Wildcat gambler's life launched industries, development and dreams of new wealth
Describing a "harrowing" float plane landing on a Canadian Lake, in 1971 Dallas Morning News outdoor columnist Henry Stowers made Mt. Pleasant oil man John B. Stephens sound like a cool hand among swashbuckling sportsmen. While others surviving the landing were slapping each other on the back in celebration, "John B, who never says more than is necessary, handed me half a water glass of straight whiskey," Mr. Stowers reported.
It was an anecdote that opened the tale of Mr. Stephens' part in the development of Lake Cypress Springs, where he owned "several miles of the north shore." Kings Country kicked off the lake's shoreline development, adding millions to tax rolls in Franklin County.
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Mr. Stowers was more interested in the 3 million northern walleye that had just been stocked in the spring fed lake, a program encouraged by Mr. Stephens.
"Smart men eye walleye," read a photo caption beneath a shot of Mr. Stephens.
The experimental stocking wasn't an overwhelming success.
These days, the walleye in Lake Cypress Springs are like ghosts, infrequently appearing, calling up recollections of a dream that didn't take root.
"Now and then, maybe a couple of times a year, somebody catches a walleye, and it's always at the same place, just off the point at Walleye Park," said a local game warden. Unlike the big game fish that once annually lured Mr. Stephens to Canada, "when somebody here does catch one, it's seldom more than 18 inches," the warden said.
But the point remains - what Mr. Stephens did made news.
"Stephens Completes Extensive Remodeling," read the headline in the centerfold of the July, 1955 edition of the Texas Hotel Review.
The story gushed about the renovation of Mt. Pleasant's Stephens Hotel, already lauded in a March edition of the Longview News Journal as having "one of the most elegant interiors in East Texas."
Located at the intersection of U.S. 67 and U.S. 271, the three-story facility stood across from the courthouse, an air-conditioned oasis for travelers. With its recessed ceiling creating indirect lighting in the Roman brick lobby, sand-blasted pine paneling in the coffee shop, Japanese lantern-style lighting in the dining room, murals, "translight" artwork and refurbished rooms featuring carpet and new drapes, the "modernization" of the Stephens Hotel was billed as "one of the most complete ever to be attempted in an older hotel property," said the magazine's review.
Mr. Stephens life as a local entrepreneur was transformed in an instant with the February, 1936 oil strike at Talco.
Along with R.L. Peveto, a Tyler geologist who for years had been studying formations along the Sulphur River flood plain, Mr. Stephens, W.F. Myers and W.B. Hinton kept themselves "broke as bandits" poking wildcat holes near Talco, said Mr. Hinton's son, Charles.
The strike moved the Hinton family from Lubbock to Titus County, where Hinton Oil remains headquartered 60-odd years later.
The third generation of a farm family tracing local roots back to the 1840's, after the Talco strike, Mr. Stephens instantly began unleashing his new capital. A 1948 story about the history of the field said Mr. Stephens and Mr. Peveto hit 50 consecutive wells before drilling another dry hole.
In March, 1939, Progressive Farmer magazine described him as a visionary, increasing family land holdings from 2,500 to 5,000 acres in Titus County at the same time he began supplementing crop income with livestock production.
The story detailed conservation initiatives like contour plowing, strip cropping and the terracing of fields. He built a sawmill, producing lumber to build tenant houses. He set up breeding programs for cattle, hogs, horses and mules.
Descriptions of planting and erosion control methods that in a single year had increased forage production enough to offset capital outlay with lower feed production costs made his the prototype operation for progressive farmers.
Local news clippings tell stories of his launching of new industries, but it was his oilfield gambles that riveted the press across East Texas.
"Oil Struck In Lake Area," screamed an all-caps banner across the June 23, 1942 front page of the Greenville Herald Banner. The account describes the overnight skyrocketing of lease prices, unprecedented visions of wealth telling of "one man turning down $1,200 an acre" for a lease near the strike, betting on a better offer.
Each strike poured hope like honey, soaking into collective dreams of riches. money.
Already, the Talco strike had launched the industrial age in Mt. Pleasant, setting the stage for construction of a refinery, bringing the first union-scale wages here for blue collar labor.
With local livestock production increasing, Mr. Stephens built a beef processing facility.
