History Lesson

A small ride down Mexia ‘Nostalgic Lane’

By BOB WRIGHT - Editor

John Stubbs, Jr., has driven many residents down Kaufman Street for a final journey into Mexia Cemetery.

Stubbs, at a local meeting, verbally drove more residents “down memory lane,” while recalling some golden days, and perhaps some not so golden during his presentation to a Lions Club audience.

Funeral Director/Rotarian Stubbs, whose wife Kathy is Lions President, brought the crowd into the discussion mix with some interesting questions, ranging from the Oil Boom and its days of illegal moonshine, prostitution and gambling, to the more sedate and memorable times when Mexia had a lively downtown.

Reviewing some of his notes revealing 1871 as the year Mexia was established as a town, Stubbs led into some other “firsts” for this area. A newspaper, forerunner of The Mexia Daily News, was established here in 1872, he recalled. The first library was set up in Mexia in 1903, and that was the forerunner of today’s well-stocked Gibbs Memorial Library, which made the scene in 1949, buoyed along by a $200,000 grant. It was named in memory of Mrs. Jesse Jones’ parents, Mr. and Mrs. Jasper Gibbs.

The Coca-Cola bottling plant was established in Mexia in 1888.

Along “Nostalgic Lane” it was pointed out one of Mexia’s tragedies, occurring in 1916 when the downtown Opera House was destroyed by an explosion. Three persons were killed and six persons (in an adjoining cafe) were killed. The late Gray Forrest, who had served as the old Mexia Gushers minor league ball club’s Traveling Secretary, was a witness, and often related his experience as a witness, to his kinfolks, including the Stubbs family.

Another tragedy for downtown Mexia happened in 1922 when a big fire wiped out two blocks of businesses. Included in that conflagration were seven 2 and 3-story buildings. Local telephone operators got busy on the switchboards to summon fire departments’ help from adjoining towns.

BOOM!!! Enter the Oil Boom which temporarily made many Mexiaites and area folks money-rich, while ballooning the Mexia population from 4,000 to 55,000 persons, many of whom had to reside in tents while working in the oilfields. Mexia suddenly became known as “Texas’ Tents Largest Tent City.”

With sudden riches came some of the dark side of humanity - prostitution, producers of moonshine, gambling, and an average of five to seven murders a night down on the Juarez Strip (today’s Belknap Street).

The Wintergarden, located on East Highway 84 outside the Mexia corporate limits, was a lively hangout for “women of the night,” gambling and illegal whiskey for oilfield workers and others who ventured into those confines. Stubbs said that Mexia got so bad that it prompted Governor Pat Neff to declare martial law. In came the Texas Rangers, aided by other law enforcement personnel. One of the first things they did was to shut down the “den of iniquity,” the Wintergarden.

Most all of you know about the Sunken Garden in Hughes Park (city park). The garden once served as the Munger Gin tank, Stubbs related. Shortly after 1923, the late philanthropist J.K. Hughes, deeded land to the city and donated playground equipment for the city park, named after Hughes.

Stubbs also reminded that the Lions Club was formed in 1921, with the late J.I. Riddle’s serving as its charter president. The Riddle Funeral Home was forerunner of today’s Blair-Stubbs Funeral Home. The Riddle Funeral Home was initially located where today’s Lions Den is located.

Once World War II ended, Mexia business leaders began searching for ways to utilize the German Prisoner of War Camp. Howard Mace, the City Manager, and Raymond Dillard went before the Texas Board of Control to make what was to become a successful pitch for conversion into the Mexia State School.

It was an interesting ride down “Mexia’s Nostalgic Lane.”