-president and member of the Council of the. American Bar
Association.
Mr. Hudson is a member of the Zeta Psi fraternity, a Mason,
Knight Templar, Shriner, and an Elk, Rotarian and belongs to the following
clubs: Yale of New York; Boston and Country Club of New Orleans; Lotus and
Riverside Club of Monroe.
In politics he is a Democrat and is a vestryman
and member of Grace Episcopal church at Monroe.
[Pages 12-13]
Carl H. McHenry. One of the men most prominent in bringing in and developing the
great natural gas industry of the Monroe field is a Monroe attorney, Carl H.
McHenry, whose abilities have been equally conspicuous in time field of the law
and the field of industry.
Mr. McHenry was born in Union County,
Arkansas, July 5, 1887, and in 1892 when five years of age his parents moved to
Monroe. His first teacher in the public schools was Prof. Henry E. Chambers,
author of the present history of Louisiana. Mr. McHenry had a thorough and
liberal education in preparation for time various duties of life. He graduated
with the Master of Arts degree from Vanderbilt University at Nashville,
Tennessee, in 1908. His law studies were pursued in Monroe, at the office of
Judge Potts, and he was admitted to the bar in 1912.
Mr. McHenry was a
member of time company that drilled and brought in the first gas well in the
Monroe field in 1916. Since then most of his time has been given to the legal
and executive duties of several of the important corporations in this territory.
At the present time Monroe is the center of time greatest natural gas field in
the world, in a district comprising about 400 square miles there are
approximately 325 producing gas wells. His activities in this industry have
brought Mr. McHenry important financial interests. He is secretary of the
Natural Gas Company, Inc., which includes the Monroe Gas Company, extensive
distributors of natural gas both for domestic and industrial purposes. He is
attorney for the Southern Carbon Company, producers of natural gas and
manufacturers of carbon black. He is also secretary of the F. Stovall Drilling
Company, Inc., which is a contracting firm, engaged in drilling natural gas and
oil wells in North Louisiana. Mr. McHenry is a director in, and attorney for,
the Central Savings Bank and Trust Company, and his offices are in time Central
Savings Bank Building at Monroe.
He married December 1, 1921, Miss
Frances Major, of Arkadelphia, Arkansas, and a daughter of Reese E. and Mary
(Hunt) Major.
[Page 230]
Fred F. Millsaps. Fred F. Millsaps is cashier of the Ouachita National Bank at
Monroe. He was born in that city and represents families that have been
intimately identified with the financial, commercial and civic history of the
locality. His father was the first cashier of the Ouachita National Bank, and
his uncle is now its president.
Fred F. Millsaps was born in Monroe in
1888. son of T. F. and Alice (Flournoy) Millsaps. The Millsaps family came to
Louisiana from Mississippi, where they have been an old and prominent family.
Millsaps College in that state was named for one of the family. T. F. Millsaps,
a native of Downsville, Union Parish, Louisiana, became one of the organizers in
April, 1887, of the Ouachita National Bank, and accepted the post of cashier.
Prior to that time, he had been a member of the private banking firm of Breard &
Millsaps, which was merged with the Ouachita National Bank. T. F. Millsaps died
in 1888, the same year that his son Fred F. was born.
Uriah Millsaps, a
brother of T. F. and uncle of Fred F. Millsaps, was for many years an
outstanding prominent Citizen of Monroe, a business man and banker of wealth,
with large property interests. He lived a much longer life than his brother, T.
F. He was president of the Ouachita National Bank from 1904 to January, 1907,
when he was succeeded by T. E. Flournoy, now president. During the same period,
Uriah Millsaps was also connected with another flourishing financial institution
of Monroe, the Central Savings Bank & Trust Company, of which he was one of the
organizers in 1905. He was its first president and held that position until his
death ~n 1914.
Mrs. Alice (Flournoy) Millsaps, mother of Fred F.
Millsaps, is a sister of T. E. Flournoy, president of the Ouachita National
Bank, and one of the best known citizens in Northern Louisiana.
Fred F.
