This Week in Texas Methodist History   August 19

Senator and Future Senator Attend Summer Encampment  August 19, 1926

The Texas State Epworth League once owned an encampment on the middle Texas Coast.  Actually it owned two different sites after the first was damaged by a hurricane.  It was called Epworth by the Sea. 

On August 19, 1926, the 10-day session began under the direction of the Dean, Steve McKinney, Presiding Elder of the Beaumont District of the Texas Conference.   Although there were illustrious speakers from the other Texas Conferences and from Nashville General Boards, McKinney had recruited most of the program leaders from his home conference, including song leader W. E. Hassler.  Some of the program leaders whose names would be familiar to readers of this column were as follows:  

Frank Culver, Waco District P.E.

Robert Adams, Galveston District P. E.

Robert E. Goodrich, Shreveport

John Walter Mills, Houston District P. E.

F. D. Dawson, Jacksonville

J. Fisher Simpson   Austin

C. T. Talley   Beaumont

George Winfield, Lon Morris College President

Jesse Lee, Huntsville District P. E.

George Sexton, Centenary College President

Many readers will know or have known relatives of Goodrich, Dawson, Simpson, and Lee.  These families have produced preachers for generations.  Twenty years later, in 1946, Goodrich baptized the author.

All the speakers were not preachers. 

U. S. Senator Earle Mayfield spoke.   His topic was “God’s Hand Revealed in the Origin and Destiny of America.”   U. S Representative John Calvin Box gave an inspirational address.

Both Mayfield and Box are little more than footnotes in our Texas history.  I would assume most students never learn about them.  They were both Methodists, Box in Jacksonville and Mayfield in Tyler.

Box (1871-1941) was a member of the famous Box family of Houston County, early immigrants from Tennessee who established Box’s Fort and were instrumental in both the civic and religious history of Houston County.  John C. Box attended Alexander Institute (later renamed Lon Morris College).   He practiced law in Lufkin but moved to Jacksonville in 1897.  He was Mayor of Jacksonville and also Cherokee County Judge.   He served in Congress from 1919 to 1931.  He practiced law in Jacksonville from then until his death.  His work in Congress is remembered because he worked for the National Origins Act, which reflected the racism of the 1920’s trying to exclude immigrants from all but European countries.  This law is back in the news because Attorney General  Sessions (another Methodist) often praises its effects in limiting legal immigration. 

Mayfield (1881-1964) is also remembered for advancing racism.  He won his seat in 1922 as the “Klandiate.”  He did not try to hide his membership in the Ku Klux Klan.   He was born in Overton, was raised in Timpson and graduated from Southwestern University in 1900.  He served in the State Senate and was a member of the Railroad Commission.  The 1922 Democratic Primary was crowded, but Mayfield made the runoff against James "Pa" Ferguson who ran for the Senate since he was ineligible for the governorship, having been removed by impeachment.    In the general election Mayfield defeated George Peddy.  

Mayfield’s service in the Senate was delayed because his victory was accompanied by political shenanigans.  The state passed a law declaring that candidates had to be nominated by primaries.  Texas Republicans didn’t have enough members to hold a primary so they nominated candidates in convention.  Peddy’s name was not even on the general election ballot, but he still got a third of the vote.  

Peddy demanded an investigation.  The Senate has the power to judge the qualifications of its members, and after considerable delay, they seated Mayfield.  

Mayfield  could not hold his seat in 1928, and upon his retirement from the Senate he moved to Tyler and the family business, Mayfield Wholesale Grocery.

Also attending was an extended family.  Rev. and Mrs. John Goodwin of Navasota were there with their daughter and son-in-law, Beryl and Joe Z Tower.     The Towers brought their 10 month old son, John Goodwin Tower.  In 1961 John was elected U. S. Senator.  Like Mayfield, he was a graduate of Southwestern University. 

(I often see Joe Z Tower’s name with a period after the Z.  That is incorrect.  The Z is his middle name, not an initial.)