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Thursday, November 7, 2024

A Woman of Faith -- Florence Butt and the H-E-B story

A snowball fight in front of the original Florence Butt Grocery Store.
Click on any image to enlarge.

Though we in Kerrville are justifiably proud H-E-B Grocery Company started here (now one of the nation's largest privately-owned companies), few remember the many hardships faced by its founder, Florence Thornton Butt.

This picture tells that story. It's of Mrs. Butt and her three sons, plus some of the early employees of the grocery store, including Leland Richeson, whose son gave me this photograph.

Missing from the photo is Florence Butt's husband, Charles. He died of tuberculosis only a few months before this photograph was taken. Of the eight people pictured, at least three would also die from TB.
People look at the Butt family today and think of their wealth and influence, but few remember the hard years. The years when it was just one small store, in Kerrville, and a family for whom grief was a frequent visitor.
Florence Thornton was born in Buena Vista, Mississippi, on September 19, 1864, during the Civil War. Her family was deeply religious, and two of her brothers were pastors; Florence often assisted them as they held revivals.
According to her family, she later attended Clinton College, where she was "not only the only girl in her class, but the honor graduate."
After college, she taught school for several years and also taught Sunday School at her church.
At 24 she married Charles C. Butt, a pharmacist, and they made their home in Mississippi and Tennessee. Together they had three sons, Charles, Eugene and Howard; there were also two stepsons from Charles’s first marriage, Kearney and Stanley Butt.
Around the turn of the last century, Charles, Sr. became ill with tuberculosis. At that time little was known about the disease, though it was widely believed to be genetic, since it 'ran in families.' Only much later would science discover it was contagious. Of the various cures offered at the time, the most popular was to move the patient to a warm, dry climate. This often seemed to help, and many spots around the country became known for their care of tuberculosis patients; Kerrville became especially famous in the southern United States for its climate and special hospitals and facilities for victims of this disease.
Tuberculosis brought the Butt family here; Charles Sr. and his son Charles Jr. (who served on the Kerrville City Council, and ran the grocery store for a while) would both eventually die of the disease, and both are buried here, in Glen Rest cemetery.
Since her husband was unable to work, and since she had a house full of sons, Florence Butt decided to sell some of the A&P grocery products shipped to her by a relative. She went door to door offering these products, and, according to her son Eugene, had a door slammed in her face by a Kerrville woman, who told her "I don't buy from peddlers."
"My mother was a very refined woman, and this hurt her deeply," Eugene recalled.
According to family tradition, Florence Butt started her grocery store on November 26, 1905, in a small rented two-story frame building at what was then 609 Main Street. Mrs. Butt opened her grocery store in the small room that served as the first floor; the family lived over the store. The windows were open upstairs summer and winter to provide ventilation and the ‘dry air’ needed for Charles Sr.
The store (with rooms above) was tiny, about 20 feet wide by 38 feet, or 760 square feet, which she rented for $9 per month; she stocked the store with what was left of her savings, $60.

