I first came to Atascosa County to visit my sister, Sula Alice May, who had married Robert Cook. They lived in Poteet where he owned and operated a cotton gin.
In the summer of 1925 I rode the bus to Leming where they were to meet me. But when the bus stopped, who was there to help me off? Robert’s cousin, Charles Hankins. He was never at a loss for words so we soon got introduced and acquainted. I liked Atascosa County right away. We were married in June, 1927, in Austin, where my parents were living.,
So my sister and I married men who were first cousins to each other. They had been reared very near each other and were very good friends. When we later had children, our children were double cousins, and loved to play together. Robert Cook’s father was Tommy Cook of Leming who owned several gins throughout the area at Charlotte, Poteet, Leming, Pettus, Three Rivers and other towns. Charles and Robert had always worked with Tommy and were able to operate any part of the gin wherever they were needed as manager, cotton buyer or whatever.
Later on, Robert L. Cook entered politics and was elected to the office of Atascosa County Tax Collector. They moved from Poteet to Jourdanton and lived there until about 1938 at the end of his second term. Then he and his family—they had two children then, a son named Bobby, Jr. , and a daughter named Lucille, my namesake—moved to San Antonio where he was appointed Chief Clerk of the 4th Court of Civil Appeals. He remained in the position until he retired just a few years before he died in 1981.
In 1926before we married and before Robert and Sula moved to Jourdanton, Charles was looking for a gin or something for a livelihood. He heard of a gin for sale at Coughran, five miles east of Pleasanton. He contacted the proper authorities and after making a contract, he found out he had bought a “whole town” consisting of a two story hotel and three concrete store buildings. One had been a large general mercantile store. Another smaller one was a creamery where cream was bought at the dairy from the farmers nearby and was shipped off on the passenger train. The other small building had been a bank. There was also a lumberyard, a dairy, and shipping pens with a cattle loading shoot up to the railroad cars. The gin needed lots of repair but it was complete with office, weighing scales, seed house, platform to stack bales on, a building to store surplus cotton and a boiler room that was fired with wood.
The hotel had been used to give room and board to the traveling salesman who stopped off the train to sell there wares. Then next morning, they would board the train and go on to other towns. There were almost no automobiles back in 1912 when Coughran was started.
Charles and I repaired the hotel downstairs and used it for our home. Next to that, we repaired the smaller store and made a grocery and general mercantile out of it which still bears the written name of Charles Hankins and which rain has never washed off—the other names written over it have vanished. We also had a post office in that building. There were about 50 people living there but there were no rural routes so the country people came to town for their mail. The mail came in and out on the passenger train each day. We also sold gasoline from a hand pump. All produce from the store came in a 100 lb. sacks—the amount bought was dipped out into paper bags and weighed.
The first two years that we were married, I taught school in the winter and ran the store in the summer. Charles operated the gin in the summer and ran the store in the winter.
There was much cotton planted on all sides of Coughran. Many large farmers planted nothing else-—the W.R. Wiseman farms; a large farm owned by a Mr. Brown of San Antonio and operated by Mr. L. Merriweather; also a large McGee farm off the highway 281. All of the Black Hill farmers brought their cotton to us; much of McCoy and the Leal Settlement brought their cotton to us; and many others.
By this time, I had stopped teaching and was rearing three small children: Bir die Jean, Charlyne and Wayne. I could help very little in the store. A Mr. Truman Clyburn and family operated the store for us for a while. Later, Charles sold the merchandise to my sister Maude and her husband, F.D. Atchley, who moved down from Abilene and took charge. They were a big help to the community as she loved to teach all of her abilities: oil painting, sewing, cooking, etc. She and I used to make lye soap in a big wash pot over a fire outside. Later, she was in charge of mattress making at the schoolhouse, which material the government helped furnish during the depression of the 1930’s. Also, she and her husband held church in the schoolhouse on Sunday afternoons. As the business grew, more people moved near by so another schoolroom was added, making ample room for the overflow.
