MARCUS PARK

The following bio was taken from page 332 of the book entitled “Rusk County History” compiled and edited and used with permission of the Rusk County Historical Commission.

Transcribed by Claudia Schuster

Submitted by Gloria Briley Mayfield, Cemeteries of TX

    I, Marcus – eldest son of Robert M. Park and Madie Collins, was born March 21, 1903 at Carthage, Panola County, Texas.

 My wife, Doris Slover, eldest daughter of W.W. Slover and Mollie Blessing, was born August 28, 1904 in Craft, Cherokee County, Texas.  Doris and I were married in Jacksonville, May 10, 1929.  On May 6, 1979, we celebrated our Golden Anniversary – a most memorable occasion.

 Doris and I have two children: William Robert (Billy Bob) born January 31, 1937 and Patricia Ann (Trish), born May 13, 1940, both in Jacksonville, Cherokee County, Texas.

 Billy Bob Park married Donna Carter of Houston.  They live in Longview and he is employed by Texas Eastman as a chemical engineer.  They have three boys – Randy, Robby, and Lee.

 Trish married Tom Laney of Muleshoe, Texas, and they live in Duncanville, Texas.  Tom is a pilot for Continental Airlines.  They have a son and a daughter, Mark and Lynne.

Doris and I, Marcus, and our children moved to Henderson in October, 1944, from Lufkin.  We purchased the Pat Hollis Printing Company, and this was the beginning of Park Printing Company.  The first six months was a struggle and we barely made expenses.  Our first Christmas was rough and had it not been for a brother, Dr. R.M. Park of Longview, our Christmas would have been a meager one.  He bought personalized stationery for everyone he could think of as Christmas gifts.  He made a merry Christmas for the Park family that first Christmas in Henderson.

 In 1970, we sold our office supply store to W.R. Harris, with whom we have been associated since that time.

 Many years earlier I was employed as a linotype operator when the “Henderson Daily News” was started.  One of the articles I set for that first issue was on the historic T. & H. Railroad -- Timpson and Henderson --  connecting the two towns through Pine Hill.  Doris was the first society reporter of the “Henderson Daily News.”

I was born and reared in Carthage where my father owned “The Panola Watchman.”  At the age of eleven, I started as a printer’s devil with the paper and learned simply by experience to set type the old handset way until we bought a linotype in 1916.  I have followed the printing trade for sixty-seven years, with the past thirty-seven of those years here in Henderson.

 My father, Robert M. Park, was a native of Henderson and learned the printing trade on the old “Henderson Times.”  He moved to Carthage in 1899 where he worked for “ The Panola Watchman,” before he bought the paper and was owner for twenty-five years.  It was there he met and married my mother, Madie Collins, who was a schoolteacher at the time.  She wrote news for the paper and later learned to operate the linotype.

 My grandparents, James Buchanan Park and Lavonia Fall, were Henderson residents.  I only know he came here from Kentucky.  My grandmother grew up in Chireno, Nacogdoches County.  The old homeplace was on South Street where the George Futch home now stands.  My grandparents are buried in the Old City Cemetery on North Van Buren Street.

 My grandfather was the first mayor of Henderson and with other city fathers was instrumental in getting the railroad from here to Overton.  They could not make payment on a $10,000 note to the I. & G. N. Railroad and a judgement against the city ensued.  The city was dissolved, and when the railroad lawyer came to renew the note, several townsmen, with my grandfather, proceeded to get the lawyer drunk and kept him that for several days, so that he could not renew the judgment note.

 The present city of Henderson was then reorganized with D.R.  Harris as mayor.  The above story was confirmed by Mr. Harris in our many conversations.

 My grandmother will be remembered as a member of the First Baptist Church.  She with others, organized the Ladies Aid Society.  Their main money project was the gathering and selling of eggs.  (This is recorded in the church’s history.)  This incident is one of the many memories I have of early Henderson.

 Submitted by Marcus Park