Florence Thornton Butt

According to one of her grandsons, she made a discovery when sweeping out the room downstairs for the first time: she found a Bible left behind by a previous tenant. She immediately prayed for her little company, and dedicated it then and there to her Lord.
Despite many hardships, her store took hold somehow, and survived, providing for the young family. Her young sons were enlisted in the effort: the first deliveries were made in what must have been Howard’s baby buggy, later in a small hand wagon.
Florence Butt ran the store alone for many years; her son Charles was active in the business as early as 1917, and her son Howard, upon return from his military service in World War I, also worked in the business, eventually becoming its moving force. She retired from active involvement in the company around 1934, though she would often go to the store in the afternoons, visiting old friends and greeting customers.
The store was originally on Main Street, but moved to Earl Garrett Street to the rock building that had been the community’s post office, and now houses Turtle Creek Olives and Vines. After Earl Garrett Street, the grocery moved to a larger building on Water Street, now gone, but about where One Schreiner Center is today. My first memory of the store was at its fourth location when it was on the corner of Water and Quinlan, facing Quinlan; it was enlarged in the 1970’s to face Main in the building that now houses Entertainmart.
Its fifth and present location is in the 300 block Main Street, only six blocks northwest and 100 years away from that original store. A new store building was recently built on the site, with a much larger footprint, and a small replica of the original store built into its façade.
The company that has grown so successful was founded by a woman of intelligence and faith, whose need to provide for her family was so strong she overcame countless obstacles, from the humiliation of slammed doors to the prevailing convention that said women couldn’t run businesses. She was ahead of her time in many, many ways and she was very determined.
She was also very generous, giving back to the community that had supported her and her family. She was active not only in her church, but also in the Eastern Star. She organized a Baptist mission at Oak Park here in Kerrville, and paid the pastor’s salary for many years. I have heard many, many stories of her kindness to those in need in our community.
Florence Thornton Butt lived for 89 years. She passed away at her home on Earl Garrett Street, a few blocks from her first store. Her life was not easy in Kerrville: she buried her husband and her eldest son here, as well as at least one grandchild, and now she rests beside them at Glen Rest cemetery near Schreiner University.
Some might consider her company, given its tremendous success, to be her greatest legacy. However, it’s my opinion the enduring gift she gave her family and our community was the strength of her faith as demonstrated by her caring service to those in need.
Her story is compelling to me because after she had one door slammed in her face, she knocked on another door, and it was opened to her.
Until next week, all the best.

Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who wishes Greg Nichols, who has ably led the Kerrville H-E-B stores for many years, a very happy retirement. This column originally appeared in the Kerr County Lead October 31, 2024.

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Sunday, October 27, 2024

Clues about a 1935 Kerrville photograph

Nine young men, dressed in white, at Kerrville's
Kerr-View Farms, around 1935.
Click on any image to enlarge.

While many are focused on this year’s World Series, where the Dodgers and Yankees will start their series this Friday, I found an old photograph in my collection which was a bit of a mystery to me, and I wanted to know more.
It shows nine men in white uniforms, between two panel vans sporting “Kerr-View Farm” logos. Two other men, in shirtsleeves and ties, rest on the front tire fenders of the cars. This photo came to me from Julius Neunhoffer, who has a vast collection of Kerr County historical items.
Kerr-View Farm was on today’s Highway 173, just past today’s Comanche Trace development. It produced a variety of dairy products, like milk and butter; it also sold fryer chickens and other farm products.
The farm was owned by Benno and Clarice Wiedenfeld, and it was quite an operation.
The first mention of the farm in local newspapers was in the September 9, 1926 issue of the Kerrville Mountain Sun in a front-page story: “Wiedenfeld sees great future for poultrymen.” The story tells about the farm’s chick hatchery, with newly-installed modern equipment, “the first plant of its kind to be installed in this section of the state.”
“Weidenfeld’s mechanical hen,” the story reported, “is no longer an experiment. Skeptics who didn’t believe there ‘was any such animal’ last season came, saw the hatchery in operation and were convinced. As a result, it is believed that the 12,000-egg capacity plant will be inadequate to supply demands and Wiedenfeld, a scientifically trained man, never believes in looking back after being convinced he is on the right track.”

