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In 1922 Turner Rice & Irrigation Company brought
in rice farmers to farm the DeMoss area land and built a business
center south of Collegeport on the road now known as Oyster Lake
Road, north of the railroad spur. They had a large grocery and
dry good store, a rice warehouse, A. G. Hunt's blacksmith shop, and
homes for the African-American workmen. Mr. and Mrs. Hugo Kundinger
moved their drug store from Central Street to Turnerville, which was
built on the west side of the road across from the Collegeport
shipping pens. From these pens 2,200 cattle were shipped by rail
each year. Soon all that was left in that area were the drug store,
the lunch stand, and the Bill Fitzgerald Home for Elderly Citizens,
which was destroyed by Hurricane Carla. "Miss Hattie" salvaged lumber
to build a small home on the drug store site. |
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The story of this big rice farm may read like fiction to the uninitiated, but this article, like all others submitted by this organization, is based on facts--in this instance obtained from the accounting department of the Turner Industries. Did you know that Collegeport and Matagorda County can truthfully boast the largest individually operated rice farm in all the Southland? This gigantic industry is under the sole direction of its founder, Ed. W. Turner, a pioneer of the rice belt. This man is an absolute vindication of the doctrine of the "survival of the fittest." He has in common parlance "been through the mill." He has experienced all the disappointments of adverse years; survived the calamity of 1920, when due to foreign condition, rice will not bring one-half the cost of threshing. He has survived all this and is today sitting on the "top of the world," ready to reap the reward earned by industry, energy, intelligence, faith and the driving power of a "transcontinental mogul." When Turner conceived the idea of the Collegeport rice farms, he was looked upon by some of our "wise ones" as a fanatic principally because of the fact that there was no canal service at this point. An extension from canal end to the rice fields would necessitate the expenditure of an excess of $40,000; the canal company could not or would not make this extension. E. W. Turner built this with his own money and made possible the biggest rice farm in the belt. This comprises one-third of the industry in the county. Figures from the 1922 crop read like a romance and remind one of the stupendous accomplishments of the oil and sulphur industries. A 10,000-acre rice field in 1922 operated under the direction of Mr. Turner, assisted by 35 rice farmers whose permanent employees total 350, this number is augmented by several hundred during harvest, bringing at this time the population of Collegeport to the 1200 mark. This 10,000 acres in the year just passed produced 114,000 sacks of rice, valued at $4.25, bringing into the community a total of $484,500. The gross revenue per acre was $18.45. The production cost based on a 10-sack yield, was $28.80, leaving a net profit of $19.65. Collegeport, before the advent of this aggressive personality, was sleeping peacefully by the placid waters of the historic Trespalacios Bay. It is today a bustling, thriving city, with good schools, churches, wide-awake aggressive merchants and enterprising farmers--made possible by the Turner allied industries and their enormous expenditure of $288,000 annually. Mr. Turner operates a large store at this point, carrying a stock in excess of $20,000, and doing more than $100,000 business annually. He owns in addition a blacksmith and machine shop--a very necessary adjunct to the rice industry. The Turner rice warehouse, operated under the same management, handles in 1921 62,000 and in 1922 114,000 sacks of rough rice. This is a considerable business in itself and shows a healthy growth. The pay roll for this industry alone was $9,000. We believe they should change the name from Collegeport to Turnerville; that would be gratitude to this man who has done so much for the community. The most important effect of Turner's operations, in our judgment, has been that the way has been paved for development of the potential agricultural resources of this community, which are unexcelled. Ed. Turner is a captain of big industry; he could not be a doer of little things. He plays the game, in our judgment, because of his love for the game, and not from a desire for big financial returns. If he made a cool million in a season that million would be doing something the next season in a helpful, constructive effort to give employment to those whose needs were apparent to breathe commercial activity into some inanimate industry. Ed Turner would be missed in our commercial and industrial life, and now that success is assured to him, let us hope that he remains with us, contributing as he does at all times to the county's industrial and commercial activities.
Matagorda County Tribune, April 20, 1923 |
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