Goliad County Texas Biographies

Roy Bryson Barry was born 21 Jun 1903, in Bryson Ranch, Comanche, Comanche County, Texas. Roy died 2 Nov 1976, in Buchanan Dam, Llano Co., Texas, buried in Electra, Wichita County, Texas. He married Lucille "Cindy" Able 12 Jun 1923, in Archer City, Archer County, Texas. Together they had 1 child: Theda Barry, born 14 Jul 1927, she died young on 3 Mar 1935, in Texas, and was buried in Kilgore City Cemetery,Kilgore, Goliad County, Texas.
[Information courtesy of Jan Cooper Greer. "The Historical Encyclopedia of Texas Revised", 1937 Published by the Texas Historical Society, Ellis Arthur Davis Editor, page 1811]

Roy Barry, who has been actively connected with the oil refining and oil well supply industries for upwards of two decades, and who is now making his headquarters in Kilgore, Texas, commands an expert knowledge of the manufacture and repair of oil operating equipment, and has become an executive leader in this field. In 1934 Mr. Barry came to Kilgore and organized his present firm, known as Standard Iron Works, which he owns and operates, employing a crew of competent machinist and welders to manage his large and well equipped establishment. Due to his reputation as an outstanding iron and metal worker, gained through his service with many of the largest Texas oil and refining concerns, Mr. Barry's shop receives a very extensive patronage in the East Texas oil field.
Mr Barry has been identified with petroleum, either from production standpoint, or in the supply and since leaving school, when he went with Magnolia Refining Company, in the pipeline department, at Desdemonia, Texas, continuing there four years. He next served a year in the gas plant of Humble Oil and Refining Company, at Corsicana, and from there he went to Texas Boiler and Sheet Iron Works, as a welder, continuing in that position two and a half years. A year with Dixie Gas and Fuel Company in the same capacity followed, and a like period with Booth and Flynn. He next served as welder for Dale Refining Company, at Electra, for a year and a half, from there going to Waggner Refining Company, as shop foreman, remaining in Electra with them for four years. he then came to Kilgore and established his present business.
Mr. Barry was born in Comanche County, Texas on June 21, 1902, and is the son of Iris Columbus Barry and Viola Amelia Lewis Barry. After completing his education in the School of Eastland and Erath County he entered upon his business career, and has been given in foregoing paragraphs.
Mr. Barry married on the twelfth day of June 1924, to Miss Lucille Able, daughter of Mr and Mrs. Able of Electra. They now reside in Kilgore. Mr. Barry belongs to Danville Blue Lodge No. 101 of Kilgore and is a member of the most experienced welders and metal workers in the development of his business interests, and no detail of his business is to trivial to receive his personal attention, no order to large or to small for his interested supervision.
In 1970 Barry was living in Buchanan Dam, Texas.

JAMES A. BURKE

Goliad

James Austin Burke is the son of Professor Peter Burke, for many years a teacher in Texas , and Bridget Kelley. He is connected by consanguinity with the distinguished family of De Boryo, of France . His father died in Goliad in 1882, on the same day as the lamented Garfield was assassinated. He was nearly one hundred years old.

This son was born August 28, 1824, at Johnstown , New York . He was educated in Louisiana , and studied for the profession of medicine, but did not adopt it as a vocation. In 1846, at the age of twenty-four, Mr. Burke came to Texas , and settled at San Augustine. He removed thence to Goliad two years later, where he has continuously resided. That was about the time of trouble with Mexico , and war being declared, he joined a company of Texans under Captain Wheeler, in 1846, and participated in the struggle. In 1849 he served on the frontier, in defense of Texas , and was for a while stationed on San Antonio river. In his county, Mr. Burke’s abilities and high character are much esteemed, an evidence of which is found in the fact that having been elected County Clerk in 1850, he was continued in office ten consecutive years, up to the breaking out of the war between the States; and some years after the war was over, he was re-elected to the same position of trust, 1876, and has filled it without intermission to the present day, December 26, 1889. This is a remarkable record of fidelity and continuous public service.

On the breaking out of the war he volunteered as a private soldier, enlisting in Wood’s regiment (Governor Wood), Co. A, 7th Texas Mounted regiment. He served through the entire struggle, from 1861 to the end in 1865. In 1862 he was in New Mexico with Sibley’s brigade; on the way thither his horse became unmanageable and ran away from him, fracturing his leg and disabling him for some six weeks or more. He rejoined the command, and returning to Texas , was ordered to Louisiana . Here he participated with his command in numerous engagements, being at the battles of Mansfield , Atchafalaya, Carrion Crow, Brashier City , Pleasant Hill , Franklin , etc. He was made Lieutenant, and subsequently promoted to Captaincy.