There was a Clopton Nursery north of town operated by Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence Brown and their family. Many laborers were
employed there. That also added good business for the grocery store. The nursery later was sold so the Browns moved and opened a nursery in Pleasanton.
I went to bed early one night knowing Charles was taking care of everything. When I got up the next morning and walked out
on the front porch, there lay spread out on the dusty floor all of my hand-pieced and hand-quilted wedding quilts my mother and sister
Lola had made and given us for our wedding presents. I almost fainted. I asked Charles why he had used those quilts. He said, “The
boys had to have a place to rest and sleep and those were the first ones I saw.” I learned.
Some of our regular crew were Jeff Crabb of Christine, Mr. Jay Robinson of Three Rivers, Walter Allercamp, Claurice Cooper,
“Buster” Johnson and Pelar Leal, beside others who filled in occasionally.
After our three children grew older, I cooked for and boarded three of the crewmen besides many customers coming home with
Charles to eat lunch. Hungry men are fun to feed. There was one old who was a puzzle. He preferred pinto beans three times a day.
One of Pelar Leal’s daughters helped me with the children and with the house. Her name was Anita Leal, now Mrs. Manuel Zamora,
and lives in Pleasanton. They have several children and grandchildren now. She is a wonderful woman and had many friends.
As summer passed, the first winds of fall blew in and the gin closed, but Coughran did not sleep. It wasn’t long before
wagons filled with ripened ears of corn came rolling to the gin scales, were weighed, and put on the freight cars for shipping.
In the spring, the railroad platform was loaded with sacks of onions to be run through a grader, put in sacks and into freight cars.
Bert Ashton from Robstown brought truckloads of laborers from Mexico every spring to handle this work. Black Hill grew many acres of
onions. Charles helped to weigh and supervise all of this work. Also many acres of watermelons were grown every summer around Coughran, were hauled there and shipped on freight cars to
distant markets. Cattle were also loaded and shipped from Coughran. A Mr. Wells who had leased acres of land north of Coughran would drive in a large herd of cattle and ship a whole train load of them to distant markets two or three times a year.
At that time, Harry Sleuter was depot agent in Pleasanton (about 1935). It kept him very busy getting freight cars to Coughran on time. He stated there was more shipping done from Coughran than from Pleasanton or any town in the county.
One reason for this was because Coughran had no good county roads through which trucks could carry heavy loads. Trucks were becoming more plentiful but poor roads were impossible to travel on. The Highway 281 missed Coughran.
In the winter when business was quiet, Charles found jobs in Pleasanton. The thirties was the awakening of the country people to modern conveniences. One year, he sold the first automatic washing machines. A gasoline motor turned the washer (if you could get it started) , then you changed dirty water for more hot water out of a wash pot. The clothes wringer was turned by hand or by a drive shaft if it had one. Another year he sold butane gas heaters to farmers who brought big tanks of butane gas from out of town. These jobs were offered him by Eloh Haverlah, distributor in Pleasanton.
At this time, living in the country or in Coughran was like living in the dark ages compared to the cities. We were on the verge of getting modern conveniences now, and Charles was selling things that were first on the market. I started out with a wood stove heater and oil lamps, and cooked with a kerosene oil stove. Coughran was just a little country town. The only modern invention we had in 1927 when we moved there was a telephone, but each line had six or eight parties on it. The only radio, an Atwater Kent open table model, was just invented. Earphones were necessary for hearing, and batteries were used for operating it. Late at night when the air was clear was the time for good listening.
Late Charles bought a second-hand Delco light plant operated by batteries to bring electric lights into our house. If the batteries grew weak, our lights were dim.
Charles sold the first refrigerators that were operated by filling a tank with coal oil, lighting it and pushing the tank under the ice-maker unit to start the refrigerator making heaps of ice. The food kept real well for 24 hours when this had to be done again.