In July, 1946, the headline of The Mt. Pleasant Daily Times lead story said, "E-Tex Packing Plant Opens Monday." Described as the town's second largest industry, the state-of-the-art plant was the "first packing house in the nation to use freon for refrigeration," and was expected to employ 150 people with storage capacity of 30,000 pounds of beef. Four smoke houses had production capacity for making 70,000 pounds of sausage a week.
The business faltered; Mr. Stephens regrouped. After closing in September of 1947, the plant opened again under new management in March of 1948.
In March, 1955, E-Tex Packing was the cover story of the Longview News Journal's East Texas on Parade. Employment was steady at 125 with products shipped to markets in Chicago, New York, St. Louis, San Francisco and Los Angeles. Citing production, the account said the facility processed more than 50,000 head in 1954, paying out $2.5 million for livestock and dressing out 41 million pounds of beef.
An accounting memorandum for the week of June 2, 1958 cited processing of 1,205 head, expenses of just over $160,000 and profit of more than $7,000.
An undated clipping from a scrapbook kept by his grandson, Tom Joiner, says he was president of the "new association promoting better high school athletics, including lighting the football field and providing transportation for players headed home after the game, "relieving coaches of that duty."
In 1955 he anchored the town's first industrial foundation, which built the poultry processing facility that in the early 60's lured Pilgrim's Pride here.
In January, 1956, the Southwestern Oil section of the Dallas Morning News reported a new strike on the Titus County side of the Sulphur River, quoting Mr. Stephens as saying the well near Cuthand had "prospects of being as big, or bigger than Talco was in its heyday.
"The strike points to future deep exploration all along an east-west line from Hopkins to Bowie County," he said.
Other Dallas clippings reflect the celebrity status of Texas oil men. Mr. Stephens and Paul H. Pewitt, "both of the Hotel Stephens, are among 33 charter inductees in the Texas Roughnecks Club," announced E.B. Germany, president of Lone Star Steel."
When he discovered his grandfather's newsclipping scrap book, Mr. Joiner discovered enterprises he doesn't remember.
"Stephens Signs Contract for New Canning Plant," said a June 5, 1957 story from the Daily Times.
The product label was to be Texas Best, and the plant was to make chili, barbecue and hot dog sauce.
In the 1970's, when Texas passed its liquor by the drink laws, Mr. Stephens opened The Black Angus, a dinner club with a dance floor.
Another undated clip from the Dallas Morning News documents his interest in the Pewitt field stretching along the Titus-Morris County line. The story tells of the possible sale of Mr. Peveto's and Mr. Stephens' holdings, citing a $25,000-a-month, six-month option held by a Houston oil man. Some 50 producing wells were expected to sell for $4 million.
Given the way the press followed him, there was a small irony in his solitude. He spent evenings sitting in a corner booth in his restaurant, sipping a water glass of iced gin. Later, he sat at the corner of the bar in the Black Angus Club, watching whatever sports program might be on TV.
Sundays he drove the country, idling along backroads alone in a Cadillac, later in a Lincoln.
He sold E-Tex packing, which later went belly up. The rendering plant he built that operated in conjunction with the processing plant passed on to become a part of Pilgrim's Pride's local poultry processing facilities.
He kept his hotel, but its importance diminished with the coming of new motels along the interstate, when a local stretch of I-30 opened here in 1967.
At the height of his push to build local industries, the Daily Times ran a long feature about him - "John B. Stephens - Name, Man Synonymous With Growth Of City," it declared, detailing his accomplishments and tracking his local ancestry back to Charles Stewart. West of town on U.S. 67, the "Ripley Massacre" historical marker says Mr. Stewart led troops who pushed the Indians from Titus County in the 1840's. His daughter married Dr. John S. Stephens, another settler said to have arrived during the last of the Texas Republic days. Dr. Stephens had two sons - Charles, who opened a drug store, and John B. Stephens Sr., a farmer.
The story credited Mr. Stephens with drilling discovery wells launching fields in Bowie, Hunt, Titus and Wood Counties.
On January 11, 1987, the Dallas Morning News ran a final piece about him, written by legendary columnist Bob St. John, who's now retired and living on Lake Cypress Springs.
"John B died the other day," Mr. St. John wrote, and can no longer be found every evening "sitting on his stool at the end of the Black Angus bar . . ."
Shortly thereafter, the Hotel Stephens was closed, then leased out and used as a storage facility, declining to a derelict pigeon roost.
On an October night in 1998, fire gutted the hotel. Its remains were demolished, taking with it the only place in town to ever bear his name.