Most of the personal information about Emma Slack Lane that appears in this sketch comes from Jessie Owings McCollam, granddaughter of Emma’s sister Ida. Jessie spent a good deal of time with her grandmother, and, by association, with Emma. In 1984 I wrote a letter to the editor of the Greenville, Texas, newspaper, asking if anyone in the city could identify the people in some pictures of the Lane family that I had. Jessie answered my letter, and I visited her on September 8 with a distant cousin, Madie Earlane Hawkins Simpson. Earlane and I spent a wonderful day with Jessie talking about the Slacks and the Lanes and visiting the family graveyards.

It is a matter of public record, however--not personal reminiscence-- that Emma was the daughter and granddaughter of men who settled in Texas when it was still a Mexican colony. She was born in Hunt County, Texas, on January 8, 1854, the first baby in her family to survive childhood. So she must have begun her life being especially valued and loved. She spent her girlhood on a farm 4 miles north of Greenville, in what was then known as the Slack Community, playing in her father’s fields and orchards on the Sabine River.

She attended the Slack school which was situated on land donated by her father for that purpose at the junction of modern day highway  69 and 69 business. It is apparent, then, that Emma’s parents considered education important and wanted a place where their children could learn to read and write.

 

Emma and her sisters may have studied reading and memory work and spelling from the Blueback Speller. More than a century later, Jessie recalled, “They (the spelling books) were marvelous! They had everything in it. It was a small book at that. When you finished that, you could read anything you wanted to and spell any word that was being used in ordinary conversation.”

Emma’s childhood was not all carefree wandering through fields and orchards, not all reading stories in the raw board school that her father undoubtedly helped build on his property. She was, after all, just 7 when the Civil War began and spent at least two years of it doing without her father. She was 11 when he returned home and 17 when  he died. She also would have seen younger siblings die in infancy and childhood.

In the March 20, 1925, Greenville Morning Herald– Celebrating 75 years a Town, she spoke for herself about her childhood. “Mrs. Lane relates that her people raised   on the farm almost everything they needed. She says there were Indians north of town which were supposed to be ‘tame’ Indians, but they were not always so. Her mother was afraid to leave the children alone at the house, and she remembers the wolves howled continuously at night.”

On November 20, 1873, she married Rufus Kidwell Lane, who had come from Greeneville, Tennessee, to Greenville, Texas, as a young man, and together they had 8 children, burying 3 before the children had reached their third birthdays. Throughout their long marriage-- as Jessie recalled-- Emma always called her husband Mr. Lane.  “In speaking to him or about him--Mr. Lane.”

 

Emma is unusual in our family because she spent her whole life in one county and state and maybe– though I doubt it due to information in census records– her whole married life in one house. Jessie said that Emma had been “brought as a bride to this mansion on North Stonewall Street that Mr. Lane had provided for her. It was a large, two-story house with a complete veranda and down across the front, a two-story thing. Wood. We would not call the house in which the Lanes lived a mansion today, but it was large and no doubt very comfortable.

My Aunt Adrena Burns Walls told me that Emma had a marble slab in front of her fireplace where she used to bathe her babies. Jessie confirmed that. “She did. It was a beautiful fireplace. I knew the mantle and the fireplace well because we sat there and visited. Her bedroom was just about as big as this (living) room we’re sitting in with a 10-12 foot ceiling in it - high ceilings. They all were built that way in that day and time. They heated those things with a fireplace, and it can’t be done. You had to sit in front of the fireplace and toast your feet.  If you’d get cold in the rear, you’d turn around and warm that and sit down right quick.”

Jessie described Emma as small, dainty, and perhaps 5 feet, 4 inches tall. Emma  had brown hair, a lock of which I have  in a frame with others pinned to a piece of ruled paper perhaps by Emma herself and passed down to her grandson Claude Brown who gave it to me. Her great granddaughter, Adrena Burns Walls, who, of course, knew Emma as an old woman, said Emma also had “big black eyes--they looked like big, black cherries.   She also had masses of white hair piled on top of her head.”   When I showed Jessie the first picture I had brought to show her, she replied, “That’s Aunt Emma. She had kind of dreamy eyes. I just don’t remember her looking that drab.  Aunt Emma had pride and was a well-dressed woman always.”

