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| Shady Acres, at the intersection of Harper Road and Jackson Road, in Kerrville, taken in the 1970s. |
A few weeks ago, when I wrote about the ‘castle’ built on a hilltop just south of Kerrville by Mrs. Josephine Leckie in 1925, quite a few readers mistook it for another home, one which also looks a bit like a castle.
That house, originally the home of W. Scott and Josephine Carr Schreiner, was something of a mystery until the land around it was cleared of trees and shrubs about a year ago. It’s a stately old home at the corner of Harper and Jackson roads – and until the land clearing, many folks didn’t know it was there.
But once folks could see it, the phone calls to me started. People wanted to know its story.
It was a family’s home, which they called “Shady Acres,” and it was built in 1927. Three people lived there at first – Scott and Josephine Schreiner, and their daughter, Josephine Tobin Schreiner.
Whitfield Scott Schreiner (1888 – 1969) was the eldest son of A. C. and Myrta Schreiner; he had a brother (A. C. Junior), and a sister (Hester). He was the grandson of Charles and Magdalena Schreiner.
W. Scott Schreiner attended Tivy High School until 1904; the Bingham School, Asheville, NC, 1904-1906; San Antonio Academy, 1906-1908; and the University of Texas, 1908-1910.
He followed his father’s career as a merchant, and was associated with the Schreiner Company for most of his life. He had many other business interests as well.
He was active in his community, serving on the Kerrville city council, on various committees, and in the chamber of commerce. He was a golfer, and he helped keep the local golf course open during the Great Depression, and, when the private golf course became the municipal golf course, it was named in honor of Scott Schreiner.
He also served Texas. He was a regent of the University of Texas for two terms, and he was the chairman of the Texas Fish and Game Commission. He also served on the Upper Guadalupe River Authority.
His wife, Josephine Augusta Carr Schreiner (1893 – 1984), was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James M. Carr of San Antonio. She was a trained musician, having studied at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music, and often sang solos for community events. She organized a Red Cross Room at her church, St. Peters Episcopal, to roll bandages during the war years. She was chair of the Community Chest (United Fund); chair of a committee of the Kerr County centennial; founder of the Kerrville Garden Club. She held offices and was a charter member of the Women’s Auxiliary of the Texas Sheep and Goat Raiser’s Association.
The couple married on January 8, 1916, at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in San Antonio. Eleven months later they welcomed their only child, a daughter, Josephine – who was nicknamed Dodo.
The young couple lived on Water Street for the first decade of their marriage, at 425 Water Street, in a two-story brick home which now houses the Kerr Regional History Center. It is next to the Butt-Holdsworth Memorial Library. The house was built for the couple, with specific instructions to the designer: each room was to have four windows, for light and for air circulation.
In 1926, articles started appearing in local newspapers about the couple building a new home. After selling the Water Street home to Charles L. Mason, Scott Schreiner announced he would “have constructed a modern country place on a beautiful 20-acre tract purchased from A. L. Starkey near the Kerrville Methodist Assembly grounds.”
The house was designed by Adams & Adams, architects of San Antonio, and constructed by Walsh & Burney, contractors. A September 1926 article says “the edifice will be Spanish in design, of rubble stone construction and [have] all the features of the modern country estate.”
The house is 4,593 square feet – with four bedrooms and three-and-a-half baths.
The Scott Schreiner family moved into their new home in March, 1927.
The house remained in the family after Josephine Schreiner’s passing in 1984, and became the home of Clyde and Dodo (Schreiner) Parker – Josephine’s daughter and son-in-law. The Parkers lived in the house until their passing.
When the Parker family sold the house a little over a year ago, the new owners cleared much of the remaining lot. A church will be built on land next to Harper Road; a small subdivision of homes will be built on a part of the original lot, with an entrance off of Jackson Road. The house itself in the middle of the property, and is for sale again. Beautiful photographs of the home can be seen at the website of Fredericksburg Realty.
Until next week, all the best.
Joe Herring Jr. is a Kerrville native who remembers the peacocks which once lived at Shady Acres. This column originally appeared in the Kerrville Daily Times August 13, 2022.
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My Maternal Aunt Lilly Guerrero Agüero worked for the Scott and Josphine Schreiner for many years.
ReplyDeleteWho was the Burney who was a partner in the construction company that built this house?
ReplyDelete