Crews Texas, Runnels County Ghost Town. (original) (raw)

Subject: Crews School
I was raised about 16 miles from Crews, Texas and attended school at Crews until it closed about 1949.

The building that is identified in your photo as "The School Building" is actually the Methodist Church, which was located adjacent to the Gymnasium. The main school building has been torn down.

The actual school building was constructed of dark red brick and held four rooms and a large hallway from the front entrance to the back door. On either side of the hallway, there were large sliding doors that when opened, converted into a fair sized auditorium and the heating was from large coal stoves in the corner's of each room. The only other class rooms were later built in a wood frame building to the west of the brick building. The restroom facilities were behind the wood frame and brick building, one for the girls and the other for the boys. The Gymnasium was a treasured feature of the school which excelled with it's basketball teams. There was a stage at one end of the gym where the senior students performed plays and elementary classes performed arts and entertainment.

My Parents, Harvey G. and Julia Ioan (McCarter) Bradley lived a few miles to the west of Crews when they were first married. They farmed a small piece of land which was located north of the current Winters/Coleman highway.

My oldest sister, Lorena Emazell (Bradley) Evans attended this same school and also did her student teaching here after two years study at Howard Payne College in Brownwood, Texas.

Many years prior to Lorena's attending the Crews School, my maternal grandparents, Joe and Fanny (Henderson) McCarter as well as my great-great grandmother, Aribella Henderson, who had 16 children of her own and also raised three grandchildren, lived in Crews for many years and my uncle Elmer McCarter ran one of the horse-drawn freight wagons between Ballinger and Crews.

I have many fond memories of this little town. There was a tornado that almost wiped the entire town away many years ago. When I attended school there, some of the foundations of homes could still be seen east of the Methodist Church.

One of my most favorite memories is of my friend "Epaw" Pape, who had a service station and small grocery store located adjacent to the Winters/Coleman highway, west of the school. Every school day, at noon, Epaw (his nickname) would prepare a delicious sandwich for me. I was in elementary school at ages 8 to 13 and I still recall how good those meals tasted and I know that a sandwich is a sandwich, so I feel sure that it was Epaw's pleasant personality that made such a difference.

I also recall with much pleasure, my friendship with Avis Cummings. We were best of friends for all of our elementary days and our voices blended quite well when we sang some of those WW2 war songs such as "Each Night at Nine."

I enjoy your Texas Escapes magazine. Thank you for producing it. - Rosemary B. Davis, San Angelo, Texas, July 12, 2007