Two of Crosby County's earliest settlers, Mr. and Mrs. W.E. McLaughlin of Ralls, began their intrepid life here in April of 1906 when they purchased land joining the old home town of Emma in the fall of 1905.As told to this writer by Mr. McLaughlin in giving a resume of the family's earlier days, he and his wife were born in Camden, Arkansas, in 1865 and 1869, respectively. Their parents moved to Texas in 1875 and the McLaughlins settled on Mill Creek in Ellis County. The next year the family moved near Peoria in Hill County where Mr. McLaughlin lived till he was grown. Mrs. McLaughlin's parents, the Leslies, continued to live in Fannin County.
In relating events leading up to his settlement here, Mr. McLaughlin said he had cowboy ideas in 1887 and decided to go to Tom Green County just up the river from where now stands Robert Lee. Working on up the cattle trail, he was employed by the V.P. Cattle Company in 1888 and 1889, where he helped take cattle to the Cherokee Strip and to southern Kansas for grazing.
In October, 1889, he went to Childress County and filed on 640 acres of State School Land on the county line eight miles south of where Wellington is now located. Collingsworth County was then unorganized. After finishing a one-room house and a dugout, he went back to Fannin County in December, 1889, to marry his childhood sweetheart, Miss Lula B. Leslie, and bring her to his new home. They lived here for eleven years, during which time five children were born, Frank, Edd, Marvin, Clyde, and Clara.
In 1900 Mr. McLaughlin bought a five-section ranch on Wills Creek in the New Mexico corner of Collingsworth County and moved there in 1902 when the Rock Island Railroad was being built from Oklahoma City to Amarillo. He also bought 640 acres of land on which is now the McLaughlin addition to the town of McLean in Gray County. Mr. McLaughlin started McLean by buying a store in Clarendon and moving it over, via wagons. He operated the post office and hired the mail brought out from White Fish until the railroad was completed to Amarillo.
When gray County was organized, Mr. McLaughlin and nine other men were successful in getting the county seat at Lefors, which was nearer the center of the county. He was instrumental in establishing the first bank and lumber yard at Lefors.
It was along about this time that Mr. McLaughlin bought land near Emma and discovered that there were no land lines designating the county. Each person had different opinions as to what lines included the county. Mr. McLaughlin and D.H. Benton entered a friendly dispute and finally a suit over whether the W.D. Twitchell lines or old lines marked the county. Mr. McLaughlin who contended that the Twitchell lines were correct, finally won the suit and people began to move to them. Although a friendly suit, it was perhaps the most important suit ever tried in the county.
He was here during the big fight over the place of the county seat when the South Plains Railroad Company surveyed this country from Lubbock to Crosbyton, missing Emma, then the county seat, on the north. The fact that Emma was not considered by the railroad caused quite a sensation among the natives and they sent a committee to confer with the builders, who informed them that running the road through Emma would not be considered. The voters were told in the following election that if Crosbyton was not made the county seat the railroad would not be built.
When the votes were counted, Crosbyton recorded 170 and Emma 120. Mr. McLaughlin further stated that this called for establishing of the exact geographic lines of the county to decide which town had won. Each side had surveys made and a case in district court followed, with Crosbyton winning.
Emma appealed the case to the Court of Civil Appeals in Amarillo, and won the decision. Then Crosbyton citizens appealed to a higher court, he related.
In the meantime, the county records were taken from the courthouse in Emma and carried to Crosbyton before the final decision. John R. Ralls and Mr. McLaughlin staked off the town of Ralls and secretly moved the Emma Post Office here with the help of Mrs. Brown, postmistress. It was placed in an old sheet-iron building moved here from Emma and was the first on the townsite until later others were moved from the old county seat.
The Security State Bank and Trust Company of today, owned and controlled by the McLaughlins, was established by him and remained a private bank until 1918, when it was changed to a State Bank. It is now managed by Edd and Marvin McLaughlin, who as mere boys helped to stake off the townsite.
Mr. McLaughlin is now retired from active duty and lives in Corpus Christi.
Source: "Through the Years, A History of Crosby County, Texas" by Nellie Witt Spikes and Temple Ann Ellis ©1951; The Naylor Company, San Antonio, Texas
Mrs. W.E.McLaughlin, A Pioneer Of This Section, Dies Monday Evening
Services Held Here Wed. At M.E. Church
Funeral services were conducted Wednesday afternoon at 3:00 o'clock for Mrs. W.E. McLaughlin, beloved pioneer woman and mother of this section, in the First Methodist Church of Ralls.The church ws thronged with the hundreds who came to pay their last respects to this great woman, as Rev. J. Edmund Kirby, pastor of the church delivered a beautiful funeral oration.
One of the most impressive floral offerings ever seen by the writer filled the church to demonstrate the esteem felt for Mother Mc by people throughout West Texas.
Interment was made in the Ralls Cemetery with Marr Funeral Directors in charge.
Death came to Mrs. McLaughlin late Monday afternoon in a Dallas hospital where she was under treatment for injuries sustained in an automobile accident near Santa Anna, Texas, on Sunday, June 26.
Mrs. McLaughlin was born Lula Belle Leslie in Buena Vista, Arkansas, on September 14, 1869, having been 68 years old at the time of her death. She was married to Mr. McLauhglin December 31, 1889, in Fannin County, Texas, moving immediately to Childress County, residing there until they moved to Emma in 1905. The McLaughlins moved from Emma to Ralls in 1913, and for the past few years had divided their time between Ralls and Corpus Christi.
Mrs. McLaughlin, familiarly known as "Mother Mc" by thousands of People in this section, was one of the true pioneers of this section, having worked hand in hand with her husband in the growth and development of this area which was so dear to her.
She was a faithful and helping wife and loving and devoted mother, as demonstrated by their devotion to her.
In addition to having helped to pioneer the agricultural development of this section, the McLaughlins established the first bank in Ralls in 1912, he McLaughlin family still controling and operating the bank.
It is on the lives of such people that this empire has been founded, and we know that she found her reward in watching the growth of our country and in the advancement of her loved ones.
Survivors are Mr. McLaughlin, two sons, J. Edd and M.A. McLaughlin of Ralls; one daughter, Mrs. A.S. Lewis of Dallas; two brothers, Bert and Henry Leslie of Childress; one sister, Mrs. walter Campbell, of Wellington, a daughter-in-law, Mrs. Frank McLaughlin of Amarillo.
Ralls Banner 1938
Submitted by Ralls Historical Museum
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