Millsaps was educated in local schools and in 1908 graduated from Washington and
Lee University at Lexington, Virginia. His first regular business connection was
in the offices of the Monroe Hardware Company, but in 1910 he entered the
Ouachita National Bank as clerk and subsequently was promoted to the position he
now holds, that of cashier. He married Miss Josephine Logan of Nashville,
Tennessee. Her father was a native Virginian and a minister of the Episcopal
Church. Their two children are Fred F., Jr., and Ellen Kent.
[Pages 244-245]
Oliver Bradley Morton, active vice president of the Ouachita National Bank at
Monroe, has earned a high degree of esteem in that parish not only as a banker,
but as a citizen. He has been identified with banking continuously for nearly
thirty years, his capacity for work and individual qualifications for financial
enterprise putting him eventually into Some of the most important
responsibilities in the banking affairs of Northern Louisiana.
Mr. Morton
was born at Marion, in Perry County, Alabama, in 1876, and was five years of age
when in 1881 his parents moved to Louisiana. Since 1892 his home has been in
Ouachita Parish. He acquired a Public school education, and in 1895 at the age
of eighteen Went to work as a collector or runner for the Ouachita National
Bank. The Ouachita National Bank, when organized in 1887, was the only bank in
northern Louisiana outside of Shreveport. Its original capital was $50,000, Mr.
Morton held several positions of increasing responsibilities with the bank, and
was its cashier when in April, 1907, a merger was effected between the Ouachita
National and Monroe National Bank, retaining the name Ouachita National. This
increased the capital to $200 000, with surplus of $100,000. The Monroe National
Bank had been established in 1889, two years after the Ouachita National. As
cashier of the consolidated bank, Mr. Morton continued until September, 1918,
when he resigned to organize the Citizens National Bank, becoming its active
vice president. On February 28, 1921, by mutual agreement, a second
consolidation was effected between the Ouachita National and the Citizens
National, the consolidated bank again retaining the name and title of the other
institution. Since this consolidation Mr. Morton has resumed his service with
the old bank and has been its active vice president. He had been cashier of the
Ouachita National from June, 1901, to September, 1918.
While most of his
time has been taken up with his work as a banker, Mr. Morton served several
years as treasurer of Ouachita Parish, and has been a liberal supporter of all
activities tending towards the advancement and betterment of his community. He
is a Knight of Pythias and a member of the Rotary Club. His religious
association is fittingly expressed through his membership in the First Baptist
Church, in which he is senior deacon, and where he has served or many years as
treasurer and superintendent __ time Sunday school.
In 1904 Mr. Morton
married Miss Daisy Roberts, a native of Biloxi, Mississippi, and to them have
been born four children, of whom three survive, namely: Mildred, Dorothy, and O.
B., Jr.
[Page 229]
Frank J. Roddy, a resident of Monroe since 1907, has been one of the men most
prominently before the public through his valuable service as chief of the
Monroe Fire Department. He was appointed the first fire chief of Monroe, and to
him more than to any one else Monroe is indebted for its present highly
efficient department. Since he became chief, the insurance rating at Monroe has
advanced from fourth to first class, with a corresponding reduction of a third
in insurance rates. The number of fires has likewise been greatly reduced.
Mr. Roddy was born in Savannah, Georgia, in 1883, and was reared and
educated in that city, and after leaving school he learned the plumber's trade.
That trade he followed in Savannah and various Cities in the country, and after
locating in Monroe in April, 1907, was engaged in the plumbing business for five
years.
In the latter part of 1912, he entered the fire department service
as a driver, was soon appointed foreman, and on February 17, 1913, was made the
first fire chief by Mayor Forsythe. Since then he has worked untiringly to
secure better equipment, more capable men and perfect the complete fire fighting
and fire protection service of this rapidly growing city, which has increased in
population from wealth and material resources perhaps as rapidly as any city in
the South. It was a short time before Mr. Ruddy entered the Monroe Fire
Department that the first step was taken towards motorizing the equipment. He
has been the fire chief during the administrations of A. A. Forsythe, Charles A.
Downey, H. D. Apgar and Arnold Bernstein. During these twelve years, a large
investment has been made in motor apparatus, and the personnel of the department
now numbers twenty-four men. Since he became chief the Gamewell fire alarm
system was installed in 1916, and in 1919 he instituted the double platoon
system.
