by C. W. GOODYEAR
1950
PRIVATELY PRINTED
COPYRIGHT,
1950,
BY
C. W. GOODYEAR
PRINTED IN THE
STATES
OF AMERICA
WM. J. KELLER, INC.
IN MEMORY OF
ELLA CALKINS SULLIVAN
AND
ELLA CONGER GOODYEAR
FORWARD
As the recollections and research that went into this story got under way,
it became obvious that there wasn't room for everything. It is admitted in all
candor and without wishing to offend anyone that there have been omissions,
particularly in mentioning all who have played important parts in the
development of
To those of the older generation who read the story, the happenings may seem
like only yesterday. It is hoped that a sense of surprise and discovery will be
given to the readers who are too young to remember the era.
C. W. G.
Ce sont toujours les aventuriers qui
font de grandes choses.
(They are always the adventurers who
make large things.)
-- MONTESQUIEU
CHAPTER I
THIS is a story of an empire carved in
wood. Mostly, it is a story of the men who did the carving; so, mostly, it is
the Goodyear Story.
They came late, these men dreaming the urgent, restless
dreams of accomplishment and of pyramiding wealth. They were long finding their
new and abundant virgin forest treasure, though its southernmost boundary was
scarcely fifty miles from
Here there had been game. And the Choctaws had taken from
its plenty. Here there were swift-moving streams and rivers; slow-moving bayous
flanked by moss-draped oaks and by cypress trees, their trunks bulging to the
height of a man before tapering into even growth. And from these waters, the
Choctaws head taken fish.
But there was more. Merchantable timber. Thousands of acres
of longleaf yellow pine. It was there even until this century. Who
before had counted its treasure? Who had yet recognized the full measure of its
riches?
At first, except for the ripples made by jumping fish or the
splash of an alligator sliding on its belly into the dark waters, the bayous
wound serenely and undisturbed toward the Gulf of Mexico. Later some of that
serenity vanished. The westward migration of the Choctaws and the arrival of
the earliest settlers overlapped, violently more often than not. Even after the
Louisiana Legislature created Washington Parish in the heart of this forest
domain, the Choctaws still were terrorizing prospective pioneers as fast as
they appeared on the scene.
Governor Claiborne more than once wondered whether their
hostility possibly was encouraged by the English and the Spaniards. A few hardy
settlers did come for a hundred different reasons, and some of them stayed. But
they changed the land little. Still other pioneers of another sort who
1
2
came much later found the forests almost as they had been in the days of the
Choctaws.
Forests of pine blanketed the land for miles in every direction.
Part of the deep green foliage turned brown in the winters and fell to the
ground, making a thick carpet of pine needles that smothered the underbrush.
Travel by horseback or wagon was impeded only by an occasional fallen tree.
Here, then, was untouched, exposed wealth like gold above ground. It was ripe
for plucking; and, as was inevitable, it was plucked.
There had been many settlements of Choctaws in southeastern
In the autumn of 1905, there was a second encampment along
Bogue Lusa Creek long after the Choctaws had moved to the
The rainy season was over so their horses did not bog
crossing
While this territory was under the banner of
*The parishes of Louisiana are analogous to the counties of other
states. Many maintain that the parish of today had its origin in the Spanish
ecclesiastical subdivisions.
3
challenge of the redskins. Later there were those of English origin who
began migrating from the Atlantic Seaboard when
And there were others, some of obscure origin, who wandered
in and squatted on the land without rights of ownership. There were among these
frontiermen refugees from justice, men who chose to live in a wilderness beyond
reach of the law rather than risk their necks in a hangman's noose. There were
nomadic families in search of new homes outside the boundaries of civilization.
The
In fact there was little in the wilderness of Washington
Parish to encourage immigration. There were no railroads to transport the
natural resources of the land for great distances and there were no nearby
industrial centers for ready markets. The better families, those who were destined
ultimately to play a part in the development of the land of their birth or of
their choice, made the best of what they had.
Transportation was crude, either by horseback or ox-drawn
wagons. The produce of the land was hauled to scanty markets in Franklinton,
the parish seat, or to
4
train and forced to swim across the Rigolets and Chef Monteur to
The second encampment on the banks of Bogue Lusa Creek in
the autumn of 1905 was to change all this; it was to mark the beginning of a
new era, a new way of life, in the Parish of Washington.
CHAPTER II
THE courthouse square in Franklinton
is like many courthouse squares. It has a monument. This is rather pretentious,
with a plaque which is an eternal reminder of a once-rampant violence in the
parish and a tribute to those who abhorred its lawlessness. The inscription on
the plaque reads:
TO COMMEMORATE THE CONSERVATIVE
AND PATRIOTIC
SPIRIT OF
THE PEOPLE OF
FAITH IN GOD, RESPECT FOR CONSTITUTED
AUTHORITY AND ALLEGIANCE TO OUR
GOVERNMENT HAS EVER BEEN, IS NOW, AND
WILL
EVER BE THE VERY FOUNDATION OF OUR
PEACE, HAPPINESS AND
PROSPERITY.
OUR CITIZENSHIP IS DEDICATED ANEW TO
THE ENFORCEMENT
OF THE LAW OF THE
LAND. THE SACRIFICE OF OUR BROTHERS
WHOSE LIVES WERE GIVEN FOR THE WELFARE
OF OUR COUNTRY
SHALL NOT BE IN VAIN.
There were times when it must have seemed that those who
lived outside the law outnumbered the good parish citizens who "upheld the
supremacy and majesty of the law." It seemed so when the Goodyear brothers
first knew Washington Parish. It was so long before they were there.
Once a witness under suspicion as an accomplice in a felony
shot to death Joe Reid, the prosecuting attorney, as he descended the outside
stairs from the second-floor courtroom where the defendant had been sentenced
for stealing cattle. Such breaches of the law were not uncommon
5
6
7
in the parish. A man indicted for a misdemeanor burned the courthouse to the
ground in 1897 so that any evidence against him would be destroyed. At that
time all written court proceedings dating back to 1826 were destroyed, so that
today it is only commonly accepted hearsay that no white man in Washington
Parish ever was convicted of the murder of a Negro until the twentieth century.
The monument in the
At the trial, the jury had been out only a few minutes when
the foreman pronounced to the court the verdict of guilty. Thereupon the judge
condemned the prisoners to "hang by the neck until they shall be
dead." There was a muffled sound in the courtroom and among the hundreds
who stood outside. But there was none of the chilling doubt that often
accompanies man's deliberate killing in the name of justice.
The defendants, who clandestinely had the sympathy of the
lawless element of the parish, appealed the case to the State supreme court on
the grounds that the confessions were illegally obtained and should not have
been admitted in evidence. The employment of a capable criminal lawyer in their
behalf indicated that funds were being supplied by some unknown source.
The supreme court affirmed the verdicts of the lower court.
But only one of the defendants was sentenced to hang. The other was committed
to the State penitentiary for life, but he was stabbed through the heart by another
convict and died after he had served only five years.
Many of the natives who were taking the law into their own
hands were of obscure origin. Intermarriage among some of them had produced
degeneracy. Clayeaters in certain sections were not uncommon. The ravages of
the hookworm were widespread. Little value was placed on human life, except
one's own. Shooting seldom was in the open but rather from am-
Natives of
8
9
bush. Shotguns and knives were the most frequently used weapons. Fist fights
were rare.
A fratricide in a lawless clan was typical of the violent
deaths that often stemmed from family quarrels. Two brothers who had been
avoiding each other for some time met by chance at a political gathering. One
of the brothers suggested that they be friends. Thereupon they stepped behind
the meeting house to settle their differences amicably and drink in celebration
of their reconciliation.