Well-dressed Emma might have been, but she must have been an unpretentious woman as well, for Jessie also remembered that Emma dipped snuff and made frequent use of a spittoon. “Aunt Emma had a little platform rocker of the old-fashioned type where all the wood shows, and the back comes up high...a little swivel rocking chair. It looked more like an old-fashioned dentist’s chair. It was good solid wood and little plush arm rests--little round, right ones. She had that sitting alongside her big bedroom window. She sat there. Stonewall street with all the traffic... She wore a shawl... She sat there with her glasses and her spittoon. She dipped snuff. My grandmother didn’t. They learned how as little girls from the Nigras. They learned to dip snuff. Aunt Emma did it as long as she lived, much to Granny’s chagrin. Aunt Emma would sit there in that chair reading her paper with one leg thrown over the arm of the chair this way. Completely relaxed. Pushing gently with one foot and reading. And that was Aunt Emma in her later years.” Jessie didn’t want that misunderstood, however, and added, “She didn’t spit when anybody was around. She was a lady about the whole thing, but it was there.” Apparently, it was not unusual for a woman to dip snuff in Emma’s day. A Mrs. William Price of Marlin, Texas— who, as she was born in 1847, was a contemporary of Emma’s— when interviewed by the WPA stated, “The young ladies dipped snuff  instead of smoking as they do now and old ladies smoked  clay  pipes.”  Mrs. Price was referring to the daughters of well-to-do Texans who were sent to Fairfield Female College during the Civil War, so dipping snuff must have been  socially acceptable to most people of the day— even if it were an anathema to Emma’s sister Ida.

Jessie recalled that Emma, being the oldest daughter, was the queen bee of her family and expected everyone to recognize that. “Emma was two years older than Ida, and we paid homage to Aunt Emma as long as she lived. She was the older of the two sisters. She had a little more money than my grandmother. On Sunday afternoon we were supposed to pay homage to Aunt Emma, and we all dressed and went down to her house and sat a while. If Granny could coax Emma to go with her, Aunt Emma would get on the back seat (of Ida’s car), right next to the door, just ready to jump out at any moment. My sister and I wedged in between them. Granny on one side and Aunt Emma on the other, and my sister and me in the center, and Mama and Uncle were drivers up in front. Away we’d go. We’d go to the cemetery sometimes. But just around town and wave to friends as we’d pass. They would. They knew everybody here. Aunt Emma never bought an automobile. She never owned one. Christine (Emma’s daughter) had a little Ford coupe that stood bolt upright. She went around. She’d come out to our house out near the college. But Aunt Emma seldom came with her.”

Ida wasn’t the only one who catered to Emma. Jessie recalled a house call made by the dentist. “When Aunt Emma’s teeth gave way-- Granny’s never did. Ida kept her own teeth her whole life. She went to the dentist once or twice after she was 70. Aunt Emma had to have her teeth pulled. Up here on the corner was Dr. Parker, and he was a dentist. Dr. Parker pulled her teeth. How in the world he got an impression, I don’t know, but that was the last time she ever went to his office. He called on Miz Lane, brought the teeth, and fitted them in her own chair in her own home. She wore them just as little as she could get by with because she was too old to put up with it, and adjust to it.  It went hard with her.”

Ida must not have minded Emma’s assumption of the family throne. The two sisters, were by all accounts, very close. “She was ‘Emmer’ to my grandmother, and my grandmother was ‘Ider’ to her. .. There’s not a sign of an ‘r’ in it, but that was their little dialect.” Jessie attributed their closeness to proximity as much as anything else. “They were right under each other’s noses in the same town and being close in birth as well. They kept in communication, and you could rest assured that you couldn’t eat your lunch in the middle of the day that Emmer  didn’t call Ider on the telephone. Our telephone was out in the hall, and Granny would stand there and talk to Emma. They would exchange the latest happenings to the members of the family every day.”

Emma was rather eclectic in her religion. Jessie considered Emma to be a Methodist, though she pointed out that “...in some of the obituaries I think someone gave Aunt Emma    to the Primitive Baptists. But I don’t remember her going to the Baptist church.” Emma lived near the Presbyterian Church, and  as she didn’t drive, and as she liked the pastor, she went to that church. She would also attend the Wesley Methodist Church around the corner where her daughter Christine was active. “Aunt Emma did not attend church as regularly as Ida. We went every Sunday, sometimes twice a day. I went 3 times because I had to go to Epworth League in the middle of the afternoons.”