Mr. Roddy married Miss Edna R. Downey, a daughter of the late C.
A, Downey, who for many years prior to his death in September, 1924, had been a
conspicuously useful citizen of Monroe, serving as a member of the city council
and mayor. Mr. and Mrs. Ruddy have two children, Charles and Frank Roddy.
[Page 239]
Hillyer Rolston Speed. The very qualifications that make men successful in the
insurance business make them also successful and natural leaders in citizenship.
One of the ablest insurance men in the state is Hillyer Rolston Speed, of
Monroe. While building up an extensive insurance agency in this city, he has
kept in close touch with the best interests of the community and has been twice
chosen to the post of Commissioner of finance and utilities.
Mr. Speed
was born at Vicksburg, Mississippi, October 4, 1873, son of Judge Frederic and
Esther A. (Hillyer) Speed. On both sides he represents families long prominent
in the State of Mississippi, his parents being well known in the social,
professional and business life of the historic town on the Mississippi.
Hillyer R. Speed attended public schools at Vicksburg, and after completing the
work of grammar school was sent north, completing a high school course at
LaCrosse, Wisconsin, and a course in the Cayuga Lake Military Academy at Aurora,
New York.
His early business training was acquired in New Orleans and New
York, where he Learned the fundamentals of the insurance business. In 1897 he
located at Monroe, and in 1900 engaged in the insurance business on his own
account. In a quarter of a century he has built up one of the largest insurance
agencies in the state. In the course of this work he has come in touch with many
individuals and communities outside of his own city, and has a wide acquaintance
all over Louisiana. He knows personally nearly every citizen of Monroe.
In 1918 Mr. Speed was first elected commissioner of finance and utilities in the
City of Monroe, and the efficiency he displayed in that office brought his
reelection by a large majority. In this office he has shown that devotion to the
public welfare which had characterized his general civic attitude in years
before he took office. At all times he has been active in movements for the
advancement of the city's best welfare.
Mr. Speed was a Louisiana
delegate to the National Democratic Convention of New York in 1924,
participating in the historic deadlock there. He is a man of special tastes, is
active in clubs and other organizations, being affiliated with the Masonic
order, Knights of Pythias, Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, the
Riverside and Lotus clubs in Monroe, the Coastal Club, the Lake Arthur Club, the
Newark, New Jersey, Athletic Club, and the Chess, Checkers and Whist Club of New
Orleans.
Mr. Speed married April 19, 1899, Miss Anna Lee, daughter of
John Martin and Vada (Burch) Lee. They have two daughters, Vada Lee Speed and
Layton Speed, the latter the wife of E. T. Lamkin.
[Pages 317-318]
Col. Frank P. Stubbs is a lawyer, banker, planter and capitalist at Monroe, but
probably deserves his greatest distinction in Louisiana because of the long
service he rendered the Louisiana National Guard, in which he served thirty
years, rising from private to colonel of his regiment. He has been one of the
men who kept up an organization in times of general apathy toward military
training, and deserves a great deal of credit for assisting in equipping and
training outstanding troops in readiness for the emergencies of war.
Colonel Stubbs was born at Monroe, May 4, 1872, son of Frank P. and Georgia
(Tucker) Stubbs, natives of Georgia. The father settled at Monroe, in Ouachita
Parish, in 1849, being then a youth. When the war came on between the states he
joined a Louisiana regiment of the Confederate army and fought to the end. He
owned and operated a large plantation, but was also a lawyer by profession and
served at the time as district attorney and was a member of the constitutional
conventions of 1879 and 1898.
Col. Frank P. Stubbs grew up at Monroe, and
is a man of liberal education and broad view on many subjects. He received his
bachelor of Science degree from the Louisiana State University in 1891, and in
1893 graduated in law from Tulane University. For thirty years, except for
periods of active war service, he has been engaged in an extensive general
practice at Monroe, and his reputation in the profession extends all over North
Louisiana. He is also chairman of the board of the Central Savings Bank & Trust
Company, which he served eight years as President, and owns a large group of
planting interests He was a member of the Louisiana Constitutional Convention in
1921.
