J. A. DULIN

The following bio was taken from pages 183-184 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

Johnnie Augustus Dulin was born in the Hickey Community of Rusk County on January 26, 1904, the oldest of four children born to Dave Finley and Lucy (Ward) Dulin. He attended Hickey School adjoining his father’s farm.

Johnnie enlisted in World War II, but due to his age, thirty-nine, he was not sent overseas. Instead, he was discharged and went to work in the shipyards at Orange, Texas.

After the war, Johnnie returned to Henderson and married Edith B. Mulford in 1948. They had two children, Mrs. Barbara Ann Reed of Houston, Texas and John R. Dulin.

Johnnie Dulin worked most of his life as a carpenter, but his main loves were hunting and fishing in the back regions of the county where he was reared. He semi-retired in 1969, after suffering a heart attack and died two days past his seventy-second birthday in 1975.

Johnnie had two sisters, and one brother: Bessie, Lavenia, and Finley. Bessie married James Bynum Rives (1892-1980), son of Henry Josiah and Mary Adeline (Tipps) Rives. The Rives and Tipps families were early pioneers who settled in the Bethel Community of Rusk County. James and Bessie Rives had two children, James "Bill" Rives, Jr. of Houston and Mrs. Ruby Hays of Henderson.

Lavenia Dulin married James Olin Beard (1909-1966), son of James Mitchell and Sue Helen (Wells) Beard. The Beards settled near Ebenezer Church, and the Wells family originally settled at Gould, Texas, near Laneville, but later moved to the Bethel Community.

Rayford Finley Dulin, born in 1914, moved to New Iberia, Louisiana many years ago. He married Jewel Brussard. They have three children—Diane, David, and Cathy Dulin.

Edith (Mulford) Dulin was born January 26, 1911 at Glencoe, Payne County, Oklahoma, the oldest child of James Elmer and Mary Ellen (Jones) Mulford. Before her birth, her father became blind as the result of an accident in which his gun exploded in his face while he was enlisted in military service. James E. Mulford (1884-1962) was the son of James William and Mary LeAnne (Shorter) Mulford of Crowley County, Kansas and the grandson of Russell B. and Melissa Mulford, both born in 1825 in Shelby County, Ohio.

Mary Ellen (Jones) Mulford (1886-1958) was the daughter of Joseph Clark and Anne Elizabeth (Snyder) Jones who came to Payne County, Oklahoma during the well-known "Oklahoma land run" in that state in the late 1890’s.

Joseph Clark Jones was born in Southington, Trumbull County, Ohio in 1846 and left orphaned, along with his sister Sarah, at a very young age. He enlisted, at the age of sixteen, in the cause of the Union. After the war he went to work in the Illinois coal mines where he contracted black lung disease. He migrated west to Kansas, where he met his future bride, Anne E. Snyder. They were married in 1877. Anne Elizabeth Snyder (1857-1930) was the daughter of Lee K. and Rebecca (Haas) Snyder, who migrated to Kansas from Illinois. Rebecca Haas was the daughter of Georde and Catherine Haas, who came to American from Germany in the early 1800’s.

Written by John Dulin