Jessie considered Emma to be “hard.” “After having lost three babies in  a row, and then her oldest son having disgraced the entire (family) she thought, she withdrew more into herself and was sharp. Aunt Emma was a good woman. (But)  She had had it, as the modern saying is, from people or circumstances that she couldn’t control.”    

One thing she couldn’t control aside from her  children’s marriages and disasters was the destruction of many of her cherished possessions. As Jessie recalled, “Aunt Emma had a shed in the backyard with 3 or 4 feather beds in it. It was stuffed with flammable materials, possessions. One hot summer afternoon, there was a spontaneous combustion in her backyard, an explosion with terrible fire, and treasures and possessions went. It was a terrible blow to her.”

Another characteristic that both Jessie and her husband Edward assigned to Emma was frankness. “She was plainspoken. She was as honest as she could be.” Edward recalled, “A few days after we ran off and got married, she called me over the phone. She said, ‘I want you to go out and see Mamie (Ida’s daughter),’ I can hear it now. She says, ‘Mamie can’t make her mind up whether she’ll get a pistol and shoot you or not.’   That’s exactly the way she said it.  She give me the devil.”

A more pleasant memory was recalled by Emma’s granddaughter Edith Mae Lane who told her daughter-in-law that her “Granny” loved ice cream and that she and Edith would go to a shop on the square and walk home eating it.

After her husband’s death, Emma must have held things together by renting out parts of her house. She rented out the top floor and part of the first floor and kept rooms for her own use. This was likely disturbing to her, giving up the use of large portions of her home to others. But I would imagine she had no choice. Jessie Owings McCollam said that at one time Emma rented out two apartments upstairs and that Christine live downstairs with Emma. The parlor was Christine’s domain. Apparently, Emma paid her taxes with the rental income.

In her old age, Emma suffered from high blood pressure and did have a stroke. She died on January 23, 1926. Cause of death was listed as anuria (inability to urinate) and influenza. She was laid out in the home where she had lived for 53 years, the home which had seen her children and grandchildren leave and return again, widowed, motherless, fatherless, or injured. The home which had contained all the important moments of  her life-- births, deaths, weddings, and funerals-- within its walls.

Christine was the executor of  Emma’s  estate and on April 8, 1926, filed a petition to manage the property  belonging to

the estate.  (Probate record; volume y, pages 480-481, Hunt County, Texas)

App for Temp Admr. The State of Texas. In the county court of Hunt County, Texas, sitting in probate January 26th, 1926.

To the Honorable N.E. Peak, Judge of said court: Your petitioner, Christine Hawkins Grace, joined by her husband, H.B. Grace, resident citizens of Tarrant County, Texas, shows to the court that Mrs. E.E. Lane is dead; that she died intestate in the city of Greenville in Hunt County, Texas, on the 23rd of January 1926; that the deceased left real estate in the city of Greenville in Hunt County Texas, upon which there is an annual rental of about Twenty three hundred dollars ($2300). That in addition she left a small amount of household and kitchen furniture and about Five hundred dollars ($500.00) in money. That it is necessary for someone to be appointed temporary administrator of the estate of the decedent to take charge of said personal property and to collect the rents and revenues arising from the real estate until the same can be partitioned among the heirs of the decedent, some of whom are non- residents of the state of Texas and the address of one of whom is at this time unknown. That your petitioner is not disqualified from acting as such temporary administrator as the daughter of the said Mrs. Emma E. Lane, deceased. In May of 1926, the estate was divided into five parts: Christine and H.B. Grace of Tarrant County, were, of course, heirs, as were her brothers, sister, and niece. They all  sold their shares of the estate to Christine as executor of the estate.

 

1.) Claude L. and Bessie Lane of Muskogee, Oklahoma, sold his interests to Christine for $8,500.

2.) William Lorenzo Lane of Chicago, Illinois, sold his interests in the estate to Christine for $7,000.  

3.) Birdie and Claude Brown of Los Angeles, California, sold her interests in the estate for $10,000.

4.) Miss Elizabeth Gamble of King’s County, Virginia, sold her interests in the estate for $7,000.