Colonel Stubbs is a veteran of the Spanish-American war, the
Mexican border trouble and the World War. His military service in detail is as
follows: Private, Separate Company C, Louisiana Militia, 1888-1890; First
lieutenant, Separate Company C. Louisiana Militia, 1890; captain, Separate
Company C, Louisiana Militia, later Company B, Louisiana First Infantry, Militia
of Louisiana, to May 11, 1893; private, Fourth Separate Battalion, Louisiana
Militia, 1894-95; captain, commanding Company B, First Louisiana Infantry
(Militia), August, 1896, to May 11, 1898; captain, First Louisiana Volunteer
Infantry, commanding Company B, in the war with Spain, May 11, 1898, to October
3, 1898, when he was discharged by reason of the muster out of regiment;
captain, Separate Company of Infantry, Louisiana Militia, July, 1899; major,
commanding First Separate Battalion Infantry, Louisiana National Guard, August,
1899, to December 5, 1904; colonel, commanding First Louisiana Infantry,
National Guard, December 5, 1904, to August 5, 1917; colonel, commanding First
Louisiana Infantry and One Hundred Fifty- sixth Infantry, U. S. Army, from
August 5, 1917, to November 6, 1918, when regiment was broken up as
replacements; went overseas with regiment, August, 1918; colonel of infantry, U.
S. Army, unassigned, from November 6, 1918, to January 21, 1919, when discharged
at Camp Dix, New Jersey, having returned from overseas January 18, 1919. From
January to April, 1918, he attended the brigade and field officers' school at
Fort Sam Houston Texas, graduating, and attended special field officers school
at Langres, France, November 13, 1918, to December 6, 1918.
Colonel
Stubbs has been twice married: June 19, 1898, he married Miss Emily Buckner
Richards, of Georgetown, Kentucky, and to them was born a son, Frank P. Stubbs,
Jr. Frank P., Jr., is a graduate of the Virginia Military Institute, at
Lexington, Virginia, and is now a member of the class of 1925 in the Tulane
University law school. October 15, 1912, Colonel Stubbs married Miss Maude
Flower, of Alexandria, Louisiana, and to this union have been born three
children: Charles, Caroline, and Barry.
[Page 311]
Albert A. Thoman, postmaster of Monroe, has had many years of active connection
with and experience in the lumber industry of the South, at first in Mississippi
and later in Louisiana. He has been one of the popular and energetic citizens of
Monroe for fifteen years.
He was born in Cincinnati, Ohio, and was reared
and educated in that city. Leaving there in 1902, he came South and had varying
interests in the lumber industry in the manufacturing side in the timber
district of Mississippi and later in Louisiana.
Becoming a resident of
Monroe in 1909, he transferred his business interests to Northern Louisiana and
gave his time to the lumber business until 1922. In that year he was appointed
by the Federal Government to a position in the Internal Revenue Department as
collector of internal revenue at Monroe. He was in the Federal service until the
summer of 1924, when President Coolidge appointed him postmaster. He took charge
of that office August 9, 1024. As he had made a splendid reputation in the city
for his upright character and thorough business qualifications, his appointment
was a popular one with the citizens. Mr. Thoman is a member of the Masonic
fraternity. In 1911 he married Miss Betty B. Buckley, daughter of W. F. Buckley,
of an old and prominent Mississippi family.
[Page 247]
M. C. Thompson since 1906 has been an active member of the Louisiana bar, and
since 1916 has been in practice at Monroe, a member of one of the leading law
firms of that city, with offices in the Central Savings Bank Building.
His father is Judge David Newton Thompson, one of the most conspicuous names in
the history of Louisiana Jurisprudence. Judge David Newton Thompson was born in
Louisiana. He studied law, was admitted to the bar before the Supreme Court of
the state in 1881, and soon rose to eminence in his chosen profession. His
public service has made him especially well known. In 1892 he was elected
district attorney for Concordia and Catahoula parishes and was reelected four
years later, completing two terms in that office. Following that he was elected
judge of the District Court for the district comprising Franklin and Catahoula
parishes. He was first elected in 1900 and reelected in 1904. Then in l908
followed election as judge of the Court of Appeal to succeed the late Governor
Hall. He was reelected in 1918, but in 1922 was called temporarily to serve on
the Supreme bench, and this service continued until 1924, when he succeeded by
regular election to his present post as a justice of the Supreme Court of
Louisiana.