As the elder of the two tossed back his head to drink from a
jug of "white lightnin'," the other drew his knife and slashed his
brother's throat from ear to ear. The jurors who heard the case unanimously
found the brother not guilty on the grounds of self-defense. Obviously every juror
had decided that his own life would be safer with an acquittal than a
conviction.
The judge himself appeared relieved at the verdict, but he
made sure that his six-shooter was concealed under his coat for a quick draw as
lie left the courthouse.
There were mass family feuds. As a rule these grew out of
sharp controversies over cattle branding, rivalry over political control, and
petty squabbles. One of the most notorious of these quarrels was between two
factions of a large family which today exerts considerable influence in the
parish. The feud and its "killin's" reached such intensity that
several members of the clan out of sheer fear moved elsewhere to seek peace and
security.
So sensational was one of these violent family quarrels that
it came to the attention of a
News was received by the Bulletin of a
premeditated murder which had just occurred in Washington Parish. A man named
Hiram Adams resided in the Parish some thirty miles from Covington and a younger
brother lived with him. There also lived in the Parish three other brothers.
Hiram and the eldest of his brothers got into litigation which engendered ill
feeling; other parties espoused the cause of the elder brother, and Hiram's
property had several times been clandestinely injured.
He in turn would sue the parties and thus a state of mutual
annoyance and
Fielding and Nick:
some
of the
10
11
irritation was kept up. On
the previous Wednesday, Hiram was in the immediate neighborhood of his own
house; he saw a band of fifteen persons approach him armed with double-barreled
shotguns and rifles. He was sitting on the fence when they came up and his
younger brother stood near him. A man named Jess Craff, who seemed to act as
leader of the gang, asked Hiram if he knew what they came for. He replied that
he did not unless it was to murder him. Craff said they came for that very
purpose. Joe, the younger brother, denounced the gang as a band of midnight
murderers, when the mob instantly leveled their weapons on the two brothers and
fired, both being killed instantly. A woman who kept house for the two brothers,
with her son, a boy of fifteen years, who were in the house and witnessed the
killing, ran for their lives. They were fired at but escaped. Among the
attacking party were three nephews of the murdered men. The murderers then
withdrew to a place of rendezvous, where they organized for systematic defiance
of the constituted authorities. The remains of the murdered men were interred by
the two brothers who had taken no part in the broils which Hiram and the elder
brother participated in. It was stated that the surviving brothers had applied
to Judge Richardson for a warrant of apprehension but he refused to grant it,
giving his reason fear of the murderers.
Had the editor of the Bulletin ventured into that section of the
parish, remote from
There was violence of still another sort in Washington
Parish. Many of the former slaves, taking advantage of their new freedom after
the Civil War, banded together in small settlements in the South. One of these
was a scant two-hour ride by horseback north from Bogue Lusa Creek. As late as
1903, it was a scene of a mass killing, stemming from the alleged attempt by a
"bad nigger" named Lott to murder a white woman. Lott was tied to a
tree and burned. Not yet satisfied, the infuriated whites waited until there
was a gathering of Negroes in
Washington Parish even had its own Jesse James. His name was
Eugene Bunch. He was a schoolteacher whose avocation was train-robbing. Those
who knew Bunch remember him as a soft-spoken man with a large black mustache,
blue eyes, and the manners of an educated gentleman. Except for the two months
when he taught children who came from far and wide on foot or horseback, he
followed sporadically the more lucrative
Professor Young and his pupils
in
front of Lee's Creek school-
house.
Professor Young
(in doorway) followed Eugene
Bunch as schoolteacher.
12
13
profession of holding up trains. His double life was a secret well kept, and
he was the terror of crews and passengers on trains between the deep South and
the North.
Ostensibly for the purpose of living near the school at
Lee's Creek, the quiet-mannered schoolteacher stayed much of the time at the
home of one Leon Pounds at Walnut Bluff on the
During the winter of 1892, the stage was set for one of
Bunch's big hauls. A southbound train on the New Orleans Northeastern Railroad
with several passengers and a shipment of currency bound for
In a few days, notices offering a $3,000 reward for Bunch,
dead or alive, were posted in the towns of northern
His confederates now began to talk freely, something they
had not dared to do while he was alive. Bunch, they said, had come from
14
railroad had condemned land through his
To him any railroad was his debtor, and he dedicated his
life to obtaining payment in full.
To his associates, and to parish natives who knew him less
intimately, Bunch was a fearless, unerring marksman who shunned taking
advantage of his marksmanship except in self-defense.
"Once I seen him pull his .45 quicker than a mule can
let out with his hind legs, and shoot two birds through the head at the same
time," an old native recalls. "High in the tree they was, too."
One of his own confederates revealed how Bunch and his gang
obtained information on railroad shipments of currency. Bunch had learned
telegraphy. By keeping slyly alert at railroad stations, he heard the
telegraphic messages on valuable consignments being sent through by mail and
express. Occasionally, though, he held up trains which carried only routine
mail and express, not only to keep his own hand well practiced, but to put the
railroad officials off guard. The passengers, he could be certain, carried
enough money and jewelry on their persons to make any holdup worth the effort.
Progress in enforcing law and order in Washington Parish was
painfully slow, but there were those who devoted their lives to it. One who
exercised considerable influence in ultimately shaping a law-abiding parish was
Delos R. Johnson, a native son born on a headright twelve miles south of
Franklinton. Johnson became a State senator, and was urged to run for the
United States Senate and for the Governorship of Louisiana. He declined,
preferring to practice his profession as a crusading lawyer in his own native
parish.
Another healthy influence in the parish was Judge Joe Ard,
whom the law-abiding natives, bucking considerable opposition, succeeded in
having appointed justice of the peace in the 1890's. Judge Ard seldom resorted
to the strong arm of the law, and few cases went to final judgement (sic) in
his court. When a suit was filed, it was the judge's habit to ride horseback to
the defendant's home, arrange for a meeting with the plaintiff, and then tell
both parties to settle their differences. Usually they did. Most of the duties
of Judge Ard's office were performed under the spreading branches
Judge Joe Ard’s home
15
16
of an oak tree or on the porch of his home. This also was the setting for
the marriages of many country folks living in the vicinity of Bogue Lusa Creek
The roll of honor of others who loyally served the land of
their birth or where they settled as pioneers, is too long to record in these
pages.
The Parish of Washington was the cradle of Protestant
religion in
At a crescent-shaped bend of
The congregation of the church at Lee's Creek was composed
of footwashing Baptists until the end of the nineteenth century when the
Reverend W. F. McGehee was called to the pulpit to spread the Gospel. Parson
McGehee was a missionary Baptist. His daughter, Mrs. Y. R. Nichols, recalls
riding to church in a buggy with her father to protect him as they drove
through the woods. The natives who did not take kindly to religion were less
inclined to shoot at the preacher when there was a child by his side. Father
and daughter often returned home from church with a shoat or two in the buggy
and a stubborn heifer lagging behind, tied to the rear axle. Gifts of this kind
were frequently received by the minister from parishioners who had little to
offer when the collection plates were passed.
CHAPTER III
UNTIL the early twentieth century, no
man ever came to claim ownership of the forests of stately pine which spilled
out of Washington Parish into other southeastern Louisiana parishes and on into
Mississippi. But it was only natural that the natives felt at least an inherent
proprietary interest in the miles of forestlands around their homes. Trees were
felled at will for logs and firewood. Razorback hogs and sorry-looking cattle
roamed at large over the free ranges.