Kerr-View Farms produced eggs and raised poultry according to the story, but it also had a fine dairy herd. Most people remember Kerr-View Farms for one of its products: ice cream.
Over the years I’ve come across a few things from the Kerr-View Farms, starting with a large metal advertising sign which offered “Farm Maid Ice Cream” at 10 cents a pint.
The Kerrville Mountain Sun, in another front-page story in its March 24, 1932 edition, reported “Modern Ice Cream Plant in Operation at Kerr-View Farms.” 
“The plant, recently completed at an expenditure of $7,000 is the last word in efficiency,” capable of “freeze 10 gallons of ice cream a minute.”
“Kerr-View’s ice cream plant will wholesale its output. Cream already is being supplied dealers in Kerrville and is being shipped to neighboring towns. Only pure dairy products from Kerr-View’s own registered Jersey herd are used in the manufacture of the ice cream, according to Wiedenfeld. There are no adulterations and the cream is to be known as ‘Kerr-View’s Jersey Ice Cream,’ with the slogan ‘Milked Today – Frozen Tonight.’”
The company also provided milk and cream to local markets and customers. A Kerrville friend gave me some of the milk bottle paper tops last year – my favorite one says the coffee cream was ‘produced by a tubercular free herd.’ Another friend gave me a Kerr-View Farm fryer-hen carton.
Among the product packaging I notice a nice consistency in the logo – a hand-drawn script K, followed by legible serif letters. In the flowing ribbon underline you can often find “Kerrville, Texas.”
Benno and Clarice had two children, a son who died as a toddler, and a daughter, Anna Jean Wiedenfeld MacDonald. Benno passed away in 1977, Clarice in 1980, and Jean in 2011. (Jean’s late son, Granger MacDonald, was a successful builder, who passed away in 2020.)
Kerr-View Farm also boasted a men’s softball team, which competed in the Kerrville Softball Association, which had both a men’s and a women’s division.
Here are some of the teams of that league, during the 1935 season: Oak Park Baptists; Legion Doughboys; Star Cleaners; Hughes Ice; American Pure Milk; Fawcett Furniture; Schreiner Bank; Tivy High School; Burton Jewelers; Kerr-View Farm; and Wolfmueller’s Bakery. Occasionally a team from a neighboring community, like Comfort or Fredericksburg, would show up and play.
Games were held at a ‘lighted’ diamond, which stood at the ‘old fairgrounds,’ which I assume was the West Texas Fairgrounds, which were between Junction Highway and Guadalupe Street, near present-day Spence and Hugo streets.
These games were often front-page news.
In their season final games, Kerr-View Farm played Fawcett Furniture for the championship. Kerr-View had won more games during the regular season, but Fawcett was a close second. It was going to be a close game.
Here’s how the championship played out, from the September 5, 1935 edition of the Kerrville Times:
“Piling up nine hits, eight runs, and seven errors, the Fawcett Furniture ran away with the championship honors leaving Kerr-View second place with a record of seven hits, four runs, and six errors. Fawcett Furniture defeated Kerr-View Farm 8-4.”
Sounds like it was an exciting game, and a great season.
Until next week, all the best.

Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who enjoys watching baseball. This column originally appeared in the Kerr County Lead October 25, 2024.

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Sunday, October 20, 2024

Golf comes to Kerrville -- 100 years ago

Kerrville's Scott Schreiner Golf Course in 1924.
The clubhouse is in the background.
Click on any image to enlarge.


Golfing in Kerrville turns 100 this month, and the city is planning a celebration at the Scott Schreiner Municipal Golf Course to mark the occasion.

One journalist covered the new golf course back in 1924: J. E. Grinstead. His October, 1924 edition of the Grinstead’s Graphic Magazine is devoted to the new golf course.

"Some of the Graphic's readers complained last month," Grinstead writes, "because I used a word several times that the preachers talk about every Sunday. Well, you won't find it in this number. The worst word I'll use is Golf."

The little booklet measures about 6 3/4 by 10 inches and had, at one time, 32 pages. My copy is missing the middle four pages, and is thus incomplete. It is illustrated with twelve photographs in the story pages, plus five more in the advertisements. (As you know, I'm particularly keen on old Kerrville and Kerr County images.) Like most of Grinstead's magazines, this one includes some "booster" copy, extolling the unblemished virtues of our neck of the woods, and also a short piece of fiction.