Judge Thompson married Elizabeth Holloman. One of their sons,
Hon. Wood H. Thompson, is assistant attorney general of Louisiana. Their son M.
C. Thompson was born in Catahoula Parish in 1883, and was liberally educated,
attending the Jefferson Military College and Tulane University. He received his
LL. H. degree at Tulane in 1906, and for ten years practiced in his native
parish. He represented that parish in the Legislature two terms of four years
each, from 1908 to 1916. It was in April, 1916, that he removed to Monroe, and
since then has shared in an extensive general practice as a partner of Col. F.
P. Stubbs.
Mr. Thompson married Miss Maud Zurhellan, of Natchez,
Mississippi. They have one son, M. C., Jr.
[Pages 341-342]
James Harvey Trousdale has been a resident of the City of Monroe for more than
thirty years, since early boyhood in fact, and has been an active factor in many
of the movements and enterprises which have made the city one of the industrial
centers of the South. His business for the most part has been in the field of
insurance, but of even greater importance has been the active part he has taken
in developing the great natural gas field adjacent to the city.
Mr.
Trousdale is a native of Louisiana, having been born in Morehouse Parish,
February 17, 1866, a son of David Brigham Trousdale and Martha Elizabeth
(Summerlin) Trousdale. His father, David B., was a native of Tennessee, who, at
the age of eighteen years, left his native state and, accompanied by his widowed
mother and other members of the family, came to Louisiana. The journey, in part,
was made on board of a boat chartered for the trip, ending at Natchez, on the
Mississippi River. From that point the family came on into Louisiana, where
their new home was established in Union Parish, and where David B. Trousdale
grew to manhood and became one of the leading citizens, taking active part in
the development of the community, eventually serving as sheriff, of the parish.
It was also in Union Parish that he met and married Martha Elizabeth Summerlin,
a native of Alabama, who had come with her parents to Louisiana.
James
Harvey Trousdale was ten years of age when his parents moved to Monroe. He
completed his education in the public schools and, while still a young man,
engaged in the insurance work, which line of endeavor was destined to become his
life's profession. By close application and energy, supplemented by a natural
aptitude for the work, he has built up a large and profitable business extending
over a large territory surrounding Monroe.
Mr. Trousdale was one of the
pioneers in the development of the great natural gas industry in Northern
Louisiana. He was one of the local business men who, in 1916, brought in the
first producing gas well in the Monroe field, and from that initial discovery
there has since been developed here the largest natural gas field in the world.
He has had part in numerous other completions, and is still active in the
business. He has ever found the and opportunity to devote to public and civic
movements that measure of aid consistent with good citizenship. He has served
for a number of years as a member of the Ouachita Parish School Board, is an
active member of Rotary, being a past president of the Monroe Rotary Club, and
in fraternal circles is a Mason, a Knight of Pythias, and is a steward in the
Methodist Church of Monroe.
Mr. Trousdale married Miss Jennie Belle
Weaks, a daughter of Capt. James C. Weaks, who was numbered among the
representative men of Louisiana. He held the rank of major in the Confederate
army, and later served as United States marshal for the Western District of
Louisiana. Mr. and Mrs. Trousdale have three children, George W., Emily W., and
J. W.
[Pages 319-320]
J. Byron Vaughan, M. D. A physician and surgeon whose home for the past five
years has been in the City of Monroe, but prior to that at Collinston, Dr. J. B.
Vaughan represents an old and distinguished family of the Bastrop community of
Louisiana.
The Vaughan ancestry runs back into American Colonial history
to some of the very first settlements made in New Hampshire when that was a part
of the Massachusetts Colony. Doctor Vaughan's grandfather, W. H. Vaughan, was
one of several brothers who left New England and sought out new homes and
opportunities in the West and Southwest, going into a different state or
territory and one of them to old Mexico. The Vaughans have been
characteristically a strong and vigorous race of pioneer people. The
grandfather, W. H. Vaughan, came to Louisiana and settled in Morehouse Parish in
1843, that being a year before the parish was organized. It is recalled that
Grandmother Vaughan brought with her from New England the first cook stove ever
seen in this locality, and it was an object of great curiosity for some years.