With most of the crude necessities of life at the very doors
of their homes, the existence of the natives, such as it was, was an easy one.
The temperate climate reduced clothing requirements to a minimum. Patent
medicines were cure-alls for every kind of "misery." White Mule was
distilled easily from corn; and corn and white mule were plentiful.
Franklinton was the only village in the parish within a
day's ride on horseback or by wagon. Here were a courthouse, a jail, a cotton
gin, a pecker-wood sawmill, and one or two stores. Few took the trouble to go
there except on missions of sheer necessity. Distances were either "right
smart" or "just a piece," and in neither case were they any
great barrier to the natives; but few went even to the village except to
exchange something they had for enough cash to buy calico and seeds.
Inhabitants in some parts of the parish had never seen a
train, though there was a railroad thirty miles to the south in St. Tammany
Parish. This was the East Louisiana Railroad, later purchased by Northern
capitalists who planned to use it as part of a line which would parallel the
Illinois Central on the west through undeveloped country. The
17
18
they rode on the rear platform of a decrepit coach from which they could
better leap to safety when the train left the rails.
Most Northerners had looked upon the
Long undisturbed by outsiders along
It is reasonable that one should wonder why Washington
Parish had remained a wilderness until the beginning of the twentieth century.
Before then, the changes which had occurred had been so gradual that they were
hardly noticeable. A few scattered schoolhouses, churches, Masonic lodges, and
an occasional dwelling of more substantial construction with painted siding and
glass windows which had been built by prosperous natives were about the only
indications that civilization was not completely dormant.
The only trunk lines operating between the coastal area of
the
It has often been asked how a vast forest situated a short
distance
19
from a large city like
The spacious and elaborate ante-bellum plantation homes,
with their slave quarters, in the fertile delta country along the Mississippi
River from Natchez to New Orleans which have either gone to rack and ruin
through neglect or have been restored to attract thousands of visitors every
year are monuments to the kingdom of cotton and sugar, the tradition of black
slavery and white gentility, to the heyday of the Deep South.
Burying the hatchet of bitterness and resentment on the part
of the Southerners toward the Yankees was a slow process. Brotherly love for
their neighbors in the North did not manifest itself until several years after
the reconstruction period. Such an aloof attitude of Louisianians (sic) in
wanting to work out their own destiny did not encourage outside capital and
enterprise for industrial and agrarian expansion.
This was the country into which the Goodyear brothers came.
They found the natives living in two different types of houses that are still
lived in half a century later. The single-story farmhouse with mud chimney and
roof of hand-hewed cypress shingles was the most common. Crude as these were,
they were picturesque silhouetted against the green background of swaying
pines. Strangers wondered how these flimsy broad-roofed houses withstood the
local tornadoes and hurricanes sweeping inland from the
"Hell, they blow right through 'em," explained one
native. And his explanation seemed logical enough.
Usually there was a porch which the natives called a
"gallery." Off this was a hallway from which, on both sides, were
entrances to bedrooms
Mrs. J. M. McGehee in front of
her
Washington Parish
home
near
Ben's Ford where she
lived for over fifty years.
20
21
and to the kitchen. In the kitchen, meals were cooked over an open fire, and
here the family huddled before blazing logs on damp, wintry days. A crude
picket fence around a grassless yard was too low to keep the chickens from
wandering into the house. Bird houses on top of sapling pole: were nesting
places for martins, which scared away the chicken hawks.
Another typical parish house was somewhat more pretentious.
These were the homes built on posts about twelve feet above the ground. The
abundant space beneath was surrounded by a stockade which in the early days
protected the women and children while the men with muskets held attacking
Choctaws at bay, firing from the more strategic upper level.
One of the earliest of these old homes still stands near
Bogue Lusa Creek. It was built in 1805 by a Baptist preacher named Ford who
migrated from
It was in this house that General Andrew Jackson stayed for
two weeks in 1814 when his troops were delayed by floodwaters during their
march to
In its early days, Washington Parish was unfriendly to all
strangers, looking suspiciously upon them as "furriners." When
General Jackson and his men crossed Bogue Lusa Creek at Ben's Ford, in the War
of 1812, parish settlers kept their guns loaded. There was watchful waiting
until the din of marching troops faded away in the distance. Then, as their
suspicions melted away, some of the natives themselves joined
This reserve of the natives gave way slightly as travelers
were more frequently seen in the parish countryside. Peddlers on foot and in
one-horse buggies came to sell their wares, and their footsteps could be traced
Entrance to Preacher
Ford's home.
22
Preacher Ford's home -
Mrs. Willie Rankin, a direct
descendant, stands on the gallery.
23
Bedroom of Preacher Ford's
house
where
Andrew Jackson slept.
24
25
by the lightning rods, sewing machines, and ornate household articles never
before dreamed of that appeared in the natives' homes. Traveling merchants
later had stores of their own in the villages of the parish. The names of their
sons and grandsons now are emblazoned in neon signs across the fronts of large
stores.
Uncle Jimmy Whalen in a forest
of
longleaf yellow pine.
26
CHAPTER IV
SEVERAL strangers, there for a purpose
other than peddling merchandise, began to appear on the Washington Parish scene
in the late 1890's. Curious natives watched them walk through miles of woods,
stopping frequently to gaze skyward along the trunks of the pines, hurriedly
count trees in every direction as far as the eye could see, and jot down
figures in their notebooks. One of these timber cruisers was Jim Whalen.
His shock of auburn hair, his handsome weatherbeaten face,
and his Gaelic accent soon became familiar to the natives in the parish which
was to be home to him for the rest of his life. Until then, wherever he had
hung his hat had been home to Jim Whalen. For years, he had been associated
with J. D. Lacey & Company, timber estimators and agents who had been
engaged to purchase extensive timberlands for Northern capitalists. Such a
project was a large undertaking, and Jim Whalen as chief estimator helped set
the stage for what was to be a successful business venture.
Slow to anger, he was nonetheless quick on the draw. He took
an unassuming pride in his membership, evidence of expert marksmanship, in the
Daniel Boone Club of Wisconsin, his native state. But, knowing the
ambush-fighting technique of many of the natives, he felt safer with the
reputation that he roamed the forests unarmed.
The compass and maps that he carried in a musette bag
hanging from a shoulder strap seldom were referred to when he was in doubt
about his bearings in the woods. To him the sun, the prevailing winds, the lay
of the land, and other omens of nature were unfailing guides.
His job for the Northern lumber interests was so well done
that he was the first man on the payroll of the company when it was
incorporated to develop commercially these thousands of acres of virgin timber.
Soon known by everyone in this
One of Jim Whalen's companions in his
27
Tom Pigott in 1946 at
the age of
seventy-six.
28
29
days was Tom Pigott, a man who, as Jim would say, "could locate a
section corner like a bird dog spots a covey of quail." Jim could estimate
the log scale of timber in a well-defined area without any help, but it
required a native son of the
Tom was born and reared in the parish. His adolescent life
was not unlike that of others in the wilderness of remote Louisana (sic). As he
grew older, he sought a better way of life than was common to most parish
natives of that time. The short sessions of the country school had not been
enough to satisfy his longing for learning, so he took correspondence courses,
including the study of surveying. In 1896, he was appointed parish surveyor.
This led a few years later to his employment from time to time by the new
owners of the timberlands.