Few of the old Confederate soldiers have a better record for faithful service than Captain Burke, and he cherishes it as a precious legacy to hand down to his children, together with his untarnished and phenomenal record in civil service. His has been a useful life to his country, both in peace and war. In politics he is a staunch Democrat. He was chosen, and is now Chairman of the County Democratic Executive Committee; he is a member of the Masonic fraternity; has been a Mason since 1852; he is an Odd Fellow, also, and is Secretary of the Blue Lodge and Commandery. In religious belief he is a Methodist.

Mr. Burke has been twice married; his first wife was Miss Elizabeth Fulcrod. By this marriage there were two children, daughters. The eldest, Josephine, married John Cosyrode, and the other, Alzenith, married Mr. R.T. Davis. His second wife was Miss Joan E. Welsh. By her he had eight children, all sons. Their names are as follows: James A., Ross E., Robert E., J. Guss, Shelby, Wilson H., Thomas and John F.

We omitted to state that Mr. Burke had been Sheriff of his county before his last term of service as County Clerk , that is, from 1874 to 1876.

In the point of personal appearance Mr. Burke is commanding presence, being six feet in height, erect and soldierly in his bearing. He has dark complexion, brown eyes and weighs 175 pounds. There are few men more universally esteemed and respected.

“Mary E. Burke died October 26, 1888, aged thirteen years.”

[Source: Types of Successful Men of Texas by Lewis E. Daniell, Publ. 1890. Transcribed by Kim Mohler]

For some years after the civil war, Texas offered the best field for enterprise to men of push, energy and sound judgment, and many men who came out of the war without a dollar, had the sagacity and foresight to take advantage of the opportunities offered and succeeded in a few years in accumulating fortunes.
The men best adapted to the kind of business that promised success were what is known as “self-made-men.” Such men have a keenness of perception and self-reliance that triumphs over difficulties before which others with more educational methods would stand appalled.
Such is the character, and such was the training of the subject of this biography, Dillard Rucker Fant, of Goliad, Goliad County, Texas.
He is the son of William A. and Mary A. Fant. William A. Fant held the office of County Judge of Goliad County for many years, and was a most respectable and trusted citizen of that county.
Dillard Rucker Fant was born July 27, 1841, in Anderson, South Carolina, but was removed to Texas with his father and family in 1852, the family settling in Goliad, Goliad County, when he was quite a youth. He received a limited education in the English branches, at Goliad, which, at that time was rather in advance of other places in the state in educational facilities; but early endowed with a desire to become an active business man, this youth did not avail himself of these advantages by prosecuting his studies to a thorough education, but having an eager and retentive mind and memory, he obtained a larger and more profitable fund of information than is contained in books, by association with intelligent men, and whetted by contact with others in the business affairs to which his ambition soon led him.
Mr. Fant followed the example of some of our distinguished statesmen, and commenced business as the driver and helmsman of a “prairie schooner,” or in other words, an ox team drawing a freight wagon between Indianola, then an important Texas port, and Goliad. In this occupation he soon discovered the methods and the facilities offered by a new country for an enterprising and industrious man to accumulate a fortune; but just about the time he was in condition by reason of maturity of judgment to branch out in trade, the war came on, and he volunteered in the service of the Confederate States government, enlisting in Company “K,” Twenty-first Texas regiment, under the command of Colonel Carter, who subsequently commanded the brigade. He attained the rank of Orderly Sergeant in his company in which he served until the close of the war.
When he returned to Goliad, he found he would have to commence life over again, and this time, as before, with nothing but honest industry and a good name as a capital.
D. R. Fant married Lucy A. Hodges, daughter of Colonel Jack Hodges, who came from Mississippi to Texas in 1838. The fruit of that marriage was a family of eleven children, only one of whom, an infant daughter, Lucy, of ten days of age, have they lost.
The following are still living to-wit: George N., Virginia B., Dillard R., Jr., Ophie, Robert W., Evans G., Lucile, Agnes M., Cooper and Sullivan.
The first year after the war and also the first after his marriage, he commenced farming, but soon enlarged his business to raising, purchasing, selling and trading in stock, and since 1869, he has been an extensive driver and shipper of cattle and horses, with ranches in Idaho, Nebraska, Dakota and Wyoming, and at present, in the Indian Territory.
He has been very successful in driving stock North, never losing over three per cent, in any winter, which is attributable to his personal attention to his stock, and extraordinary care taken of his herds.
Mr. Fant has had several contracts to furnish the government with beef, which he has filled to the letter of the contract, and which have been very profitable to him.
Last year, 1889, he drove three herds north, and shipped two herds. A herd is composed of two thousand to two thousand five hundred head of cattle. He has also sent north, eighty head of saddle horses.
1884 was a fortunate year for cattle men. That year Mr. Fant drove more cattle north than any other driver in the South. He purchased, at an average cost of $15 a head, forty-two thousand head of cattle. He had contracted to sell twenty-two thousand head to one firm in Wyoming -- Swain & Bros. He also drove north, thirteen hundred saddle horses. The cattle and horses were all delivered in good shape and fine order. The balance of the stock not contracted for by Swain & Bros. were sold in New Mexico, Kansas and Nebraska. The gross amount derived from the sales of cattle and horses came to near one million dollars. The profits were in great contrast, that year and this. Cattle then were worth $20 a head, for which it would be hard to obtain $5 per head now, in 1890.
Mr. Fant is a man of extensive observation and sound judgment, and predicts that in the course of three years, there will be a change for the better in the cattle market, and he also thinks that large ranches will be divided up within that time into farms or smaller ranches, but he hardly hopes for the extensive operations gain, that yielded a fortune in the stock business in one season.
He has, however, been so prudent as to invest in valuable lands that will yield himself and large family, each a fortune, and having made hay while the sun shone, he can afford to take it easy the rest of his days and devote himself to rearing and educating his children.
Mr. Fant has taken great interest in the public school system of the state, and has aided and been instrumental in erecting school buildings as well as railroads in the interest of the development of the vast resources of the state.
He is both a member of a lodge of A. F. and A. M., and an Odd Fellow.
As a citizen, he is public-spirited and patriotic, believing that Goliad is the garden spot of the world; in fact that the town and county combine all the qualities of soil, educational facilities, climate and society, that would invite and captivate the immigrant to Texas, and make his residence there pleasant and profitable.