According to her son, Claude Brown, Birdie received enough money to make a down payment on a home and also to buy a lot. Yet, Birdie felt she had been shortchanged by her sister Christine. Birdie wasn’t the only one. Jessie McCollam recalled that Claude Lane had gone to Jessie’s sister Mayfair “and he was hot on Christine’s trail. Mayfair couldn’t give him any information. She told him that the last she knew of Christine, Christine was in Fort Worth. He tried to make Mayfair admit that she knew where she was.  He wanted a settlement out of the estate.  He swore he never got a thing.  That was years and years later.”

Hunt County, Texas, Deed Record Volume 310, page 405: In this deed Claude L. Lane and Bessie Lane of Muskogee County, Oklahoma, for $8,500 paid by his sister Christine, sold his rights to her to all of the estates of R.K. and Emma Lane. His portion was 1/5th interest in those estates. The property sold to Christine included lot 1, in block 4 of the original town plan which had once been owned by G.W. Gamble, her brother-in-law as well as a tract of land in Greenville which was part of lot 6, block 14, as well as a tract of land half mile northwest of the public square in Greenville being 4 3/4 acres that was sold in 1881 by T.D. Montrose to R.K. Lane (Deed Book A, page 193).

Dallas (Texas) Morning News, August 27, 1918: Mrs. R.K. Lane of Greenville is visiting her daughter Mrs. Claude A. Brown in Highland Park.

Unknown Greenville, Texas, newspaper, dated March 20, 1925: (This is a partial description of the parade that Emma and her sister Ida took part in.) Greenville today celebrated in appropriate and befitting style the occasion commemorating the seventy- fifth anniversary of its founding with one of the largest historic pageants ever attempted in the city before for any similar occasion. The day of the pageant dawned clear and bright and long hours before the time scheduled for the parade every incoming train and stage line brought their quota of visitors into the city. By noon parking space along the designated line of march was at a premium and the streets were lined with a jostling good natured crowd of sightseers. An hour before parade time the crowd was augmented by the arrival of hundreds of local citizens and employees of local stores who closed two hours during the celebration. With beg owned and costumed persons in accordance with the fashions in vogue half a century and more ago, and with scores of attractively decorated floats, each depicting some outstanding event in the city’s founding and subsequent development, Greenville slipped back into the past and lived over again for one brief occasion, those early epoch making days that marked its beginning three quarters of a century ago. Heralded as one of the most elaborate events ever undertaken by the city and extensively advertised throughout Northeast Texas, the spectators by the thousands, gathered along the line of march. The pageant was also covered by staff men representing leading Texas daily papers. The parade formed on West Lee Street and Walnut Street, and moved east toward the square and was augmented by additional units dropping into allotted places at intervals along the line of march. By the time the parade had reached the outskirts of the business district it had attained its full proportions. The parade itself with its scores of beautifully and appropriately themed floats, each...

Dallas (Texas) Morning News, March 21, 1925: Covered Wagons Roll Once Again in Hunt County. 30,000 Attend Fete Held in Greenville. East Texas Witnesses Picturesque Re-Enactment of Early Days. City 75 Years Old. Metropolis Erected After Pioneers Suffered Hardships Throughout Long Period. Greenville, Texas, March 20– Covered wagons rolled over the black lands of Hunt County once more Friday and the wary redskin fell back again before the advance of fur-capped pioneers with Bowie knives in their belts and flint rifles over their shoulders, as 30,000 people of Greenville and neighboring towns and counties witnessed a re- enactment of the picturesque history of early days in Texas. It was Greenville’s seventy-fifth birthday. The whole countryside joined in the celebration, almost doubling the 16,000 population of the city in the number of persons who saw the long and brilliant pageant. Greenville’s diamond jubilee represented with the high water mark of local civic enterprises and the thousands of visitors who were more than repaid for coming to the party. For over two miles the parade of Comanche, outriders, first settlers, founders of the city and then floats symbolical of the town’s past since that time stretched out before the spectators. Scarcely an hour and a half was long enough for the dramatic unfolding of the parchment from the mounted squadron at the front carrying the six flags of Texas until the last decorated motor van conveying the flappers of 1925 had passed. The crowds stood ceaselessly cheering. But the dominant note of the day’s celebration was not pride alone in the growth and prosperity of Greenville. Instead it was a reverent homage to the pioneers of North Texas, who, like McKinney Howell Wright, surveyor and founder of Greenville, came fearlessly into a new land to make their homes....