In these timberlands were large areas patented by the
Government. They had not been surveyed for years, and the stubs marking the
section corners were hard to find under the thick layer of pine needles. Many
of the witness trees had long since disappeared. Tom Pigott made the job of
surveying easier than it might have been otherwise. Jim Whelan (sic) often
watched in amazement as his friend measured a section boundary line while
riding horseback. It was not until long afterward that Tom told how he did
that. He had trained his horse to walk with an even stride so that he could
determine distances by counting the number of paces of his mount.
Another early timber visitor was J. D. Lacey, and it was not
long until he, too, was no stranger in the parish. For it was he who purchased
small areas of timberland held by the natives. Most of these landowners placed
little value on their undeveloped property as long as they had enough cleared
land for crops, a garden, and a house to live in. The transfer of a large
holding of timberland for "two bits" an acre and the sale of an
entire section of 640 acres for a yoke of oxen and a rifle were fresh in the
minds of the landowners. Mr. Lacey's offer to pay as much as $25 an acre was
breathtaking. One landowner, Marshall Richardson, was so pleased with the
$8,000 Lacey paid him for 430 acres that he named his next son Lacey
Richardson.
Most of the land that became the forest empire of the
30
Pennsylvania
News spread rapidly when the Northerners began their
purchases of timberlands in the Parish. Something in the air portended great
changes. There was constant speculation about what this man Lacey intended to
do with the thousands of acres of pine trees he was buying. It would take a
hundred sawmills like the one in Franklinton and as many years to turn all
those trees into lumber. There weren't enough oxen in the whole State of
The interest of the natives was intensified when surveyors
began laying out a line almost due north from the little
Not a few were adamant in declining to sell their holdings,
and a spring day in 1905 found Mr. Lacey back in Washington Parish trying to
buy land he needed from owners who had refused to sell on his previous visits.
One who caused him the most concern was shrewd Le Roy Pearce. The fact that his
acreage was surrounded by land Lacey already had
31
bought put Pearce in a favorable trading position. Both of them knew it. The
situation appeared hopeless, but Lacey drove his sleek black stallion to the
Pearce homestead that March day with anything but a faint heart. He had been
involved in difficult land deals before, and there was an air of confidence
about him as he alighted from his buggy after handing the reins to Manuel, his
colored boy. Le Roy was out calling his hogs, a morning ritual that had been
his long before he married Julia Josephine Adams and purchased several hundred
acres of land in Washington Parish.
Le Roy was the best hog-caller in the parish. About
Barbara and her husband Ed Keaton stopped by as Mrs. Pearce
was commenting on the particulars of the picture. They wanted to see the
ornament of artificial flowers under a glass cover that a traveling salesman
had told them he had sold Mrs. Pearce the day before.
"That sure is pretty," Barbara said.
The others looked at it and "allowed" it was, but
Mrs. Pearce said that Le Roy couldn't understand why they wanted to buy
imitation flowers when the bushes around the house were filled with real ones.
Outside the house the gardenia shrubs, which the natives
called "stink bushes," were studded with buds nearly ready to burst
into lush white bloom. Purple wisteria hung from the roof of the gallery. A
profusion of other native flowers made this home radiant with spring color.
From the fence rows came the melodious whistle of bobwhite quail calling their
mates. A colored woman stooped over an iron kettle in which the week's
The Le Roy Pearce family
32
33
laundry boiled and bubbled. She paused now and then to smear her teeth with
snuff.
Mr. Lacey contemplated the serenity and unpretentious
well-being of the surroundings and doubted whether any of what he saw was
conducive to a selling mood on the part of the owner. His thoughts were
interrupted as Le Roy trudged up the path that led to the house. Mr. Lacey
walked to the gate to meet him.
"Sure am mighty glad to have you back again," Le
Roy greeted him cordially.
"Glad to be here," Lacey replied, considering the
best time to approach the subject he wanted most to settle. He decided to wait
until after dinner, which he hoped would have a mellowing effect on Le Roy.
Wearing a red bandanna and shuffling over the rough board
floor in her bare feet, Canary, the colored woman, dished up fried chicken,
grits, yams, and biscuits covered with cane syrup. Everyone was too busy eating
to bother with more than perfunctory conversation.
Ed Keaton and Barbara still were there. Ed had been away
from home for two weeks, hauling logs and floating them down
"I reckon I did right well. They paid me higher prices
for the logs than I ever got before. You know, Papa, that timber of yours is
goin' to be worth a heap of money 'fore long."
Le Roy nodded, stroking his beard. Mr. Lacey was about to
change the subject when Canary began to clear away the dishes, a signal for
everyone to leave the table. Le Roy and Mr. Lacey walked from the table and sat
in rocking chairs on the gallery for their noonday siesta. They talked about
hogs, crops, and politics. No longer was there the formality of these two men
addressing each other as Mr. Lacey and Mr. Pearce; now it was Jim and Le Roy.
The subject had not been broached by either of them, but Jim Lacey had reached
the conclusion that Le Roy's timberlands could be bought only at an exorbitant
price, a price he tried to justify to his own satisfaction during a lull in the
conversation. Certainly the value of the land should not be measured only by
the standing timber,
34
he mused. The area was well situated on high ground along a flowing stream.
It could be put to good use after the trees were cut. Lacey decided that it was
now time to get down to the business for which he came. Turning to Le Roy he
said:
"Le Roy, you know, of course, exactly why I am here
today."
"No, I ain't got no idea."
"I came here to buy your timberlands and you know
it," said Lacey bluntly.
Le Roy was equally blunt, impressing on Jim that he had no
intention of selling. Just that morning, he said, he had met Fielding Adams
riding through the woods looking for his milch cow. They had sat on a log and
talked for "quite a spell." Fielding had told him how he had
"heared" some Yankees were "fixin' " to build a railroad
along the west side of
Besides, he could ship his hogs to
"You know, Jim, women are always wantin' something
different. The last time Julia drove to Franklinton, she come back with a pair
of button shoes with high heels and fancy toes."
35
By this time it was too late for Lacey to return to
Mandeville before dark. The two men strolled out to the barnyard. Le Roy had
his evening chores to do, and Lacey wanted to tell Manuel to unharness the
stallion and put him in a stall for the night. Le Roy stopped working and
watched intently as the prancing horse was led to the barn. Later, while they
were waiting in the house for the evening meal, Manuel brought in Jim's shiny
alligator-skin satchel and left it just inside the door. Le Roy eyed it
enviously.
After the women of the house had retired for the night,
Lacey walked over to his satchel and took out a bottle with a label marked
"Old Forester, 100 proof, 10 years old." By the time he had pulled
the cork, Le Roy was back from the kitchen with two glasses. Le Roy poured
himself a drink up to the level of his three fingers.
"That sure is mighty fine liquor," he said,
smacking his lips after the first sip. "A whole lot better than that white
mule I make when Julia ain't around."
Jim brought water in a dipper from the wooden bucket on the
porch and filled his own glass with whiskey and water. When there was scarcely
a jigger of whiskey left in the bottle, Le Roy allowed it was time for them to
go to bed if Jim was to get an early start in the morning. Stealthily and
unsteadily, they walked toward their bedrooms, Le Roy whispering:
"Goodnight, Jimmy."
"See you in the morning, Uncle Le Roy," replied
Jim.
Manuel had hitched up the stallion the next morning and was
waiting in the buggy for the day-long ride to Mandeville as Lacey thanked Mrs.
Pearce for her hospitality. Le Roy took his arm and led him aside.
"Jim, I've decided to sell after all if your price is
right and if you'll promise not to fence in the land for five years so my
hogs'll have a free range. And if you'll loan me your stallion when my mare
comes in heat and if you'll leave your alligator-skin satchel."
