Montgomery’s First

By Narcissa Martin Boulware

The town of Montgomery and all it’s surrounding communities is unique in the number of "Firsts" it cab brag about. Donald Denn told be about Dobbin having the first golf course in the county. It lay on the right hand side of FM 1486 going north past Mock’s store. Most of the players were from the Conroe area, but the man who pushed it into being was one of the very prominent Nutter Family, who lived further up 1486 in the Barrett-Pinery settlement. The members played on Saturdays and Sundays, but when the Mr. Nutter of the Dacus area moved away the gold course fans built one on the edge of Conroe.

Another First was the used furniture and household goods shop established by "Old Miss Dora Geisinger-Winslow". This very much needed shop started during the depression when there was no money to spend, when people had to move on to try and find work, "Old Miss" bought their goods, the sale giving them enough money to go find work. The second good came when people who were strapped for money could find the household goods they needed at a price they could afford. This second hand store led to the first and largest antique shop closer than Houston. This antique shop became famous and many articles and stories were written about both the shop and the proprietor.

Montgomery also had the value-beyond-reckoning services and love of one of the most famous of men, C.B. Stewart. His life and times in the town of Montgomery have been recorded more than anyone other native and rightly so. He was a statesman, a Democrat, a family man and a farmer.

In the past two months when the annual crops of bluebells made people gasp at the on-of-the-kind once a year beauty . I talked to some wonderful neighbors who own a nice lot of land, just the kind the bluebells like and they were so awe-struck at the solid mass of unbelievable beauty standing solid around their home, she said she wanted to find out about the origin of the bluebell. She then told me the first bluebells were planted by C.B. Stewart on his land near his home on the corner of SH 105 and FM 2854. Thus we have two more "firsts" to our credit. Stewart and his bluebells. I think we can claim a "first" school, integrated a "first" Baptist church.

I know we can claim the first public kiln which produced pottery for household use. Glass was costly and transportation and breakage necessitated the use of pottery which was a step above the gourd and wooden vessels. The kiln was located a few miles south of Montgomery, about where Lake 177 Subdivision is locate.

One of the most popular products (not to be bragged about) was the utensils to make bootleg whiskey and wine. They also made the jugs to carry the finished product away from the still.

In a newspaper clipping loaned to me by Martha and Harley Gandy of the famed Nat. Hart Davis group, there is a small paragraph. It asks the question; "Did you know Montgomery had a young lady that became famous for her voice and sang with the Metropolitan Opera in New York?" I am determined to uncover this story and I feel that she and her family lived next door to me when I was growing up. This lady was African American and when she retired she came back to Houston and finished out her life there. The story is a true story and several of our local citizens knew her. I’m going to know more and write it soon.

We can list many other firsts" for the settlement-town-city of Montgomery, since quite a few of the Spanish land grants were given to families who came to Montgomery to settle. There are quite a few descendants of the first grants still living in Montgomery, not the town itself, but in the surrounding communities. We can claim the first stores that carried general merchandise, possibly the first churches, perhaps the first legal postoffice, not just a local business or home to drop off the once a week mail delivered by a man on a horse.

I have evidence that one of the highest education opportunities offered at that time by the original Baylor College was held in the John Landrum, Mexican land grant home just north of Montgomery. Students there had to master Latin and the penmanship had to be perfect.

Another first was the young black man raised on my father’s farm who became the first black Assistant District Attorney in Harris County. This was the Hatchett-Ward family, many of the family still living in the area today.

More "Firsts" next week.