biography – Page 30 – Texas History Notebook

Sam Rayburn

Samuel Taliferro Rayburn was born January 6, 1882 on a farm near Kingston, Roane County, Tennessee to William Marion Rayburn and Martha Clementine Waller Rayburn. He was the seventh of their eleven children. His father, William Marion Rayburn, had served in the Confederate Army during the Civil War. The Rayburns were a farming family. Sam was five years old when the family moved to Fannin County, Texas in 1887, settling on a forty acre farm where they raised cotton. He received his education in Texas. There was not enough money to pay for all of the siblings’ schooling and the family story was that Sam was sent off to college with $25 cash from his family. Rayburn enrolled at East Texas Normal College (later known as East Texas State and Texas A&M University-Commerce) and worked his way through the early days of his schooling by sweeping floors for $3 per month. While he was a student, he began to work as a teacher. Upon completing his Bachelor of Science degree, he enrolled in the law school at University of Texas in Austin. He did not earn a law degree, as far as we can determine, but upon completion of his studies, he was admitted to the state bar of Texas in 1908. His political career had begun two years earlier when he won an election to the Texas House of Representatives. Rayburn served two more terms before being elected in 1912 as a United States Representative.

Oveta Culp Hobby

The name Oveta Culp Hobby is probably somewhat familiar to Texans, whether or not they may know who she actually was. She was born Oveta Hoover Culp on January 19, 1905 in Killeen, Bell County, Texas to Isaac William Culp (1870-1934) and the former Emma Elizabeth Hoover (1881-1959). Isaac was born in Coryell County to John Robinson Culp and the former Mary A. Dole. John Robinson Culp’s parents were Josiah C. Culp, Jr. (1819-1879) and Rachel Eaton. Less is probably known about Josiah than his son John Robinson Culp or grandson Isaac William Culp, but Josiah is believed to have come to Texas from the southeast prior to the Civil War and served for some period in the Confederate Army, possibly the entire time in the Frontier Brigade, in Texas having enlisted in Gatesville.

Anne Gwynne

The actress known as Anne Gwynne was born Marguerite Gwynne Trice in Waco, McLennan County, Texas on December 18, 1918. Her parents were Jefferson Benjamin Trice and Pearle Guinn Trice. Her father was in a number of businesses, but seems to have worked as a traveling salesman from time to time. They lived at 1308 N. 15th Street in Waco, just outside of the downtown business district.

Eliza Allen Houston Douglass

Elizabeth Ann Allen was the first wife of Sam Houston. Quite a bit younger than Houston, she was born in 1809 to John and Laetitia Saunders Allen in Tennessee. The Allens were a wealthy family of the Gallatin area. Houston was born in 1793, so he was some 16 years older than Eliza when they married in 1829. Some accounts will give her age to be sixteen but according to genealogical sources, she was about twenty. Although they were only married about eleven weeks, the reason for their separation and eventual divorce has been the subject of speculation ever since.

Tex Schramm

Texas Earnest Schramm, Jr. was born in 1920 in San Gabriel, California. His father was named Texas Ernst Schramm and his mother was Elsa J. Steinwender Schramm. Tex’s father later adopted the spelling Earnest for his middle name, but at birth his father had shared the middle name Ernst with four of his siblings. Tex’s grandfather, Edgar Ernst Schramm had come to the United States from Germany and his grandmother, the former “Tony” Benner, was born in New Braunfels. The Benners had been long time Texas residents, as Tex’s grandmother Benner’s family had had arrived in the 1800s. His Schramm grandparents had resided in San Antonio for many years. Tex’s father had moved the family to California where Tex spent his early years, attending high school there. Tex attended University of Texas in Austin, graduating in 1947 with a degree in journalism, after serving in the United States Army Air Corps in World War II.