Lacey lost not a moment emptying the contents of his satchel into a cotton sack
in the back of the buggy. The satchel had served its purpose well, and he had
four more exactly like it. He scribbled on a piece of paper the address where
he could be reached when the mare was ready to be bred and handed Le Roy ten
one-hundred-dollar bills to clinch the purchase transaction. The offer he made
Le Roy was the highest price he paid
36
for any of the timberlands he acquired in Washington Parish as agent for the
Northern lumber interests.
It was a short ride to Lee's Creek post office, the
forwarding address Lacey had given his office in
Lacey stayed to chat awhile with the postmaster, learning
that he had served with distinction in the War Between the States and recently
had been called to
Lacey, meanwhile, had been anxiously waiting an opportunity
to read the letter from
GREAT
SOUTHERN
ELLICOTT SQUARE
Mr. J. D. Lacey, President
J. D. Lacey & Co.
Hibernia Bank Bldg.
New Orleans, La.
Dear Jim:
Complying with your request of February 26th, we enclose
herewith by insured, registered mail our check in the amount of $1,250,000.00
to reimburse you for the more recent purchase of timberlands which you have
made as our agent.
My brother, Frank, writes from his winter home on Jekyll
Island, where he is making his annual visit to get away from the wretched
weather which we have up here at this time of the year, that he was fortunate
in meeting James J. Hill, who with George F. Baker, J. P. Morgan and other
financiers were wont to gather in the clubhouse in the late afternoons for
their customary drinks of Scotch and soda. Apparently Mr. Hill was very much interested
in our plans for building a railroad from
We are anxious to go South as soon as possible to select a
site for the sawmill and town. On account of the
I hope that your supply of alligator skin bags is holding out
and that the stallion, which you bought in
Sincerely yours,
C. W. GOODYEAR
Vice-President
38
It had taken a man like Lacey to visualize and call
attention to the possibilities of converting these vast forest lands of
Lacey started his business career as a traveling salesman
for a manufacturer of embalming fluids. He realized that this had its merits as
a dependable livelihood because the demand did not fluctuate as was often the
case with other commodities and its use was not likely to be adversely affected
by business depressions, but he was not satisfied for long in making only
enough money to meet his living expenses.
What young Lacey saw primarily while traveling the
countryside with his horse and buggy were trees. Between the towns, where he
sold his wares to funeral parlors, there were large areas of virgin-pine timber
most of the way on both sides of the road. He himself did not have sufficient
capital to start a lumber business, but it occurred to him that he might
purchase timberlands as agent for prospective buyers. After familiarizing
himself with several large tracts of timber, he inserted an advertisement in
the American Lumberman: "J. D. Lacey, Timber Estimator and Agent
for Timberlands." Soon after it appeared, he was on his way North to see
the Goodyears and others.
With the meager savings from his salary and commissions as a
salesman of embalming fluids, Lacey was able to tide himself over until he
could close several timber transactions. During the years that followed, he
accumulated considerable wealth as agent in buying enormous blocks of timber in
the South and on the
CHAPTER V
SLEEPING under mosquito netting on
cots in the backwoods of
"This is my idea of paradise," said Will Sullivan.
"Just look at all those wonderful trees. I figure we have enough timber to
keep a sawmill operating day and night for twenty-five years. I can hardly wait
to start building the plant."
"If you don't watch out, Will, you'll be talking yourself
out of a job," interrupted Frank. "You know we haven't decided who is
going to manage the business for us here in the South."
Will smiled. "I suppose, then, I'm fired before I'm
hired," he said.
A Canadian by birth and an Irishman by descent, Will
Sullivan had come up the hard way. Half an index finger on his right hand never
let him forget his first trade as a carpenter. This led to a small contracting
business. With the money he earned from building a church at
At the completion of his business course, he was employed as
an inspector by a hardwood lumber company. The Goodyear brothers met him while
traveling on the train from
39
40
When they decided to develop their new timber holdings in
"We've got a full day's work ahead of us, so we'd
better get an early start," said Frank, eager as always, to get down to
business.
Charles led the way, sitting in the front seat of a surrey
behind a pair of rawboned, undersized horses. Wondering whether the animals
could survive another day's drive, he turned to the driver and remarked,
"You have small horses here in the South, don't you? You know, in the
North where I live they're much larger."
"I reckon they have to be big horses where you come
from," said the driver, eying Charles's big frame and his 225 pounds.
Just then, a strange voice was heard in the distance,
echoing through the pines.
"What in the world is that?" someone asked.
"Why that's my old friend, Uncle Le Roy Pearce, who
sold us most of the land around here," replied Lacey. "He's walking
through the woods calling his hogs. You know, he's the best hog-caller in the
parish. Le Roy will be back at his home around noontime and we'll stop in and
see him. He'll want to give us something to eat. Le Roy is friendly to Yankees
since I gave him all that money for his land."
The men first drove in an easterly direction toward
41
Landing as a potential water-transportation terminus from the
When the surreys drew up in front of the Pearce home, Le Roy
and his friend Fielding Adams were sitting on the front porch. They had just
returned from their morning ride through the woods. Their ponies, tied to the
picket fence, still were saddled and dripping with sweat.
"I declare, if it ain't my old friend, Jim Lacey,"
said Le Roy, hurrying to the gate to greet the visitors. "What in the
world are you doing here again? Jim, I'm mighty glad to see you. You all come
up and rest on the gallery before we sit down to dinner. We got plenty of
chicken, greens, and the best yams you ever et."
The names of F. H. and C. W. Goodyear had become generally
known throughout Washington Parish by this time and were mentioned with some
awe. Certainly Le Roy Pearce never dreamed that he would meet the two
industrialists from the North, much less have them as guests in his house.
Mrs. Pearce came out on the gallery and greeted her
unexpected visitors.
"I sure am glad to have you folks for dinner," she
said.
Turning in his chair toward his wife, Le Roy said:
"Julie, we got nine hungry men out here. You better kill some more
chickens and get about a peck of yams out of the root cellar."
"You all must have got a right early start to drive up
from Mandeville and be here by noontime," said Fielding, who had been
watching the strangers with interest.
"No, said Tom Pigott. "We came up yesterday and
camped last night along Bogue Lusa Creek, a piece east of Ben's Ford."
"So, that's where the smoke came from," said Le
Roy. "I saw it when I started out to call my hogs this morning. I thought
it was them surveyors who are layin' out the railroad. Well, you all must spend
the night here. We can divide the party. Fielding, you got the best house. You
take the Misters Goodyear, Mr. James, and Mr. Sullivan. Uncle Jimmy
42
and Tom Pigott are used to putting up here for the night, and Mr. Coleman
can sleep in our company bedroom."
That was hardly an invitation to be considered lightly by
the Yankees, who had been dreading another night sleeping on cots in tents.
Mrs. Pearce interrupted her husband to call out that the
chicken was about ready and that Canary had the food on the table. The men went
to the back porch where they passed around a cake of soap and washed in buckets
of rain water. Then they followed Le Roy in to the table.
No one spoke for awhile. They were all too busy eating the
chicken that Canary had cooked in traditional Southern style. Finally, Le Roy's
curiosity got the better of him. Why was Lacey back again and, this time, with
these men from the North? They already owned all the merchantable timber in the
parish. Stroking his beard and turning to Frank, who sat next to him, he spoke
out in a loud voice:
"Mr. Goodyear, we are mighty glad to have you all with
us. But I ain't got no idea why you came all the way up here from Lake
Pontchartrain. I reckon it ain't just to pay us a visit. Big businessmen like
you ain't got no time to mess around with folks way back here in the
country."
