Bishop's First Families

May 14 - 16, 2010

[The following is from the Bishop News of 1960 in a series written by Mrs. Gail Tubbs for Bishop's

then upcoming Golden Jubilee celebration.]

~~First Families - W. E. Foster~~

The W. E. Foster family landed in Bishop in the late fall or early winter of 1910. In the family at

that time were: Mr. and Mrs. Foster, Lella (Mrs. R. T. Moudy of Happy, Texas), Edwin (Neosho,

Mo.), Mildred (Mrs. Bryan Harrell), Henry, and Fred (Beeville). Estill Foster, well known band

director, was born in Bishop several years later.

"We moved from Sherman on account of mother's health," Mrs. Moudy writes. "I don't know how

we happened to run onto Bishop, but mother and daddy always felt there was no other place on

earth that could hold a candle to it. There wasn't much there but prairie. But such prairies in the

spring! Acres and acres of wild flowers of all descriptions! I recall that I filled all the vases, then all

the jars, and wound up filling all the window sills with gallon buckets of wild flowers. The children

brought them in by the millions.

"We stayed in the old Bloxom Hotel while our house was being built. Later the Kendalls got their

house finished and let us room with them, quite an improvement over the Bloxom. Our first house

was the story and a half box house on the corner. Daddy and Mother built the home place (504

East Main) while I was finishing school in Huntsville in 1912-13.

"As I recall when we arrived in

town there were two hotels, one

store, the school and a few

homes. There were only about half

a dozen of us girls who were

anywhere near grown, and

hundreds, it seemed, of boys--

mechanics, carpenters and

workmen of all sorts--that was one

town in which no girl ever

wondered whether or not she

would be in demand.

"From the very first, Bishop had a

nice park, with band stand, where

later we had concerts. The artesian wells and deer park were quite show spots. Mr. Bishop had

gardeners and a beautiful "winter garden" that sold the country to people he would bring down

from the cold north.

"Miss Mollie Moore taught the first school, and although they did not have

the work I needed, all the Fosters enrolled," Mrs. Moudy relates. "Buena

Hill ( now Mrs. Burton Dunn of Corpus Christi) came to teach primary. That

summer, Buena, Electra King and I went to San Marcos to summer school

and got teacher's certificates. The next year I taught primary for that term

and the next four years. A. R. Ladd was superintendent."

Mrs. Foster began teaching music and expression--they called it elocution

then--soon after the family moved to Bishop. "Many were the recitals she

has given," her daughter writes. "We children had to learn a new piece to

say or play each week--there was the same group to hear us each time.

"Mother was active in all clubs in the early days, a charter member of the

Woman's History Club and the P-TA, and served as president of both. She

did much toward keeping the Church of Christ alive during those early days.

She taught at Palo Alto and in the Bishop schools for almost 20 years.

"Daddy carpentered, painted and farmed little "patches" as he called them, blocks and lots, a few

acres each. He was a druggist, and Mother wanted him to put in a drug store in Bishop, but he

didn't seem to care to be cooped up indoors--so the drug store waited for his son, Henry.

"You wanted a funny story of the early days--it wasn't funny at the time--but do any of you

remember when everybody turned up with the bedbugs? Each family tried desperately and

ashamedly to keep the neighbors from knowing they had 'em. One woman followed the advice to

sprinkle kerosene and strike a match to her mattress--she got rid of those bugs and her mattress.

It finally developed that the bedbugs were in a shipment of lumber, some of which practically

everyone in town had bought.

"You really should have sent your query about the beginning of Bishop to Brother (Edwin Foster).

He could have recalled a thousand things to one that I remember, and he would gladly embroider

anything he didn't remember until it would have probably have been more entertaining than the

things he did recall."

Bishop, Nueces County, Texas 1910 - 2010 One Hundred Years of South Texas Heritage!

Swimming Pool and Bath House at City Park

J. R. Lunsford, agent for

Mr. Bishop, with deer in

Bishop City Park.