Virginia KNAPP

The following bio was taken from pages 274-275 of the book entitled “Rusk County History” compiled and edited and used with permission of the Rusk County Historical Commission.

Transcribed by Gloria Riley

Submitted by Gloria Briley Mayfield, Rusk County TX Coordinator

I came to Rusk County in the fall of 1942 when I accepted a teaching position at Gaston High School in Joinerville. I have lived in Henderson since that time. My parents were Dr. Bradford Knapp and Mrs. Stella White Knapp of Lubbock, Texas. My father was the second president of Texas Tech University. Prior to our coming to Texas, he had been president of Auburn University and Oklahoma State University. I am the only surviving child of three boys and two girls. Families of two of my brothers are still living in Texas. I went to public schools in Stillwater, Oklahoma; Auburn, Alabama; and Lubbock, Texas, where I graduated from high school. I received my B.A. degree in journalism from Texas Tech two years after my father’s death. My mother died one year after my teaching career began. I taught in Silverton, Electra, Gaston, Carthage and Longview high schools, a period of thirty-nine years. I am the third generation of teachers in the family; my Knapp grandparents owned and taught in a private school in New York State over one hundred years ago. My father and brothers taught me to swim, to play golf, to ride horseback, to play musical instruments, and to sing harmony. I remember that in 1935 Governor James Allred appointed Dad chairman of the Safety Council. Because Dad was colorblind and the traffic lights in each city differed as to position of red and green, he suggested the standardization of traffic lights throughout Texas. One of the main things I remember about Mama was her cleaning house and singing or humming. The tune was always the same, so I asked her once what song it was. She said, “Why that’s the ‘Little Brown Church in the Wildwood’. It makes me think of the happiest day of my life. Your father and I were married just a few miles from that church in Iowa.” Early in my life, my father promoted my historical interest through travel. This interest led me to my M.A. degree in history from the University of Texas. During the 1950’s and 1960’s I became interested in East Texas history and in preserving old houses here in Henderson. I became a charter member of the Rusk County Heritage Association, which restored the Howard-Dickinson House in 1967. Historical preservation and teaching have been the center of my life for the past thirty years. I am concerned not only with the preservation of Rusk County history, but also with the preservation of family historical artifacts and sites as well. My grandfather, Seaman A. Knapp, was the founder of the United States Extension Service. I have taken part in the marking of sites associated with his work in Washington, D.C., where an archway connecting the old agriculture building to an annex behind it is named the Knapp Archway. Texas Historical subject markers to Grandfather have been placed at Tyler, Terrell, and Jacksboro where I participated in the ceremonies. During the Diamond Jubilee Celebration of Extension in 1978, I was invited to speak about my grandfather at Texas A & M and Stephen F. Austin Universities. I also have supplied personal papers and possessions of both grandfather and father to Texas Tech University. During the years that I sponsored publications in the high schools where I taught, I had the good fortune of winning a number of awards with my students and their publications. In 1980 I received the Trailblazer Award from the Texas High School Press Association in recognition of my work over the years with student publications. That was a big highlight in my life. At Electra, when my second year to teach began, I met Ruth Kirkham who was the head of the English and Journalism Department at the high school. We worked together a lot that year as I was taking her place as sponsor of the Electra High School newspaper and co-sponsor with her of the yearbook. I had lost my parents in the three years prior to my going to Electra. I hated holidays so much because of being alone. Ruth took me home with her for Thanksgiving. Her parents, from that time, spoke of me as their “daughter.” We did not dream that years later we would still be friends and be living together in Henderson. In the past year since my retirement from teaching, my association with the Rusk County Historical Commission for seventeen years was made more important to me when Rusk County Judge James Porter asked me to become chairman. This book is the project we undertook. Written by Virginia Knapp.