Since Coughran had only one fenced public road leading up north and connecting with the old Floresville Road, the county decided to build more roads at Coughran. This money was coming from the Federal government because when President Roosevelt came into office he made jobs for people. The depression was on. Charles was given the job of organizing the work force of WPA (Work Projects administration) workers, and getting land owners to donate a part of their land for a county road. Material to build the fence had to be bought. The fence had to follow the property line between each land owner. This would eliminate gates on the road. The grading of the road was the big job because there were no maintenance crews or heavy equipment at that time to make roads. The grading was done by a fresno scraper, a huge iron shovel pulled by two mules or four mules according to the heavy load. The fresno was guided by two handles attached to it and several men directing where and how deep to break up the dirt for the road. It was hard work. But it is amazing how high and smooth the road bed became and how deep the side ditches.
Before this road was built, there were four gates to open between Coughran and Pleasanton. part of the road was deep sand--part was black, and slippery in rainy weather. Now it was smooth and fast traveling compared, but no tarviating at that time. Likewise, a road to Black Hill was built. Their old road was hans traveling and there were many gates to open and creeks to cross. Black Hill people could now get to jourdanton to the county Courthouse to take care of taxes and business. Another road was buit south of Coughran to connect with the old Charles Downey Road. We called it the Mansfield Road. About the time, the Karnes County Rural Electric Company was organized. They wanted permission to run lines into Atascosa County through individual propertyowners' land and to sell them electricity to operate those refrigerators, washing machines, stoves, lights, radios and fans. Charles and Henry Shearrer, Sr., were given the job to contact the land owners for permission to run the lines across their land and to conect their line to their house. At that time, it cost a $5.00 fee to get the REA line connected to each home. Many refused to pay but soon were sorry as it cost two or three times that later on. Mnay rual people bought the electricity and have been helped by this company. Afterthe REA entered the rural homes there were no more country people. We had all the conviences of the city people. Even the tractors replaced the mules and plows.Many town people moved to the country for fresh air and quiet living with all modern conviences of the city. Our children attend Coughran School for two or three years. They enjoyed all the children and the games. Then they rode the Pleasanton bus in to the schoolsthere as they grew up. At Coughran, we had many school programs at Christmas time, also at the close of the year. Every country year had a program and people from all the surrounding communities attend. Every Saturday night our children had a promise we would take them to the Plestex Theatre in Pleasanton to see Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, Hop-a-long Cassidy and others.There have never been such good shows since. They also went swimming and wading in the Atascosa River and caught crawdads when possible. Those were the good old days when the annual Atascosa County Fairs were held around the old Courthouse grounds in Pleasanton. There were all kinds of sewing and cooking contests and selling booths. Huge crowds attended. They always had old automible races east of the Courthouse grounds. They were exciting, racing around and around the track. One race I'll never forget. Willie Palmero, a young mechanic in town, had fixed an old car up to race in. It was two-seated with no top on it. All cars were racing and Willie was going faster than anybody. But soon something went wrong with his car, maybe the steering gear. His car left the racetrack and ran straight into a large telephone post. It shot willie straight up into the air about 20 feet as the car bounced back, then foward again, and Willie came straight down on his two feet and went walking off to his car. He was not hurt at all. Willie was a game and lucky little fellow. I want to say I knew Mr. and Mrs.Abe Coughran, the founders of the town, well. He still had a fine home and some good white-face cattle on land he had leased. He never saw too much rain. When it flooded, a fellow would say to him, "We had a fine rain." He'd say, "Yeh, yeh, just a little shower." Mrs. Coughran was a hard worker. She taught me to gather and make ripe (seedless) wild grape preserves, also cottage cheeze and pickled watermelon rind salad. She was a great neighbor. There comes an end to all good things. The government passed a law limiting the number of acres of cotton that a farmer could plant in an effort to get the price up--supply and demand. That hurt our ginning. The onion business had declined. Also watermelons. The war with Japan had started and times were changing. The little town that had