W. H. Vaughan acquired by Government grant a large tract of land in North
Louisiana. For several years he lived on his plantation and then established his
family in the parish seat at Bastrop.
Dr. J. B. Vaughan was born at
Bastrop in 1877, son of Capt. H. D. and Mary Clementine (Holloway) Vaughan.
Captain Vaughan was a native of Michigan and a child when his parents came to
Louisiana in 1843. For many years he was a prominent steamboat captain on the
Ouachita River and tributaries. He was a brother of the late Frank Vaughan, a
brilliant lawyer and member of the famous Bastrop bar of the early days when
that bar represented some of the most conspicuous ability and legal talent of
any section of Louisiana.
Dr. J. B. Vaughan attended public schools at
Monroe, and at one time was a pupil of Prof. Henry E. Chambers, author of the
present history. He graduated in medicine at Tulane University in 1901, and then
returned to his home town of Collinston. He remained there engaged in a busy
general practice until 1919, when he transferred his residence to Monroe, having
his offices in the Ouachita National Bank Building. He is a skilled physician
and surgeon and a member of the Louisiana State and the American Medical
associations, and is president of the Ouachita Parish Medical Society. He is a
member of the Masonic fraternity, the Rotary Club, and the Episcopal Church.
In 1901 Doctor Vaughan married Miss Minta Reily, eldest daughter of John B.
and Betty (Ward) Reily, of Collinston, Louisiana.
[Page 233]
Hon. Tandy Tatum Webb, for three terms a member of the Legislature from Ouachita
Parish, is a veteran business man of Monroe, where his name has been prominently
associated with real estate transactions for over a quarter of a century.
Mr. Webb was born in Barbour County, Alabama, November 4, 1857, son of Dr.
I. P. and Fannie (Bonnell) Webb. It was in the Bonnell home, among his mother's
people, that Mr. Webb was born. His father's home at that time was across time
river in Muskogee County, Georgia, near Columbus. Dr. I. P. Webb was gifted with
various talents. Removing to Louisiana with his family in 1858, he first located
about nine miles north of Coushatta, in what is now Red River Parish, then a
part of Natchitoches Parish. While there he organized a company and went into
Confederate service, participating in the Red River campaign, and was at time
battles of Pleasant Hill and Mansfield. After time war he chose as his home
place old Sparta, then the parish scat of Bienville Parish. In addition to the
practice of medicine he conducted a plantation and a mercantile business and
exercised a noteworthy influence in the affairs of his district. He was a member
of the Constitutional Convention of 1879, a member of the Legislature, was
president of the parish police jury and parish school board, and was chairman of
the Democratic Executive Committee. Doctor Webb died in 1913.
Tandy Tatum
Webb was an infant when his parents came to Louisiana. His school education was
acquired at Sparta, Homer and Mount Lebanon. Leaving Sparta, he located at
Minden, in Webster Parish, and was a citizen there about fifteen years. During
that time he was for four years parish assessor.
Since coming to Monroe,
in 1898, Mr. Webb has been engaged in the real estate business. That has been
his principal occupation, but he is perhaps best known in the parish for his
long continued and able service in the Legislature. He was three times elected
to represent Ouachita Parish in the House of Representatives, in 1916, 1920 and
1924. He has been a student of the legislative program and of the best interests
of his parish and state, and has given time to his duties that meant the
sacrifice of his pecuniary interests and home, in the session of 1924 he was
chairman of time committee on contingent expenses. This gave him an opportunity
to exercise his studied policy of enforcing strict economy in all matters of
state government. He blocked many proposals for useless and extravagant
expenditure in many bills that were considered by this committee. He was also a
member of the committees on municipal corporations, parochial affairs, pensions
and militia,
Mr. Webb married Miss Florence Wilkins of Minden, La. They
have two daughters, Mrs. Nellie Bubb and Miss Carol O. Webb.
