Person:Charles McBride (5)

Information below is from the database of Linda Bianchi on RootsWeb:

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From the notes of Paul T McBride:

(Info furnished by Joan McBride) Notes for CHARLES HOMER MC BRIDE was born l897 in Tarrant County Texas. He grew up in the Azle, Texas area. The family farmed in or near the area now under Lake Worth, near where the old night club (Casino?) used to be, west of the current bridge across Lake Worth on Hwy l99 (per L.C. Barry). C.H. attended school in the area served by the Bluff Springs School district and most likely attended school at Bluff Springs. He had a classmate named Charley Rothless. C.H. attained at least a grade school education but any further knowledge about his education is not known.

The McBrides may have lived near Bone Reynolds out toward Mill Creek and Reynolds Cemetery in Parker County between the Reynolds Cemetery and Ash Creek Baptist Church l/2 mile west of the church. The Reynolds had a mill on Ash Creek near the Ash Creek Baptist Church and were related to the McBrides.

Henry Boyd McBride, father of C. H. had a place one time just south of Azle, he was a tenant farmer and the place was between Silver Creek Road and Hwy l99. H. B. also bought and sold lots in Rosen Heights in Ft. Worth but it is not thought he ever lived on those lots. The lots were probably for investments only. H.B. worked construction when the packing plants in Ft. Worth were being built for Armours and Swift and Company. At one time H.B. bought a place near present Bridgeport, to was all gravel so he let it go. Perhaps he should have kept it for it now is a large gravel pit.

H.B. moved his family to Swenson, Texas by l9l0 where he farmed and also hauled pipe for oil field construction. It was probably here that Homer learned to use the fresno. (may be a colloquial term and not a correct name for this tool). It was a large scoop pulled by horses with two handles on it and it was manhandled by the operator. A very tough job for the operator.

C.H. left home and worked for a time on the Spur Ranch about l9l7/l920. He lived the true life of a cowboy, keeping his gear in an old wooden trunk at the bunkhouse. C.H. loved horses and during this time procured a nice horse and buggy of which he was very proud (per his brother Elmo). The Spur ranch was a part of the Swenson Ranch. In April of l888, Wm. J. Elliott came from Scotland to manage the Spur Ranch, having to learn how to be a cowboy. In l896, he managed the old Dockin Store (for ranch supplies at wholesale prices). Elliott was at Spur Headquarters then he went to Espuela (town whose Spanish name meant spur). Elliot owned a ranch at Red Mud Creek, l0 miles sw of town of Spur. On this ranch he found buried remains of dinosaurs. One of the ranch managers was Henry Johnstone who had managed the Matador Ranch. Large numbers of men or hands on the Spur ranch were employed in rounding up "doctoring", and branding cattle. Round up season began mid April. The Spur Chuck Wagon carried food, bedding, tents and a second wagon carried water barrel, mesquite cord wood and branding irons. The wagons moved from one camp site to another. Some camps were Chimney Creek, the crossing on Catfish Creek, 2 Mile Pen, Gamel Horse Corrals, Spade Pens, Wilson Tank and Soldier Mound. It was at Soldier Mound that Homer and his sister were part of the organizing committee for a church and he was one of its first deacons.(per Elmo). Ranch families and town families all went to camp at Roaring Springs and enjoyed the excellent spring water. A purchase of the Tongue River ranch purchased in l902 gave the cowboys at the Spur ranch, access to the Ft. Worth and Denver RR line at Estelline.

The whole family lived in Dickens County for a time. C.H. met and married in l821 to Eleanor Beal Karr while living in Dickens County. Beal had attended school at Soldiers Mound and they may have met in the church at Soldiers Mound. The story of C.H. and Beal is one typical of the area in that it was the farmers daughter and the cowboy. This story was re-enacted for many years in a play produced and presented in the county of Dickens. Ina Mae, oldest child of C.H. and Beal was born in Dickens County as was the second child Ruby.

From Dickens County, the McBrides moved to Seagraves about l924/25, and Nita was born in Seagraves. C.H. and Beal, H. B. and wife and unmarried children all moved to Seagraves and began to buy land. Circumstances proved this to be a bad time for this enterprise. There was an early freeze that destroyed crops of l924 and by l930, the depression had dropped the price of cotton so much that the cost of harvest was more than you could get by selling the cotton. C. H. picked as much as he could himself but he had to leave most of it in the field. Beal also picked cotton, leaving Ina and Ruby at the side of the field. There is a difference in picking cotton and pulling cotton which was done in later years. When you picked cotton, you had to pull it free of the cotton burrs. All the gin had to do was take out the cotton seed. Pulling cotton, you pull cotton and burrs. The land C.H. farmed was land that had been cleared by H.B., his father, as a tenant farmer some years earlier. After the disasters in Seagraves, C.H. and family returned to Dickens County and he farmed for his father in law, J. R. Karr. Daughter Dorothy was born during this time in Dickens County.