grown in the last 15 years was changing , too. No cotton, no work and no money. In October, 1942, Charles was offered a job in Robstown as a manager of the Coastal bend Production Credit Association. He tried it out and liked itso well we all moved down there. We sold the town of Coughran to Walter Allercamp who continued to opperate the store. Mr. and Mrs. Atchley sold the contents of the store to him and they moved back to Abilene near his people. He died there in 1960. She returned to San Antonio and Pleasanton soon afterwards and died in 1980 in Pleasanton. We retained our ranch at Coughran and I leased it out. Charles' work in the office at Robstown was very heavy for him. The office was headquarters for 27 counties from Corpus Christi to Brownsville and they loaned money to farmers and ranchers as a co-op. a lot of responsibility and traveling was required. Many meetings throughout the state required the directions and him to attend. The association grew so that a new office building was erected in Robstown while he was still manager. We lived in Robstown 25 years till he retired, and we linked the town very well. It had good schools and good churches. All three of our children graduated from Robstown High School. Wayne, our son, was an wxcellent athlete, participating in most sports. He made the highest score in a basketball game that was ever made in that gymnasiam-32 points. All three children attended A&I University at Kingsville. But Wayne stopped after his second year and enlisted in the Army. He had training at Ft. Ord, California; at Camp Chaffee, Arkansas; and intensive training at Ft. Knox, Kentucky, in heavy artillery--105 millimeter howitzer cannon. He was injured there but later went to Germany for a year. Then back to Ft. Carson, Colorado, and later mustered out with an honorable discharge. He returned to A&I university and finished his degree making honor grades. He taught school for a while, then later took up ranching on our land at Coughran. When Wayne was ranching at Coughran, he worked very hard and made many improvements also. There was a large earthen tank that caught the rain water. There were also cattle pens fairly nearby with one gate. he built a fence from a corner to go around the tank, making one gate in the middle and ran the fence on the pens. So when he needed to catch cattle for shipping or doctoring against infections from disease-carrying flies, he let the cattle come up for water or feed, then closed the two gates and he had them secure. He also built an excellent loading shoot from large telephone posts. The shoot lasted for many years. Birdie, our oldest child, now Mrs. Jim Davis, has a master's degree from A&I and has taught school 32 years in Robstown. She has three children: Linda Kay, Cindy and Paul Anthony Wasson. Linda Kay, now Mrs. W.Paul Davis of Abilene, also has a master's degree from Abilene Christian University and teaches English in Wiley High School. She has also been directing the one-act U.I.L (University Interscholastic League) school play for several years. They have one young son. Cindy, now Mrs. Richard Mackerer of Corpus Christi, is also involved in school teaching. They have three little boys. Paul Wasson, Birdie's only son, graduated from Calallen High School. He and his wife, the former Rhonda Fitch of Robstown, live in Corpus Christi, and he works at Five Points Mall in Calallen. Charlyne, our second daughter, now Mrs. Tom Wilson, has a degree and has taught school in Robstown about 24 years. They have three daughters and all have degrees: Sandra, now Mrs. Alan Towler, whose husband is an instructor at Southwest Texas State University in San Marcos. They have a boy and a girl. Sandra teaches in a Christian school. Another daughter, Becky, now Mrs. Tim harmon, lives in Simi Valley, California. She is head of the Physical Education Department inthe junior high school. They have one little girl. So you see we are all family teachers. To be honest, my father's sister in-law was a teacher, beginning in the 1890's I also had two sisters and a brother who taught, besides my three children, five granddaughters and myself, making 14 in all. It was stated that my mother's mothertaught school in Magnolia, Arkansas, but that ws back in 1854 so I really don't know. We all love helping the young children to learn.And we also love the three-months' vacation we get in the summertime to be with our own families at home and to take some short trips. We have many wonderful memories of Robstown the 25 years we lived there. But when Charles retired, he wanted to return the good earth and the good soil at Coughran to live out his days. He worked so much, improving our land--draining swamps, killing undesirable plants, building new fences and planting coastal Bermuda grass. At the same time, our grandchildren were still in high school. They loved to visit us in the country. It was fun working and playing in the open spaces. After several years of retirement, Charles took sick after a long illness, he died in 1978. Wayne and I live in Pleasanton and still love it here.
--Lucille May Hankins
--Lucille May Hankins