Frank sat back in his chair.
"Mr. Pearce, we are here to select a location for a
sawmill and a town we propose to build. As far as we have looked, the area
around here along both sides of Bogue Lusa Creek would be suitable for a large
lumber operation such as we have in mind. That would include the land we bought
from you and from the Richardsons, the Adams farm, the Hunt headright, and one
or two smaller parcels of land.
"This should be a healthy place to live in. There's
good drainage. Mr. Coleman tells us you can get a fine flow of water by
drilling an artesian well a couple of thousand feet almost anywhere in this
part of the parish.
"We have considered a site north of here in Mississippi
at a place called Ten Mile, but the laws of Mississippi aren't favorable to a
corporation. They limit real-property holdings to a million dollars. Our
investment in the South will exceed that figure by many times. So the idea of a
mill and town in Mississippi has been abandoned. That's about all I have to say
right now."
Mrs. Pearce had been busy in the kitchen helping Canary, but
she came to the doorway while Frank talked. He sounded different than the
43
country people she knew and he used words she didn't always understand. When
Frank spoke about spending millions of dollars, she looked at Le Roy with an
expression that belied her suspicion. She saw that Le Roy was looking at her
with the same expression. They had both heard big talk before from traveling
salesmen. They were thinking of the lightning rods they had bought from one of
them. A short time after the rods were put on the hay barn, it was struck by
lightning and burned to the ground. Then there were the wax flowers under the
glass cover, which they had bought from Sears, Roebuck. They were so pretty
until they melted when the hot weather came.
But Will Sullivan thought Frank was too modest and
restrained in telling about the mill and the town. When he could no longer curb
his enthusiasm, he jumped up and stood behind his chair, exclaiming:
"We're going to build the biggest sawmill in the world
right here. It'll have a capacity of a million feet of lumber every twenty-four
hours. It'll run day and night for twenty-five maybe thirty years. The logs
will be skidded by machinery and then hauled by the trainload to the sawmill.
This means we'll be building a mile of railroad track every day. We won't be
using any oxen to do the logging, except perhaps where there are small
scattered tracts of timber.
"The town we build will be one of the largest in
Louisiana. There'll be modern homes and schools. There'll be a hospital and
banks. There'll be jobs for everyone in Washington Parish. Why, this wilderness
will be turned into one of the most prosperous parts of Louisiana before you
know it. That's what we're going to do here, Mr. Pearce.
"When we leave here, we're going North to order the
machinery and equipment. I'll be back down South in six months to start
construction. The town will grow like a mushroom. We will be sawing logs and
shipping a train of fifty cars of lumber every day three years from now."
Charles leaned across the table while Will talked. He
whispered to Frank:
"We might just as well make up our minds that Sullivan
is hired to manage our properties here in the South. I guess you just can't
keep a good Irishman down."
What Will said sounded incredible to Le Roy. He began to
wonder whether he had been paid enough for his land after all. Finally he
spoke:
44
"I sure do hope you all will do these things you
tell about and that you'll do it right here in Washington Parish. When I sold
my land, Jim Lacey promised that I wouldn't be fenced in to keep my hogs out of
the timber for five years. I reckon we won't have no fallin' out about that,
whatever happens. But there'll be some ornery folks who will be tryin' to cause
a heap of trouble when you start cutting down the timber. They just don't like
to have furriners change the way they live. Country folks like me and Fielding,
we'll do what we can to help you all."
There was still much land to be seen, some toward
Franklinton near the Sheridan homestead and more north of Bogue Lusa Creek.
Frank again was anxious to get started.
Back where they had pitched camp the night before, Jim
Whalen and Tom Pigott packed the tents, cots, and cooking utensils in the back
of the surreys. The others watched Jim Lacey trace the course of the long day's
trip on a map he spread out on the ground.
"Charles and I have been talking things over,"
Frank said, "and as far as we're concerned, we're satisfied that the area
around here couldn't be better for the kind of a sawmill and town we have in
mind. If there are any different opinions, we'd like to know what they
are." Turning to Sullivan, he continued: "Will, as General Manager of
the Great Southern Lumber Company, how do you feel about it?"
"Well, I'm mighty glad to know that I'm not fired after
all, said Will, grinning from ear to ear. This is an ideal location for the
largest sawmill in the world. I couldn't be more pleased. All I want to do is
to work the rest of my life for the Goodyears, and live and die right here in
this paradise."
Le Roy Pearce and Fielding Adams were waiting on the
galleries of their homes when their weary visitors returned and stepped down
from the surreys.
"Hope you all have a good rest," said Mrs. Adams
soon after supper when she led her guests to the bedrooms, a candle in each
hand. The feather beds, bare wooden floors, and a roof overhead seemed
luxurious after the tents they had slept in the night before.
The next morning, they ate an early breakfast by candlelight
and left
Mr. and Mrs. Fielding Adams
45
46
for Lake Pontchartrain. Jim Whalen and Tom Piggott stayed behind to survey
the site for the town that was to take its name from Bogue Lusa Creek and
become Bogalusa, Louisiana. Before nightfall the rest of the party was in
Mandeville in time to catch the old ferry on its last trip of the day across
Lake Pontchartrain to New Orleans. The colored doorman at the St. Charles Hotel
in New Orleans welcomed the adventurers back to civilization.
Next day the Goodyear brothers, Charley James, and Will
Sullivan called on several of the leading businessmen, bankers, and lawyers. In
the evening they were guests for dinner at Antoine's in the French Quarter,
where oysters Rockefeller, broiled pompano in paper bags, and crepes Suzette
were the piéces de resistance, before taking the train for the North in
Frank's private car, the "Sinnamahoning."
The pioneers were going home, the biggest job in their lives
about to start. Neither Frank nor Charles was to live to see his dreams come
true. Neither was to hear the drone of the largest sawmill in the world. The
child of their creation grew into a rich maturity, guided not by them but by
the generations which followed.
CHAPTER VI
CHARLES Waterhouse Goodyear was
fifty-six and Frank Henry Goodyear was fifty-two when the brothers invested
nine million dollars in their fifteen-million-dollar venture in Louisiana and
Mississippi. Earnings accumulated from lumber and coal enterprises in Pennsylvania
provided the necessary funds.
Another three million dollars of capital stock was
subscribed by the Hamlins and the Crarys, Pennsylvania capitalists, and by
Charles I. James, scion of an aristocratic Maryland family. James had been
associated before with the Goodyears in their northern hemlock lumber
operations, which by this time were approaching depletion. An issue of 6 per
cent first-mortgage bonds was the source of what other funds were needed to
finance the purchase of timberlands, construct plant facilities, provide houses
for employees, and develop a city that was to be a home to 15,000 people.
But the Great Southern Lumber Company, from its beginning to
its end years later, was essentially a Goodyear family enterprise.
Like many of their contemporaries of comparable industrial
achievement and stature, the two brothers who founded this fabulous lumber
empire started life with meager beginnings. They were born in a rural
settlement near Cortland, New York. Their father, Bradley Goodyear, was a
country doctor. A poignant memory that never left them was the sound of sleigh
bells waking them in the darkness of a winter's night as their father hurried
to an expectant mother or drove for miles in a blizzard to prescribe a hot
mustard foot bath for a hysterical patient who feared that death was imminent.
Practicing his profession among families of modest means,
often without compensation at all, Dr. Goodyear never was able financially to
provide his sons with educational advantages beyond those which were available
in the public schools. The white one-room rural schoolhouse where they obtained
their elementary education was typical of hundreds
47
F. H. Goodyear
C. W. Goodyear
48
49
of others which in this period dotted the countryside of New York State.