In l931 C. H. had his family living in Rule Texas where Esther and Lester were born. He farmed some and also worked for the Agriculture Extension office at Spur Texas. In l834 C.H. Was living in Childress when son Homer Karr McBride was born. C. H. worked at building road for Bob Kimbrough (a relative, thru Lottie Clingman an aunt of C.H. McBride, who had married Bob Kimbrough) C.H. worked on building the bridge on Hwy 80 near Mineral Wells. The family lived for a time at Santo while he was doing the road work. He also lived for a time north of Seymour and north of Childress. While at Childress he also worked on the road to Wellington, Texas.

In l935,l936 C H. was in Kermit, Texas, living out on the desert in a movable trailer he had constructed himself. The trailer had plywood walls half way up, then canvas walls above that. C. H. worked for his brother Harry, building roads and slush pits in the oil field. While doing this work, C.H. injured himself severely and was out of work.He hired an attorney to get the oil company to pay him because of the in jury but he got very little from the settlement, always believing the attorney sold him out to the oil company.

By l94l, C.H. moved his family to Sundown, Texas. There was an oil boom but because of his back injury, C.H. was unable to find work in the oil fields on a regular basis. He did pull cotton or whatever he could for money to feed his family. His children also pulled cotton along with him. Homer Karr, his son, started pulling cotton at age seven, he put what he pulled in his Dad's sack at first, and then he had a small sack of his own. The first summer Homer Karr McBride hoed cotton and his Dad didn't charge the farmer for any hoeing Homer Karr McBride did at first but after training he started earning l/2 wages, all of his wages were paid to his Dad, not to Homer Karr McBride. While living in Sundown, the family still had the home built trailer that Lester and Homer K. lived in and the rest of the family lived in two small rooms, moved in adjacent to the trailer.

Homer moved his family back to the Azle, Texas area about l943,l944, after his daughters Dorothy and Nita hot hired to work at the Fort Worth Bomber Plant during World War II. Daughter Ruby had married L. C. Barry and she remained at Sundown. After moving to Ft. Worth, Dorothy and Nita did take the training required to work at the Bomber Plant but never went to work there. Nita and C.H. both worked at a cotton mill for 35 cents an our. Soon C.H. began trimming trees for $l an hour, for Mr. Holder, a contractor for Southwestern Bell Telephone Company. C. H. also contracted some work on his own and worked weekends independently. Often working for those who wanted more done than the SWB contractor had done. C.H. eventually went to work, after World War II, at what was then known as Consolidated Vultee Aircraft (once the Bomber Plant). He had a hard time in passing the physical but eventually passed and worked for a while as a basic machinist at Consolidated. C.H. continued to work there until l955/56 and in l856 Homer Karr McBride went to work at then General Dynamics and he retrieved his Dad's old tool box which was still where he had left it when he left work, because he was sick, never to return to work at Consolidated. The tools in the box were issued by the company but the tool box belonged to the worker and HK returned the box to his Dad. One tool in the box was an air drill and was said by others working in the plant to be the best of its kind and Homer was able to trade that drill for one he had been issued and he continued to use that drill while he worked at GD. When HK left the job, he traded the drill to an old timer there and then turned in the old timers drill to the company.

During the years in and around the Azle area, C.H. and family lived at the Creamer place, the Neeley place for 4 years, the Harvy place for l year and eventually the Session place. They attended church at Elm Grove Baptist Church near Silver Creek. THe O'Donald family, C.H.'s grandmothers family, donated the land for the church. The children, Esther, Lester, Homer Karr and Evelyn attended school at Bluff Springs, the same school attended by their father, for a year and one half. All transferred to the Azle School District. Esther and Homer both graduated from Azle as did Marie who spent all her school years in the Azle District. The family had moved the trailer from Sundown to the Creamer place then to the Neeley place and Homer K and Lester continued to sleep in the trailer. It wasn't until the move to the Harvey place that Lester and Homer K. got to sleep in a regular house. Homer K. tore down the old trailer and made a one wheel trailer to use, keeping the lumber scraps for other uses. The Harvy place was also the first time the family had indoor plumbing. After the move to the Session place, the family once again used outhouse toilet facilites.

After C. H. quit at GD, he raised cattle and did odd jobs. He made his own branding iron, which son Homer Karr McBride now owns. It was a simple "H" shape. C. H. worked in season for his son in law L.C. Barry in Sundown. After his daughter Marie graduated from high school and began to work away from home, C.H., Beal, Ina and Marie moved to Newark, Texas where Marie paid the rent and C.H. again raised cattle on a small scale. After Marie married and left home, L.C. Barry bought a place at Boyd Texas and C.H.,Beal and Ina moved to Boyd and took care of the place for L.C. Barry. C.H. lived at Boyd until he died in l967.

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1. ↑ Charles Brashear and Shirley Brasher McCoy. A Brazier/Brashears Saga- 300 Years of . . . ..
2. ↑ Charles Brashear and Shirley Brasher McCoy. A Brazier/Brashears Saga- 300 Years of . . . ..