 

Dallas (Texas) Morning News, October 1, 1925: Letter to the Editor– My mother, Mrs. R.K. Lane, who has resided at 2216 Stonewall Street, Greenville, since 1873, has not missed an issue of your very excellent paper since the first copy was off the press. We have preserved all your special editions and compiled many authoritative articles which you have given your readers. My family, consisting of six brothers and sisters, have been reared to manhood and womanhood, cherishing the many good things that we have gotten through a lifetime’s reading of your admirable paper. My mother is now 70 years of age, in excellent health and enjoys The News to the fullest extent.  Mrs. Christine Lane Grace, Greenville.

 

Greenville (Texas) Evening Banner, January 25, 1926: According to Jessie Owings McCollam, this was written by Emma’s daughter Christine who was infuriated when one of Emma’s friends, Mary Carpenter, wrote an obituary for Emma that Christine considered flawed. Jessie’s comments about the pallbearers are written in bold print. Mrs. Carpenter’s obituary ran in various papers beginning January 23rd.

 

Funeral services for Mrs. R.K. Lane, pioneer Greenville woman, who died at the family home on North Stonewall Street Saturday morning, were held Sunday afternoon at 2:00, at the home 2216 Stonewall Street. Services were conducted by Dr. George French, pastor of Wesley Methodist Church assisted by Rev. J.B. Gober. (Brother Gober was a one-armed circuit preacher. Everyone knew and loved him. I think he was Methodist.) Pall bearers were active: Jim Ellis. (He’s 104 years old. Lives on Stonewall Street right down the way here several blocks. Goes to Sunday School every Sunday morning. Never misses.), Will Reeves (He lived the next block north of Aunt Emma and owned the Coca-Cola Bottling Works, very well-to-do people.), Marvin Bush, Jess Morris, M.O. Leggett (M.O. Leggett, the son of this man was a friend of O.E.’s. They played across the street. They looked at each other across the street and hollered back and forth and played. M.O. grew up and fell into a share of the Luby Cafeterias.), Al Island (dry goods merchant), Fred Derricks (who lived in the upstairs apartment of Aunt Emma’s for years), and H. L. Carpenter. Honorary pallbearers were N.S. Moore (another very influential man who lived across the street from them on St. John Street. He was a grocery man and in later years became mayor of this town.), J.M. Spurlock (the banker), T.D. Starnes (another lawyer), and Dr. Galliard. (He lived across the street from Aunt Emma. His house is in our park out here being one of the first homes in Greenville.) To that we’d add  N.E. Peak (another merchant), Otha McCombs (who was of the family), Sam Rosenthal (who courted Christine for years during   her widowhood. He was a Hebrew. He was a furniture man.), A.G. Grandmasters, C.S. Hutchens, and William Arnold. (He led our Centennial parade. He was so old, he had to be shown around at that deal. It was at this parade that they made the moving picture show, and A.S. Moore owned the picture show for years, and he showed that picture on two different occasions to the public. There they were, the two sisters standing side by side. They were in the honored group at the parade and centennial.) Mrs. R.K. Lane was born January 8, 1854, and married on November 20, 1873. To this union 8 children were born, 3 dying in infancy. A daughter, Mrs. Mary Gamble, died in February 1916. The four surviving are Ren Lane of Chicago, Mrs. H.B. Grace of Fort Worth, Mrs. Birdie Brown of Los Angeles, California, and Mr. Claude Lane of Muscogee, Oklahoma. Her husband, R.K. Lane, was a successful dry goods merchant of Greenville for twenty years. He preceded Mrs. Lane in death 12 years ago. Mrs. Lane had resided at the same place for 53 years where she was taken as a bride. Her parents came to this county 100 years ago. Mrs. Lane’s father, who was Isaac

