Reuben and Alexine ELLIS

The following bio was taken from pages 193-194 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

In 1965, after living thirty-nine years in Dallas, Texas, Reuben and I, Alexine Ellis, moved to Henderson, Rusk County, to escape the rat race and noise of the city. We found the slower pace and friendliness much to our liking. We arrived here in time to see the Howard-Dickinson House restored. Reuben had the pleasure of turning and finishing the balusters for this beautiful historic home. He enjoys Rotary, the Heritage Society, the Historical Commission, and church work, as I do. I am active in the United Daughters of the Confederacy and the Daughters of the American Revolution.

Since we were born in 1898, we remember when life was simpler but harder. Reuben’s life story is more interesting, so the following is his own account.

The Ellis saga started in American when Edward Ellis landed in Virginia in 1636. Generations later found my great-great-grandfather Jesse Ellis in South Carolina. One of his sons, Gideon, a Methodist preacher and farmer, married Nancy Allgood. They moved by wagon train to Blount County, Alabama. There my father, William, the ninth of twelve children was born. Nancy and all of the children but one survived the Civil War and Reconstruction.

In 1879 William, also a Methodist preacher and farmer, married Mary Deaver, daughter of Wilson Deaver. Wilson was shot and robbed by renegade Confederate soldiers (Tories). He died in 1865 when Mary was ten years old. Life grew harder as the family increased and their land wore out.

In 1895 the William Ellis family of nine, with relatives and friends, came to Texas on an immigrant train. Each family was allocated space in a day coach where they carried their worldly goods rolled in sheets or blankets, plus food for the trip.

When the family arrived in Hill County, William had $105.00 in his pocket to begin a new life in Texas. With my arrival (Reuben) in 1898, the family numbered ten.

In 1899 William bought a farm of one hundred and twenty-five acres, sight unseen, for $5.00 an acre, in Taylor County near Abilene. He acquired one hundred and twenty-five more acres by giving the owner all of the cotton grown on forty acres for five years.

For the move to Taylor County, two covered wagons were outfitted and a freight car chartered. William and Mary with seven of the children rode in the wagons. The eighteen-year-old son went in the boxcar with the harvested crops, livestock, and farming implements.

After two weeks and two hundred miles over rough trails, they arrived at their new home in November 1899. They were forced to continue living in the wagons and two soddies the boys dug. The tenant refused to move until January.

Here I grew up with four brothers and three sisters. We worked hard, played hard, bathed, swam, and fished in the stock tanks, and attended camp meetings. Father preached and farmed. We children took turns going to college. Three of us boys earned degrees.

It was at Oklahoma A & M in 1923 that I met and courted Alexine Ledford, a Tennessean. We married in 1926 and made our home in Dallas. She kept the home fires burning while I traveled over most of Texas selling fire insurance for lumberyards and sawmills.

Here our son, James, and daughter, Mildred, were born. James, a graduate of Rice University, is a petroleum engineer and lives in Tyler. Mildred, A Southern Methodist University graduate in medical technology, lives in Muskegee, Oklahoma. We boast of eight wonderful grandchildren.

Written by Reuben and Alexine Ellis