Back to his coverage of golf:

"...Golf has come to Kerrville. It seems strange that in this mountain retreat, where so short a time ago smoke was rising from the campfires of the Comanche, such a modern thing as golf links should be at hand. Fifty years ago [from 1921, that is, 1871], a golf course here in these mountains would have been quite a curiosity. Yes, and fifty years ago a woman with bobbed hair, or a man wearing bell-bottomed pants would have been shot for a new kind of varmint. Fifty years ago, if just one automobile had run through Kerr County at night, the population would have been reduced by those who broke their necks trying to get away.

"The world has progressed, and Kerrville has progressed with it. As a step in that progress, the Kerrville Chamber of Commerce, the liveliest civic body I know anything about, decided that Kerrville needed a Country Club and a Golf Course. When the Kerrville Chamber of Commerce decides that their town needs a thing, they go get it."

Looking over the photographs, I believe this "country club" and its golf course were spread out over the same acreage as today's Scott Schreiner Municipal Golf Course. Of the images in the little magazine, I have the negatives to two, which helps me know approximately how old they are.

The golf course had been completed only a few months before the "Golf Number" was published. The early board "of governors" of the Kerrville Country Club were Scott Schreiner, president; E. Galbraith, vice-president; Cecil Robinson, secretary; A.C. Schreiner, Jr., chairman of the golf committee; Ally Bietel, chairman of the finance committee; E. H. Prescott, chairman of the entertainment committee; Dr. J. D. Jackson, chairman of the house committee; Dr. A. A. Roberts, chairman greens committee; and S. H. Huntington, A. B. Williamson, and Hal Peterson rounding out that first board.

"Through the course runs Quinlan Creek," Grinstead wrote, "a brawling mountain brook, which affords no less than seven water hazards. No matter where the player may look, he is confronted by natural scenery, mountain, valley and stream. This sporty nine-hole course was designed by John Bredemus, well-known golf engineer and architect. The designs were carried out under the supervision of O. J. Dobkins, who is at present professional in charge of the course. Mr. Dobkins was assisted in the work by Hal Peterson."

Grinstead predicted, accurately, that other courses would be built here.

Happy 100th birthday to the Scott Schreiner Municipal Golf Course!

Until next week, all the best.

Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who has hit more than a few golf balls in the water at our local golf course. This column originally appeared in the Kerr County Lead October 3, 2024.

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Sunday, September 29, 2024

The story of the little dam in Kerrville's Louise Hays Park

Louise Hays Park dam, sunset.
Click on any image to enlarge.

I’ve spent hours watching the Guadalupe River flow over the concrete dam in Louise Hays Park, and generations of kids have played near it, both above and below its spillway. I’ve also seen fishermen casting there, though often without much success. The only fishermen who I’ve seen have success there also have wings – several species of birds fish there regularly.

And I’ve seen hundreds of photographs of the water flowing over the dam there, mostly taken by locals and posted on social media.

Like most of the structures in downtown Kerrville, that old dam has a story.

Surprisingly, that story starts with an even older dam – made of wood.

Originally built by Christian Dietert, that wooden dam diverted the power of the Guadalupe River into a mill Dietert built. He used the mill to saw lumber, process grain, and even generate electricity.

The dam was first built in the 1850s. It was rebuilt many times, after many floods. After Charles Schreiner obtained the mill, he had the dam reinforced and made taller. For many years, one of his sons kept the dam in somewhat safe repair.


In fact, one can often guess the date when a photograph was taken by looking closely at the dam and its state in the photograph.

When Kerrville built Louise Hays Park in a single day, the old wooden dam looked rickety and unsafe. Some felt it was time for the old dam to come down, but the water it impounded into the little lake was a fine feature for the new park.

In 1952, R. R. “Railroad” Tarr came up with the idea to replace a 75-year-old wooden dam with a concrete one.

Tarr collected about $8,000 in donations, and went to City Hall, only to be told the donations he’d collected should be used to repair the old dam. Tarr told them the money had been “pledged to a concrete dam – a new one.”