U.    Slack, was married to Mary Williams, June 28, 1849. Her father being five years of age when he came here from

Wood County, Mississippi. Her mother came from Pittsylvania County, Virginia, in 1847. Isaac Slack fought through the Civil War, dying from pneumonia a few months after the close of this conflict. He was the first man to plant wheat in Fannin County and the first man to plant cotton in Hunt County, and attended the first court held in Hunt county which opened its sessions under the huge oak tree on Johnson Street in this city. He also helped lay off the streets of Greenville. To the Williams-Slack union were born 11 children, the 3 eldest dying in infancy. Three children survive as of this death: Mrs. Ida Sanders of 2122 Langford Street; Mrs. Lora Terry, of Durant, Oklahoma; and Mrs. John Harris of Celeste. The history of the Slack family of which Mrs. Lane was a member, reads like a romance, and there are just a few of this family carrying on. Eight grandchildren and two great grandchildren survive Mrs. Lane.

 

Predictably, as Christine wrote this obituary, there are a pack of errors in it. The Slacks came to Texas in 1836, 90 years, not 100 years before Emma died. Isaac Slack came from Woodville, Wilkinson County, Mississippi, not Wood County. He died 6 years, not a few months, after the end of the war.  Six, not 3, of the Slack children died.  Christine, however,  was ironically right on target when she said the history of  the Slack family  read like a romance.  But then, when she wrote or told it, it always did.

 

Unknown Greenville, Texas, newspaper, dated Wednesday, January 28, 1926: (This was written by a friend named Mary Carpenter whose initials were M.V.C.)....Mrs. Lane had resided at her present home since her marriage her husband bringing her there a bride 53 years ago, making her home an old landmark. Mrs. Lane was a woman of strong character, true to her convictions, a good wife, a real helpmeet to her husband, a kind and indulgent mother and a true friend.  She joined the Primitive Baptist church in her girlhood. The writer has been a constant visitor in her home for forty years. She was always glad to have me. I always felt at home in her home. Her last birthday only two weeks ago it was I dropped by only to wish her many happy returns for her natal day. Little did I realize she was so near the end of her journey, although she said, “Mary, there is no use to wish me many more birthdays, for I won’t be here that much longer, but I wish you to be here as long as I am.” So ended my last visit to my friend, Mrs. Lane. I will miss her, yes, I’ll miss her. She has gone to her saintly rest.– “Where no sorrow can be known and no trouble can molest. For her crown of life is won And the dead in Christ are blest.” A friend, M.V.C.   (Note: I was told this obituary infuriated Christine.)

Greenville (Texas) Messenger, Thursday, January 28, 1926: This obituary was written by  one of Emma’s friends, Mary   (Mrs. H.L.) Carpenter, wife of one of Emma’s pallbearers. Mrs. Emma Slack Lane, widow of R.K. Lane, a pioneer merchant and one of the best known business men of the earlier days of this city, died at her home where she had lived for 53 years, last Saturday morning. Mrs. Lane was 72 years, and her life was spent in and near Greenville. She was he daughter of Isaac Slack, a pioneer citizen who lived in the Slack community, north of Greenville, where for so many years the public school carried his name. In 1872 she was married to R.K. Lane and since her marriage has lived on North Stonewell Street little more than one block off the public square. She was of that hardy type of pioneer citizenship to whom duty brought no task too severe or before which she would flee in fear. She was a woman of positive character and impressed all about her with sincerity and devotion to her duties as she understood it. In early life she united with the Primitive Baptist Church and lived true to faith throughout the years....

CHILDREN OF RUFUS AND EMMA LANE:

1.     Mary Margaret Elizabeth

 

born: August 22, 1875, Hunt County, Texas. In the 1900 census, Mary says she was born in August 1874 which is not possible if the dates on her brother’s tombstone are correct. Her brother gave her birth date as 1870 on her death certificate, but she is listed as being five years old in the 1880 census.  In the 1910 census, Mary gives her age as 32, which would mean she was born in 1878.

 

married: George Wesley Gamble, July 15, 1897, Hunt County, Texas. His name is given as Wesley J. Gamble in one census. Her tombstone says she was born August 24, 1874, but again, there is either an error with her stone or her brother’s. The family Bible record gives August 22, 1875, as her birthdate.

children: a.) Catherine Elizabeth, born June 1898, Hunt County, Texas

died: February 29, 1916, Greenville, Texas, of Bright’s Disease. She and her husband share a modern stone on which her birth and death dates are not. Only his age at death, 34 years, 11 months, 18 days, is engraved on his stone. Census records say he was born in October 1869, so he would have died in 1904. This stone is in East Mount Cemetery, Greenville, Texas.

