Copyright © 2009-2010 Bishop Centennial Celebration, Inc. All rights reserved. Updated August 22, 2009
May 14 - 16, 2010
Bishop, Nueces County, Texas 1910 - 2010 One Hundred Years of South Texas Heritage!
WHITTEN FAMILY MOVES TO SOUTH TEXAS IN 1916
(Information submitted by grandson, John Whitten Pierce, July 2009, and taken from The
Kingsville Record, Nov. 16, 1965; Nov. 5, 1968; New Encyclopedia of Texas, Vol. IV, 1927,
p. 2893; and family members.)
William Edgar Whitten was born in Georgia on November 5, 1875, but moved with his
family to Grandview, Texas in 1894 when he was eighteen. Shortly after moving to Grand-
view, he met Annie Alta Harrell, daughter of a prominent Grandview farming family. After a
proper courtship he proposed to Annie. Since she was only fifteen and he twenty-two, they
chose to elope. According to family legend, Edgar Whitten borrowed a fast horse for his
buggy from a friend, picked up his sister and her husband in their buggy as their chaperone,
because unmarried couples had to be accompanied by chaperones on dates in those days.
As they continued on their date, Edgar quickly signaled his horse to go into high gear and
outran the chaperones. He raced to the parson’s house in his buggy with his bride-to-be
at his side on December 28, 1897, and married her. Their marriage lasted seventy years
and produced five children, the first baby dying in infancy.
Immediately after their marriage, the couple moved to a small, one-room boxed house with
a small shed room on a farm in Grandview where he farmed during farming season, hauled
cordwood to a gin during the fall and winter, and later entered the grocery and confectionary
business in partnership with his brother until 1912. But word of newly opened black land in
Nueces County reached the folks in Johnson County, so in 1916, W.E Whitten bought land
one mile west of Bishop and began farming again. The farm roads to town were unpaved,
making it difficult for his children to attend school regularly when they were muddy, so
Whitten moved his family into town and in 1919 opened a real estate and farm loan office
that he would operate for the next 40 years.
In discussing his move to Bishop to take advantage of the black land in Nueces County
many years later, he mentioned that the land sold for fifty cents per acre. When his grand-
children questioned his not buying large sections of the bargain-price farmland, he
responded with, “I didn’t have the fifty cents an acre.”
W.E. Whitten, a self-taught man with a keen legal mind, wrote many legal documents
during those 40 years. According to him, he wrote more than 800 deeds, over 100 wills,
hundreds of contracts and thousands of acknowledgements, as well as making out many
income tax reports.
Besides running his farm and his real estate and farm loan business, Whitten was a
visible force in the various farm and civic enterprises that would promote the growth and
development of Bishop. He helped organize the Bishop Chamber of Commerce and served
as its director and president. He was also organizer of the Bishop Cemetery Association
and served for 20 years as president of the association. He also donated land for the first
cemetery before the Bishop Cemetery was established in its present location. He served
as president of the Bishop School Board from 1919-1920.
In 1920 he became a stockholder in the First State Bank of Bishop and was almost
immediately elected director and vice president. President of the bank was Robert
Driscoll, and directors included such pioneer South Texas business leaders as Joe Hirsch
and Caesar Kleberg.
Several years later, Whitten became vice president and director of the First National Bank
of Bishop. His interest in banking extended to three nephews who occupied prominent
positions with Kingsville banking institutions. One, Otis West, was president of Kleberg
First National Bank, while two others, T.A. Harrell and J.H. West were directors of
Mercantile National Bank in Kingsville.
His influence and activities expanded beyond Bishop into Nueces County and even to
surrounding counties. He served as director of the Farm Bureau Federation and the South
Texas Cotton Cooperative Association, which he helped organize, and for 10 years was
county committeeman for the farm program. He was on the first plow-up committee in
1934 and chairman of the first pink bollworm eradication program. When the farm program
was up for consideration, he was one of the Texas farmers sent to Washington to meet
with President Roosevelt and the members of the House and Senate. (In the accompanying
picture of the delegates to Washington, D.C., some of the older South Texas residents may
recognize some of the men.) After their meeting with the President, the Texas delegation
was taken on a tour of the Capitol by a tall, young, lanky Texan named Lyndon Baines
Johnson, who was then secretary to Congressman Kleberg of South Texas.
Whitten served as director of three other business institutions which he had helped
organize in Bishop, the Bishop Duval Land Company, the Farmers’ Gin and Ice Company,
and the Bishop Land and Investment Co. In addition, he also served as a notary public for
more than 50 years. He also served on the War Rating Board for Nueces County during
World War II, and was in charge of first registration day for men of military service age in
this area.
A story that gives insight into W.E. Whitten’s character emerged as a result of the first
house he built in Bishop. As Whitten prospered, he built a comfortable house on the
west side of Bishop just across the railroad tracks. Then in 1935, shortly after the birth
of his grandson, John Pierce, while John and his mother Alta Pierce were staying at her
parents’ house, the house caught fire one Sunday morning while Church was in session.
Ken Pierce, John’s brother, remembers their mother rushing down the stairs and scooping
up young John and running from the house. Most of the volunteer firemen were in church
but left immediately and fought the fire in their Sunday suits. Of course, the suits were
badly damaged and smoked filled, so Whitten purchased each fireman a new suit. He
rebuilt the house, which stands in the same place and is presently occupied.
Whitten, a member of the First Baptist Church for 58 years, served as a member of the
board of deacons for over 40 years and was church treasurer for 21 years. Those who
knew him would agree that he was a fair-minded Christian who was kind to his family
and thought of others first. Every activity he was involved in was to benefit others.
As a result of Whitten’s life of public service, he was invited to the inauguration of Lyndon
B. Johnson in 1964. The invitation is still in the possession of the family.
Whitten Family: L to R standing, Mrs. W. E. Whitten, Kenneth Pierce, Mr. W. E. Whitten, Robert Whitten, Mrs.
Robert (Mope) Whitten, Dwain Whitten, Libby Whitten, Jim Whitten, Margaret Ann Whitten, Alta Pierce, (baby)
James M. Whitten, Harry F. Pierce, Oscar Whitten, Bina Miller Whitten. The children kneeling in front L to R are
Edgar Whitten, Susan Whitten, Peggy Pierce, and John Pierce.
)
Click photo to enlarge.