GEORGE STORMFELTZ

Goliad

Captain George Stormfeltz is a veteran of the “Lost Cause.” On the declaration of war between the North and South, he promptly enlisted as a private soldier in the Eighth Texas Calvary, Terry’s Rangers, Company G, and followed that roving and ubiquitous troop all over the South, taking part in every engagement, large and small, in which the celebrated “Rangers” fought. In addition to the numerous battles and skirmishes in which they were engaged west of the Mississippi river, they fought at Shiloh, Champion Hill, Perryville, Murfreesboro , Chicamauga, Knoxville , Atlanta , Black River ( North Carolina ), etc. A glance at the map will give some idea of the range over which these “Rangers” ranged; from the extremes of the Confederacy, north, east, south and west. They were very Cossacks, and lived in the saddle. It is a remarkable fact that notwithstanding the number and the severe character of the battles in which this gallant soldier was engaged, he was only once wounded; and then his life was saved by a miracle. Near Rome , Georgia , in one of the many fights the Rangers had with the enemy, Mr. Stormfeltz, who had, in the meantime, been promoted to the command of his company (Company “G”), was stuck by a minie ball on the left side. It struck his watch and its force was thus broken; otherwise the wound would doubtless have been fatal.
Captain Stormfeltz is the son of Jacob and Elizabeth Stormfeltz. His grandfather, John Stormfeltz, was a soldier in the Revolutionary War of 1776. George was born in Lancaster City , Pennsylvania .
He was given a fair English education, and set out in life as a carpenter and contractor. He came to Texas in 1857, settling at Liberty ; here he remained only seven months, when he removed to Goliad, where he still lives. He is engaged in the mill and ginning business, being of the firm of Redding & Stormfeltz, and has several thousand dollars invested.
He has been married twice; his first wife was Miss Sarah Campbell, who died in 1871; he then remained single until 1884, when he married Mrs. E.A. Haden. He had but one child, Valentine West, who died in 1883, aged eleven years.
In 1885 Capt. Stormfeltz was appointed Sheriff, to fill an unexpired term; he was then elected, and served two consecutive terms. He is a Democrat, as are most Confederate veterans, and canvassed his county the past two elections. He is a Methodist and a member of the Masonic fraternity. In height he is five feet, eight inches; has blue eyes and sandy hair and beard, and is a staunch and must respected citizen.

[Source: Types of Successful Men of Texas by Lewis E. Daniell, Publ. 1890. Transcribed by Kim Mohler]