According to Jessie Owings McCollam, Mary had dropsy, was very deaf, was pretty, had a nice disposition, and enjoyed music. When she married Gamble, her father provided a house for her and later for Claude. No wonder he went bankrupt!

1900, Mary is living with her husband and daughter in Greenville, Texas, on North Stonewall Street, two doors down from her parents. Her husband is working as a salesman in a dry goods store, possibly her father’s. They have a boarder living with them. 1910, Mary is living with her parents on North Stonewall Street in Greenville, Texas. She has one child and is working as a magazine agent. 1920 Katherine E. Gamble is living in Washington, D.C. in a large rooming house and working as a clerk in an office. 1930, Betty Gamble is living in Manhattan on West 67th Street, and working as an actress in the theater. In 1940 a Betty Gamble, born in Texas, about 1900, was living in Guadalupe County, Texas, working as a hostess in a night club. The census says she was living in Los Angeles on April 1, 1935. Apparently, housing came with the job as she was living in the home of the female proprietor of the night club along with 3 other hostesses.

Dallas (Texas) Morning News, January 3, 1897: Greenville, Hunt Co., Tex., Jan. 2– Last night G.W. Gamble, dry goods, filed an assignment, naming William Penman as trustee. His preferred creditors are W.F. Balthrop $510.35; W.A. Jones $28.29; M. Aarvin $61.60; Scott, Force & Goodbar Hat company, St. Louis, $274.85; Sherill & Hefner, $100; Ed s. Jones, St. Louis, $550; First National Bank of Greenville $3900.  Total preferred liabilities $5425.09.

Dallas (Texas) Morning News, July 18, 1897: Hymeneal. Gamble-Lane– Greenville, Hunt Co., Tex., July 16.– Last evening, Mr. G.W. Gamble was married to Miss Mary Lane at the home of the bride’s parents. Rev. C.T. Caldwell of the First Presbyterian church officiating.

Dallas (Texas) Morning News, August 29, 1898: Mrs. G.W. Gamble and daughter Catherine Elizabeth and Misses Christine and Birdie Lane are visiting relatives in Denison.

Dallas (Texas) Morning News, April 28, 1902: Mrs. G.W. Gamble is in Italy, Texas (Ellis Co.).

Dallas (Texas) Morning News, March 13, 1909: Honey Grove, Tx. March 12. At a meeting of the executive committee of the Board of Trade Wed nite the following committee were appointed: Statistic and advertising...GW Gamble.

Commerce (Texas) Journal, July 18, 1913: A Jolly Porch Party. One of the jolliest parties given in Commerce was that  of Wednesday morning from 8 to 10 in honor of Miss Alma Caldwell of Sulphur Springs, and Miss Vera Johnson of Iowa Park, at the home of Miss Gertrude Mayes on Sycamore street. The porch was lavishly decorated in ferns and sunflowers which made it a thing of beauty. The register was an unique conception which was presided over by little Miss Ethel Hooser. From here the guests were shown to the punch bowl where Grace Caldwell and Melba Moreland served grape juice. After the guests had all arrived the rest of the time was spent playing rook which was enjoyed by all. After a delicious ice course the many guests departed hoping that Miss Mayes would entertain the visiting girls again soon. The guests were....Elizabeth Gamble of Greenville....

Commerce (Texas) Journal, July 18, 1913: Miss Elizabeth Gamble  of  Greenville  has  been  visiting Mrs. O.E. Hawkins

Morning Herald, March 7, 1918: Miss Elizabeth Gamble will leave tonight for Washington having received her appointment in the Registry Department.

unknown newspaper, unknown date, 1916: Monday afternoon at 3:30 o’clock at the family home, 2306 North Stonewall street, Mrs. Mary Gamble, aged forty- two, eldest daughter of Mr. and Mrs. R.K. Lane, passed away after several months’ illness. Mary Gamble was a sweet, unassuming Christian woman.   She was married   to Wes Gamble eighteen years ago, and to this union was born, Miss Elizabeth, who with her mother, two brothers, Wren Lane of St. Joseph, Mo, and Claude Lane of Parsons,