The Sherman Courier
Wednesday, August 15, 1917
pg. 15
Fiftieth Anniversary Edition

Mrs. Julia King Tells About Being Present When Sherman Was Located - She Named First Streets
The following interview with Mrs. Julia King, published in The Courier August 13, 1910 and reproduced in our fiftieth anniversary edition will prove of great interest and value both to the present and future generations.  It was Mrs. King who named the first four principal streets of Sherman.  Mrs. King is a daughter of one of the pioneers of North Texas and first settlers of Grayson County, Colonel T.J. Shannon.

"I was born in Missouri, but was only two years old when my father and mother came to the Republic of Texas and located in Red River county, and we moved to Grayson county in 1846.  My father, Colonel T.J .Shannon owned the land where Sherman is now located and he donated the public square in Sherman and the land for the streets of the original town.  The town of Sherman was laid off in 1847 and I was then ten years old.  I had been studying Texas history and had read with great interest about Travis and Lamar and Crockett and Houston and I named the four original streets in this town after those men who were to me then and are now the greatest men that ever lived.  I was the only woman or girl present when the town was being laid off.  The commissioners who laid out this town stayed at our house and I remember distinctly the preparation my mother made in order to entertain them.  Sherman was moved over here from about four miles west of here because there was plenty of wood and water here and none over there.  I remember there was a fine spring then just below where the city hall now stands and there was a spring where the Murphy building now stands, and I remember too, when the Murphy building was built they said it cost $500 to pipe that water away and get rid of it.  I have seen many a herd of buffalo in Grayson county, and I have also seen herds of wild horses - horses that did not belong to anyone any more than rabbits do.  I have been to church in Sherman when the services were conducted under a big pecan tree that used to stand on the public square, and the people went to worship, too, but they took their guns along, though there was very little trouble with the Indians after we came here.
I married Frank Richards on December 29, 1852, when I was only sixteen years of age.  My husband was the first merchant that ever sold a yard of cloth in Sherman, and I consider that I raised Tom Richards, the present postmaster of Sherman, because he ran away from school in Arkansas and came to our house when he was only seventeen years old, and he stayed with us a good part of the time until he was 25, when he married.  The reason he ran away from school, however, was that the doctor told him that he had consumption, so he decided to come to Texas instead of going to his grave.  I remember distinctly when I first saw Tom's wife.  She was then about twelve years of age and a beautiful little girl and she is now one of the best women in the world and always has been.
My first husband, Mr. Richards, died in 1852, and about two years later I married R.A. King who lived about fourteen years, and the balance of my life I have lived a widow.  I have raised ten children, eight boys and two girls, all to be 21 years of age, and I have also helped to educate three orphan children and I have never known need.
My father was very actively identified with the early development of this county, and he was the first representative from this county.  He and Sam Houston were friends when boys, and the first speech Sam Houston ever delivered in Sherman was in my calf lot under a big tree.  I then owned eleven acres over west of the square and had a good house over there, and I entertained Sam Houston during the day and my father entertained him at night.
I see some people represent that there was nothing here in the early days, but that is a mistake.  There were quite a good many people here many years ago who had money and before the war many of them had good houses, though of course, everything then was different from what it is now, but some of the best people in the world were the early settlers of Texas, and as I said, my admiration for those old pioneers knows no limit.

Sherman History
Susan Hawkins
© 2024

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