Here there was the usual ritual to inspire youthful patriotism. That, of
course, was the raising of the Stars and Stripes before morning classes to the
accompaniment of childish voices singing the national anthem. Here, always
within reach of the schoolmistress, was the willow switch with which stern
discipline was administered.
Both of the Goodyear boys inherited a few traits in common
from their mother, but otherwise their characters, personalities, and
appearances were completely unlike. Like their mother, both were ambitious to
succeed, impulsive with quick tempers, generous with their worldly goods and
tolerant of the frailties of others. Unlike their father, the brothers were
stockily built. A later tendency toward obesity was allowed to take its course
in unrestrained gastronomy and with as little exercise as possible. Athletics did
not become popular until late in their lives. Among women of their day,
voluptuous bosoms and well-rounded buttocks were considered necessities of
pulchritude. Among men, a protruding stomach was a mark of enviable
distinction. At middle age, both of the brothers weighed well over 200 pounds.
The urge to do great things could not long be satisfied in
their native New York State village. Frank was the first to leave home. Still
in his teens, he had an insatiable desire to make money that was to stay with
him all the years of his life. Coupled with that consuming ambition were
abundant energy and keen business sense. With his worldly possessions packed in
a small satchel and $100 borrowed from his father, young Frank boarded the
train for Looneyville on the outskirts of Buffalo. It was here that he began
what was to be a spectacular business career, as a $35 a month employee of
Robert Looney, founder of the town which honored his name.
Years after, a member of the family tried to locate
Looneyville on a map of New York State. He learned that its name had been
changed to Wende several years ago by an almost unanimous vote of the
townsfolk.
Robert Looney had a profitable business logging timber from
several acres of land he had bought at a low price. He sold ties and cordwood
for fuel to the railroads. His business was growing when Frank Goodyear went to
work for him, but Robert Looney was getting along in years. Frank promptly set
about convincing the aging lumberman that he was the man to shoulder responsibility.
In a remarkably short time he had
50
mastered the details and was running the business while still in his early
twenties. He also found time to court and marry his employer's daughter,
Josephine.
The urge to search out greater opportunities soon made
itself felt. In 1872, Frank Goodyear and his young wife moved to Buffalo. Frank
was only twenty-two, but, financed by Elbridge Gerry Spaulding, a leading
citizen of Buffalo who was nationally known as the "Father of Greenbacks,"
he set up a lumber-and-coal business of his own. Mr. Spaulding must have been
much impressed with Frank's business acumen, for generosity was not one of the
old gentleman's characteristics. The wealthy Mr. Spaulding made a practice of
walking to his office to save the five-cent fare in a horse-drawn street car,
and it was his custom to read the penny newspaper as it lay on the newsstand.
The fact that Frank sold Mr. Spaulding the idea of financing a business scheme
was evidence of a talent that was to make him an outstanding industrialist of
his time.
In a few years, Frank Goodyear liquidated his indebtedness
and built up a lumber-and-coal business that provided capital for investing in
even larger and more profitable enterprises. By this time he knew the lumber business
was to be his life, and the idea appealed to him. He was impatient to expand
his interests; he felt bridled and restrained. When finally he heard that a
large tract of virgin hemlock timber in Potter County, Pennsylvania, might be
had at a reasonable price, he could hardly wait to see it. He took the first
train to Keating Summit, a flag station on the very edge of the timberlands.
Alone he climbed, almost ran, to the top of a mountain,
where his eyes scanned thousands of acres of hemlock trees that had scarcely
known the stroke of a woodsman's ax. He looked at it longingly for hours and
when he came back down the mountain, his decision was made. In a few years he
owned and operated fifteen sawmills in northern Pennsylvania. He made their
management a one-man job at which he worked night and day. And at the age of
thirty-seven, he broke under the strain of his own intense nervous energy. He
was stopped for the first time in his life, but not for long.
Charles Goodyear was cut from a different cloth, of a more
versatile pattern. There was ambition, but it was less compelling than that
which possessed his brother Frank. A professional career rather than business
51
success appealed to him as a young man. During his summers, as a youth, he
worked on a farm and in a tannery to pay for an education in the academies at
Wyoming, Cortland, and East Aurora in western New York. He was a talented
orator and was one of the finest debaters in the schools he attended. For
awhile he taught school before he, too, went to Buffalo to study law.
In 1871, when he was twenty-six years old, he was admitted
to the bar in New York State and hung out his own shingle. From the start of
his career he attracted attention as a young lawyer, and later succeeded Grover
Cleveland as a senior partner in Buffalo's leading law firm when Cleveland gave
up his practice to enter politics. With his brilliant personality,
distinguished physical appearance, and oratorical ability it was not surprising
that Charles Goodyear, too, should dabble in politics.
In 1876, he was appointed Assistant District Attorney in
Erie County. Later he was District Attorney. After one important and
sensational trial, a Buffalo newspaper commented: "No case that has been
before the courts in many a day has been so cleverly handled as by Mr. Charles
W. Goodyear."
Public life was beginning to attract Charles Goodyear more
and more. His close friendship with Grover Cleveland also was an incentive to a
growing interest in politics. In 1882, he was elected County Chairman of the
Democratic Committee. In this first position of political leadership, he won
his spurs. He played an important role in the nomination and the election of
Grover Cleveland as Governor of New York State.
Years later, a boom was started for the candidacy of Charles
Goodyear in the gubernatorial campaign of 1904. He declined at the outset, but
his political backers were persistent and a "Goodyear for Governor"
movement gained momentum. Typical of the pressure that was being brought to
bear on his nomination was the following letter from Cleveland to an
influential friend:
Princeton, N. J.
June 17, 1904
Dear _____
I have just received your letter and the clipping enclosed. It is a delight to
me to learn that there is a movement on foot looking to the nomination of
Charles W. Goodyear for Governor of New York. As a Democrat, still much
interested in the grand supremacy of my old state, I should look upon Mr.
52
Goodyear's nomination as the wisest and best that could possibly
be made.
I will not omit saying that he is one of my best and most intimate friends,
and
that his selection would be a great personal satisfaction to me; but I
will at
the same time deny that my friendship for him leads me to place an
exaggerated estimate upon the moral, intellectual and political traits of
his character, which certainly ought to make him an ideal candidate.
Yours very truly,
GROVER CLEVELAND
Charles Goodyear
Ella Goodyear
53
Letters from other prominent men with political influence began to pour in. One was from the Secretary of War, Daniel S. Lamont, who wrote to Mr. Goodyear: "We can swing the nomination for you without a doubt and you will be elected." Charles did not take seriously the campaign on his behalf until posters and buttons booming him for Governor began to be circulated. By this time he had many irons in the fire. The lumber operations in Pennsylvania, although curtailed because the standing timber was rapidly being depleted, had several years to run. Much of his time was taken by the business of acquiring timberlands in the South. The new operating company, the Great Southern Lumber Company, had been incorporated and its organization was in the making. Besides, the poor health of his brother and partner had added to Charles's burdens.
Finally, notices appeared in the press announcing the categorical refusal of Charles W. Goodyear to accept the nomination for Governor. That marked his retirement from political life, and it was a disappointment to him long after.
As a young lawyer, Charles Goodyear had little time for other than his profession during the first seven years that he lived in Buffalo as a bachelor. His social life was limited to week-end parties. At one of these in the home of Mr. and Mrs. Ogden P. Letchworth on Niagara Street, Charles met Ella Portia Conger. It was love at first sight, and the two were married on March 23, 1876. The young Charles Goodyears were a distinguished couple. Ella was handsome, with charm and poise.