Willard E. Simpson designed the new concrete dam; Jasper Moore built it, at a cost of about $25,000. Jess Stahlings and Dick Furman sought donations, and the amount was raised in about two weeks.

The dam they built still stands in Louise Hays Park, and was dedicated on December 12, 1952. It’s the same dam in the park today, though with various repairs showing and some minor bits missing. It also tells the story of Kerrville people seeing a problem, coming up with a solution, and raising the money to fix it. No idea why they involved city hall.

I’m glad they replaced the dam – and that it still stands. The Guadalupe River, as it tumbles over the dam, is a pretty thing to watch.

Until next week, all the best.

Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who has enjoyed many a swim in that little lake in Louise Hays Park. This column originally appeared in the Kerr County Lead September 26, 2024.


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Friday, September 27, 2024

The story of a Kerrville bridge

The Sidney Baker Street Bridge, Kerrville, 1960s.
Click on any image to enlarge.

Is it possible to love a bridge?

Every time I show photos of the old Highway 16 bridge in downtown Kerrville, folks say "I loved that bridge."

That bridge, a camel-backed steel truss bridge, was constructed in 1935, and extended Sidney Baker Street across the Guadalupe River. It was a two-lane bridge with a pedestrian walkway.

In the mid-1970s the bridge was widened from two to five lanes, with a (dangerous) pedestrian sidewalk, and transformed from a truss bridge to a pre-stressed concrete girder bridge. The bridge went from 22 feet wide to 60 feet and the improvements cost around $1.1 million. 

While the new improved bridge was needed and more efficient, it isn't as attractive as the old bridge. I think that's why people say they loved the old bridge.

When the original bridge was built in 1935, it was a major improvement for our community.

Before then, there were crossings near Francisco Lemos Street and G Street, as well as a private crossing near the confluence of Quinlan Creek and the Guadalupe River.

The problem with all of these other bridges was that they were low water crossings, and every time the river rose, they became impassable. The Highway 16 bridge extending Sidney Baker Street solved this problem for all except the most severe floods.

There is a small plaque on the current Sidney Baker Street bridge which reads "Dedicated to Captain Charles Schreiner: a pioneer in citizenship, philanthropy and highway building in the hill country." That plaque was transferred from the old 1935 bridge to the current bridge.

I suppose, with this dedicatory plaque, the real name of the bridge is the Charles Schreiner Bridge.

The current bridge still has some of the bones of the old bridge; several of the original piers were widened to support the bridge. You can tell which ones are original because the 1970s piers are shaped like a "T," with arms extending on both sides, and the old piers are not. When the steel trusses were removed, the span between piers had to be shortened, requiring new piers to be built. The pier in the middle of the river, for example, is a new pier.

Several of these ‘older’ piers will be decorated with murals in the coming months.

Some of the features of the old 1935 bridge were nice. The original bridge sported fancy lighting, and a more protected walkway for pedestrians. Today's sidewalk is not separated from the traffic except by a curb; the old bridge had a barrier between the two.

It also had three distinctive steel trusses through which all traffic passed. Unless my memory is wrong, the steel structure was painted silver.

There were tales of young people jumping from the old bridge into the Guadalupe River below, a risky sport considering the height of the bridge and the random arrangement of boulders below the surface of the water.

While I never jumped from the bridge, I did climb across the top of its camel-back once, after it was closed to traffic. The renovation project occurred when I was in middle school, a time in most young men's lives when common sense is not well-formed. Several of my friends and I knew the old structure was going to be dismantled and figured if we were ever going to climb across it, this would be our last chance.

Of course, we didn't tell our parents about our adventure until years later.

Until next week, all the best.

Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who thinks the new Spur 98 Bridge (Thompson Drive) at Highway 27, next to the Lakehouse Restaurant, is a much more attractive bridge. It needs a name. This column originally appeared in the Kerr County Lead September 19, 2024.

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