Depression-era oil boom drew new banker, new ideas to Mt. Pleasant
bringing slow shift of ag economy
By HUDSON OLD
Journal Publisher
In the days when W.L. "Billy" Means gave up road construction for banking, the headlines in Mt. Pleasant were about oil, water, Great Depression-era public works programs and struggling family farmers. And bars.
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Four years after the repeal of prohibition, moral issues bore down on the ballot box.
As the town's December, 1937 wet-dry election approached, a pamphlet citing the problems of "dope and prostitution" accused local authorities of turning a blind eye to slot "167 slot machines openly located in local establishments."
"There weren't honky tonks on main street, but there was a pretty good one out on West 1st," Mr. Means said.
A native of Belton, he got into highway construction after his $50 university tuition loan from the hometown Rotarians played out.
"I got a job with a concrete crew building bridges," he said, work that took him to Hughes Springs.
"We replaced the old one-lane bridges across Black Cypress and Turkey Creek, between Hughes Springs and Linden," he said.
While in town, he met and married the local banker's daughter, Evelyn Daniel.
Her father, A.G. Daniel, and Mayo Casling, another Hughes Springs bank investor, bought majority stock in the 1st National Bank, rode into Mt. Pleasant and fired President A.J. Copellar. Mr. Daniel replaced him.
"Bank presidents then weren't like now," Mr. Means said. "The man who ran the bank was the cashier, C.E. Lee. The president was usually the man with the most stock."
Mr. Means jumped at the chance to give up highway construction for banking.
"The standard loan for a farm family was $25 a year, and they didn't get that all at once," Mr. Means said. "They took it in five monthly advances, beginning with spring planting season."
In northern Titus County, until the year before, it was the same story.
"My dad told stories about farmers coming in to borrow money to put in a crop or buy groceries," said Guaranty Bond-Talco President Virgil Jones, the third generation of the family running its hometown bank. Felix Jones, he said, would walk down to the general mercantile with the farmer, and "buy a plow or a bill of groceries or whatever was needed, then walk him back down to the bank and have him sign a note for exactly that amount," Mr. Jones said.
"Looking back on the old books, there were lots of $5 and $10 notes, and not many for as much as $100," he said.
In an interview in the 1970's, Felix Jones remembered how the oil strike at Talco changed Titus County overnight.
"Nobody could have been more surprised if they'd found a pot of gold on main street," he said.
Humble Oil, Mobil and American Liberty (later to become Fina), established oil field camps. There was work everywhere and within a year more than 600 working wells in the field.
Seventeen miles south, Mt. Pleasant became the business center for the oilfield, the closest town with motels and the convenience of running water.
Mt. Pleasant and Mt. Vernon vied for location of the American Liberty Refinery. When Mt. Pleasant voted a bond issue to build a city lake for a water supply, the issue was settled.
Work on U.S. 67 -- then named Highway 1 -- was routing "The Broadway of America," through town, an ambitious two-lane national highway spanning coast to coast.
In the midst of hard times, there was new money and new opportunity here.
Mt. Pleasant was ripe for new bankers less rooted in conservative traditions.
During Mr. Means' 40-odd-year tenure at 1st National Bank, it rose to be Titus County's dominant financial institution.
But while oil brought new money, it didn't solve the changing world of farm families, the traditional backbone of the local economy.
In a community effort to keep farm families afloat, retailers working beneath the chamber umbrella bought eight Jersey bulls to rotate through the county, helping farmers shifting from and supplementing row cropping income with dairy production. It was a long-term initiative to improve milking bloodlines.
The oil strike ignited new segments of the economy - with land men descending on the Titus County seat, the Gaddis Motor Court announced plans to add 40 rooms and Dr. W.A. Taylor built a new hospital.
Even so, those $25 yearly farm loans represented as much as a quarter of the bank's business, Mr. Means said.
Agriculture remained the broadest economic base.
"Oil didn't change the understanding that if the farmers didn't survive, none of us would," Mr. Means said.
The drive to develop the dairy industry began earlier. In 1930 the town raised $60,000 to lure Texas Milk Products here. The milk plant provided a local market.
Two decades later, as President of 1st National, Mr. Means took a seat on the board of a newly-incorporated Industrial Foundation with the same agenda - creating markets for agri-business.
Chaired by oil man Jno. B. Stephens, the corporation's announcement of plans to raise $100,000 for construction of a poultry processing facility made the June 19, 1955 Dallas Morning News. Other officers included Mr. Means' one-time mentor, C.E. Lee, who was then president of competing Guaranty Bond Bank. The foundation board included competing insurance agency owners T.C. Walker and Phene C. Williams. Morris Rolston was the attorney.
"The milk plant was on a down-hill slide," Mr. Means said, adding that the poultry plant struggled under a series of managers until purchased by Pilgrim's Pride in the 1960's.
Today, the facility's payroll pumps $80 million in into the town's economy, and the fact that the foundation 40 years ago got out of the chicken business by the skin of its financial teeth was of secondary significance, even then.
"If we'd ever made a profit, we'd have just put it back in the foundation," Mr. Means said. "We got our money back in creating new jobs."
The foundation moved on, buying property on Industrial Boulevard, a site once used as a pottery plant. Master Craft built there.
They bought property across the road for a mobile home builder who failed - the facility now is Dekoran Wire & Cable, which 30 years later employs 50 to 75 people, depending on market demand.
On the civic side of the ledger, "Billy Means never met a bond proposal he didn't like," said a local realtor. "Better schools, better streets, whatever visions the community dreamers might have, he never let the idea of tax increases hamstring his thinking. He's had a lot of influence at critical junctures, and looking back, it seems he's always been right."
Over the years, oil field money flowed into town at a price.
"The refinery stunk so bad it'd wake you up," Mr. Means said.
The flow of oil from Talco slowed. The boom town began fading away in the 70's and 80's.
"The bank wound up with deeds to a dozen lots in Talco," Mr. Means said. The sellers' market was so bad the bank tried giving the lots to the city.
"They wouldn't take them," Mr. Means said. Shortly thereafter, wells in the area were re-worked and the bank collected $30,000 in royalties, he said.
Remember the Joneses, Talco bankers going back to the oil strike? In the 1970's the family bought controlling interest in Guaranty Bond Bank.
Art Scharlach came to town as a member of a new management team.
"Billy Means was the man you had to beat," said Mr. Scharlach, who saw a different side of the smiling, white-haired community activist and by then, banking patriarch.
"He may be the most ferocious competitor I've ever met," said Mr. Scharlach, now President of Guaranty Bond. "He had the big stick and he knew how to use it. He didn't just understand the market, as a banker he had powerful ideas about how to address it."
When Guaranty began advertising technological advances, Mr. Means' 1st National pushed hometown warmth.
"We ran an ad about our new computer and Billy came back with this radio spot comparing the sound of a bunch of clicks and whirs to this warm, honey-voiced sweetheart that his customers could expect," Mr. Scharlach said.
But the other side of that tough competitor is the heart of the man behind it, Mr. Scharlach said.
"When Billy takes the lead in civic initiatives, it isn't because he needs to be out front," Mr. Scharlach said. "It's because he wants the best for a town. Even when you don't agree with that kind of man, he deserves your respect."