[Page 230]
S. J. Bowman Whited is numbered conspicuously among the industrial leaders of
the City of Shreveport, where he is president o the Shreveport Blow Pipe & Sheet
Iron Works. He is also known for his long continued and deep interest in boy
welfare work, manifested especially through the Boy Scout Movement.
Mr.
Whited is a native of Ouachita Parish, Louisiana, son of F. T. and Katie
(Bowman) Whited. When he was a small boy the family moved to Shreveport, where
he acquired some of his education, and later they removed to Alden Bridge,
Bossier Parish, where his father was in the lumber mill business.
Mr.
Whited has been a resident of Shreveport since 1904. In 1912 he became
associated with the Shreveport Blow Pipe & Sheet Iron Works, and in different
capacities has assisted in the development of this as one of the important
industries of the city and one that has added greatly to the city prestige as a
manufacturing center.
He has the honor of being president of Norwela
Council, Boy Scouts of America, and this council embraced a district of
Northwest Louisiana, containing the Parishes of Caddo, Bossier, Webster,
Claiborne, DeSoto, Sabine, Natchitoches, Bienville and Red River.
Mr.
Whited married Miss Dimple Dugey, who was born at Palestine, Texas, in Anderson
County. They have two sons: Jack and Bowman. Her mother, Mattie Belle (Greene)
Dugey, is a descendent of the Robert E. Lee family of Virginia. Her lather was
Oscar Dugey, born on a sugar plantation owned by his mother and grandfather near
Patterson, Louisiana, in the Teche Country.
[Page 115]
George W. Wright, M. D. In the eight years since he graduated from medical
college, Doctor Wright has risen to a place of genuine distinction as a surgeon.
It is in that branch of his profession that all his practice is centered and a
number of facts attest his splendid qualifications and leadership.
Doctor
Wright, who attained the rank of major in the World war, is a resident of
Monroe, and was born in that city January 16, 1892. His higher education was
acquired in Tulane University, where he graduated with the Bachelor of Arts
degree in 1914 and as a Doctor of Medicine in 1916. During 1916-17 he served as
a fellow in the Mayo Foundation. His parents, James B. and Sammy (Roscoe)
Wright, were natives of Massachusetts and Virginia, respectively.
Doctor
Wright in July, 1917, entered the army service in the medical Officer's Training
School at Camp Greenleaf, Georgia, and was transferred to Camp Jackson, South
Carolina. Early in 1918 he went overseas with the Fourteenth Evacuation Hospital
Unit. This was a mobile unit and with it Doctor Wright served in two of the most
important campaigns of the American Expeditionary Forces: the St. Mihiel and
Argonne Forest Offensives. Following the armistice came a stay of six months
with the Army of Occupation at Coblenz, where he was on duty as consulting
surgeon. He rose from the rank of lieutenant to major in the Army Medical Corps.
Major Wright received his honorable discharge in June, 1919, but still holds the
rank of major in the Medical Officers Reserve Corps and also has an active
commission with the rank of major in the Medical Detachment of the One Hundred
and ifty-sixth (Louisiana) infantry.
Major Wright is one of the youngest
surgeons to achieve the honor of Fellow Of the American College of Surgeons. He
practices exclusively in surgery and is chief surgeon of the St. Francis
Sanitarium at Monroe. He belongs to the different medical societies including
the American Medical Association, and is a member of the American Legion and the
Society of Foreign Wars. He is also a Mason, a member of the Lions Club, the
Lotus Club, the Monroe Country Club, and the college fraternities, Delta Kappa
Epsilon, and Alpha Kappa Kappa, the latter being a medical fraternity.
September 22, 1919, Doctor Wright married Miss Ileen Haynes, a daughter of
William R. and Martha (Shrewsbery) Haynes, of Tennessee, and they have one
child, George William Wright, Jr.
[Pages 191-192] Note: The sketch is accompanied by an autographed portrait of the subject.
Contributed 2021 Nov 04 by Mike Miller, from A History of Louisiana, by Henry E. Chambers, published in 1925, volume 2.
Copyright © 1996- The USGenWeb® Project, LAGenWeb, Ouachita Parish
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