A white New England-type country house in the village of
Collins Centre, about thirty miles from Buffalo, was the birthplace of Ella
Con-
54
ger on August 30, 1853. She was not one to be contented long in a rural
community. Her unrest was expressed in a letter she wrote while a young girl to
a friend: "I am getting most crazy for the holidays to come. Won't we have
fun! You can't begin to think how I want to see you. Oh dear! there is nothing
like being buried alive in the ruins of Pompeii where you can never see your
friends."
The generosity of her father, a well-to-do country banker,
made it possible for her to have the best education that could be had at that
time and to study music. Ella attended the Buffalo Female Academy (now the
Buffalo Seminary) and was graduated in 1873. Later she went to Brooklyn to
study singing. Discriminating friends were lavish in their praises of her
talents. Ella visualized herself behind the footlights of an opera house,
bowing to the applause of enthusiastic audiences.
Instead, with her formal education completed, Ella returned
to Collins Centre where she worked in her father's banking office and learned
the rudiments of finance. Singing in a church choir helped to pass the time,
but Ella soon became dissatisfied with life in a village. Back in Buffalo, she
made her modest debut as a soprano in the quartet of St. Paul's Cathedral.
Dwarfed by towering office buildings, the Cathedral still stands impressively
in the downtown business section.
Marriage ended Ella's singing career. She retained an active
interest in music until the later years of her life, but she sang only at
informal gatherings. Her home and family crowded out her dreams as a prima
donna.
When Ella was married, her father gave her as a wedding
present, money to build what was then a pretentious residence at 723 Delaware
Avenue, across the street from Westminster Church, in the section where the
elite of Buffalo's prominent citizens were beginning to erect their homes.
During the first eight years of her marriage Ella gave birth
to three sons and a daughter -- Anson Conger, Esther Permelia, Charles
Waterhouse, Jr., and Bradley. With her large home and growing family, her time
was full.
Ella was never without the necessities and most of the
luxuries that make up fine living. Security marked her life but it was not
always free of difficulties and anxieties. The Civil War, the Spanish-American
War,
Ella gave birth to three
sons and a
daughter.
55
World War I: Charley,
Conger, and
Bailey
56
The left wing of this hospital, in
Austin, Pa., was the
home where
Ella and the children
spent several summers.
57
The Goodyear sawmill
in Austin,
Pennsylvania
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59
World War I, and the first part of World War II occurred during her
lifetime. Her three sons served overseas in the first Great War and her worries
came to a glorious ending when she watched, from a window of the Genesee Hotel,
the 106th Field Artillery march up Main Street with Bradley leading as
commanding officer. The regiment's homecoming from the battlefields of France
received a rousing welcome of the cheering crowds on both sides of the street.
The position of Ella's husband in the community was well
established and he was a successful, prominent lawyer. But he was beginning to
realize that the legal profession never would assure him more than a comfortable
living, and Charles Goodyear needed more than that.
In 1887, Charles became his brother's partner in the already
established lumber business. Frank again had cracked under the strain of
excessive work and had gone to Europe. Charles took over, assuming the
responsibility of running a large lumber enterprise. As a lawyer he frequently
had been associated with the affairs of corporations, so that he was not long
adjusting himself to the problems attached to his new vocation. He spent most
of his time in Pennsylvania, actively managing the business from the logging of
timber to the final processing of lumber.
So that she might be with her husband as much as possible
and help him in his new business career, Ella and the children spent several summers
in an ugly frame house on a hillside overlooking a sawmill in Austin,
Pennsylvania, a typical lumber village not unlike the Western frontier towns of
earlier days. The droning of the buzz saws in the mill, the whistles and
exhaust steam of the locomotives hauling trains of logs, were incessant day and
night. The Goodyear youngsters galloped their ponies over hilly dirt roads and
fished for brook trout in the bubbling mountain streams. Ella often said, years
later, that the summers in Pennsylvania were the happiest times of her life.
But that, perhaps, was in retrospect.
CHAPTER VII
ALL during the Gay Nineties, Charles
and Frank rode on the crest of the wave. They were approaching middle age.
Their business was running smoothly and profitably. Frank had a million dollars
on deposit in the bank and a fortune besides in stocks and bonds, but his
ambition to make still more money never lessened until the last year of his
life. Already he had dreamed of another lumber operation when the supply of
hemlock timber in Pennsylvania was exhausted. He knew there were almost
boundless tracts of virgin yellow pine in the Deep South. The urge to build the
largest sawmill in the world grew as Frank studied the glowing reports of
timber cruisers in Louisiana and Mississippi.
It was the golden age, too, for Ella and Charles. The
children were old enough to be left in the care of competent nurses and
faithful servants. The Goodyears traveled and became more socially prominent.
There were frequent trips to New York City for the theater, the opera, or to
delight their epicurean appetites at noted restaurants. Ella's letters were
filled with ecstatic references to Sir Henry Irving and Ellen Terry in a
Shakespearian revival; to Melba, who was appearing in grand opera as Lucia.
Charles, too, wrote of a gay evening when he, Ella and Postmaster General and
Mrs. Wilson S. Bissell dined at Delmonico's before seeing Weber and Fields and
Lillian Russell, who were the hit on the Broadway stage for several years.
There were few places attractive to travelers that they did
not visit at one time or another. On one trip through the South they boarded an
antiquated boat at New Orleans which might have been one of the sternwheelers
that Mark Twain piloted before the Civil War, and leisurely wound their way up
the Mississippi River as far as Memphis. While on long journeys to the West
Coast or across Canada, they traveled in a private railroad car with friends or
with the children during summer vacations. For a lark, in 1897, they left the
private car in Vancouver and took passage on a steamer through the Archipelago
along the coast of
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61
British Columbia as far north as the Yukon. The rickety old boat was loaded
with hopeful prospectors headed for the Klondike.
Trips abroad to continental Europe, the Mediterranean, and
the British Isles became annual junkets -- sometimes with such definite
objectives as the Passion Play at Oberammergau and the Paris Exhibition. In
1899, all the family went abroad. Ella and Charles thought that the children
had reached ages at which they would be interested in seeing the sights of the
Old World. The high spots of the trip for the two younger boys were kissing the
Blarney Stone during a coaching jaunt through Ireland, climbing the Eiffel
Tower and going through the morgue in Paris, boating on the Thames River, and
the visit to the palatial summer home of Buffalo friends on the Isle of Wight
where they were introduced to the game of cricket. Esther was bored generally
except when she and her mother restocked their wardrobes in Paris while Charles
took the baths in Bad Nauheim. Conger, the eldest of the Goodyear boys, had as
little as possible to do with the rest of the family and was particularly
annoyed with his precocious younger brothers. That summer he preferred the
company of his classmates who had gone abroad after graduating in the spring
from Yale.
At home in Buffalo, too, there was social life for the
Goodyears. The Delaware Avenue house had been enlarged and was the scene of
lavish dinner parties. Ella and Charles were the guests on several occasions of
President and Mrs. Cleveland at diplomatic receptions and informal White House
dinners. After one of these, Ella wrote to a friend: "After dinner we went
upstairs. The President took off his dress coat and had a nice smoke as we sat
around and visited. After a time, the President had calls and was excused. Just
before retiring we went into our room. Mrs. Cleveland was with us and we had
some ginger ale."
As the children grew older, Ella decided that the city was
no place for them during summer vacations. The family spent several summers on
Cape Cod, where a spa