Spurlins of Hamilton County, Texas

John L. Spurlin

A Find a Grave memorial gives John L. Spurlin's birth as 17 September 1853 in Navarro County, Texas, and records the inscription "Born Chatfield Point, Texas". It names his parents as L. B. Spurlin (1831–1854) and Sarah Roseanna Reagan Scogin (1832–1901), and his wife as Margaret Vedder Spurlin (1853–1925). He died in Waco on 10 November 1935 and is buried in Oakwood Cemetery there.^[1] For earlier Spurlins near Chatfield, see Spurlins of Navarro County, Texas.

Newspapers of 1908 and 1909 describe him as a nephew of John H. Reagan,^[2][3] the former Confederate Postmaster General and U.S. senator from Texas.^[4] The Palestine Daily Herald noted in October 1908 that Spurlin, passing through on his way from Hamilton to Marlin, "bears a striking resemblance" to his uncle.^[2] In January 1909, according to an Austin dispatch, he was in the capital conferring with legislators about a proposed bill for the state to buy Reagan's papers, diary and correspondence from his widow.^[3]

Merchant and banker

A 1934 retrospective in the Hamilton County News recalled Spurlin as having run the leading general mercantile business in Hamilton for many years. It described him as a promoter of every public enterprise and a firm believer in advertising, and said he had been a public school trustee and an ardent Democrat who followed William Jennings Bryan on free silver. It also credited him with organizing "the First National Bank" and with serving for years as president of the "Hamilton-Hico Telegraph Co.", and said he had owned many farms and ranches in Bosque, Hamilton and Coryell counties. By 1934 he was living in Waco with his daughter.^[5] A 1938 "Pioneer Edition" of the same paper recorded that in 1897 he was business manager of William Maxwell's mercantile house and president of the Hamilton-Hico Telephone Company, with about 10,000 acres of land for sale in the three counties.^[6] In 1906 a San Antonio newspaper called him "one of the biggest merchants of West Central Texas".^[7]

A Texas historical marker for the Hamilton National Bank, put up in 1966, says the bank received its charter in 1890. Its first officers were Dr. George Perry as president and J. T. James as vice-president, with J. L. Spurlin and J. A. Eidson as directors.^[8][9] (The HMdb transcription of the marker spells the last name "Edison".^[9]) Another 1966 marker, for St. Mary's Episcopal Church in Hamilton, names J. L. Spurlin with S. D. Felt and E. R. Williams as the building committee for the church, whose site was given in 1891.^[10]

Railroad promoter

Spurlin was active in the push to bring railroads to Hamilton. In August 1905 he was named Hamilton County's representative on a committee, formed at a meeting in Waco, to push a proposed railroad between Waco and Thurber.^[11] In January 1906 he was in Waco during a visit by Cotton Belt officials, when extending that line to Hamilton was discussed.^[7] In July 1907 he was elected first vice-president of the newly organized Waco, Hamilton and Brownwood Railroad company.^[12] He was also on the first board of directors of the Stephenville North and South Texas Railway, chartered in February 1907, which reached Hamilton at the end of that year.^[13] In February 1908 he was billed as one of the principal speakers at the annual convention of the Southern Cotton Association in Dallas.^[14]

The Hamilton incorporation case (1907–1908)

A J. L. Spurlin was the first-named appellant in Spurlin v. State ex rel. Graves, 51 Tex. Civ. App. 266 (1908). In February 1907, residents of Hamilton petitioned the county judge and then voted to incorporate "the town of Hamilton." According to the opinion, J. L. Spurlin and the other appellants were the people elected or appointed to the new town's offices, which they held from April 1907.^[15] F. M. Graves, a resident taxpayer, brought a quo warranto suit in the State's name to dissolve the corporation. The district court of Hamilton County held the incorporation invalid, and on June 10, 1908, the Texas Court of Civil Appeals affirmed. State law barred a town of fewer than 2,000 inhabitants from incorporating more than two square miles, and the Hamilton incorporation took in four.^[15] The opinion does not say which office Spurlin held, or whether he was the J. L. Spurlin who was a director of the Hamilton National Bank. See Spurlin in American case law.

The Spurlin community

The town of Spurlin grew up on the Stephenville North and South Texas line in 1908–1909. A 1909 dispatch printed in the Washington Herald states that "Spurlin is named for John L. Spurlin, of Hamilton".^[16] The Handbook of Texas describes Spurlin as a ranching community in northwestern Hamilton County, four miles from Carlton, which handled its mail^[17]. In 1936 it had a church and a business. By the late 1980s it no longer appeared on maps^[17]. See Spurlin, Texas.

Context

Spurlins were among the families who moved west into central Texas in the 19th century. A Spurlin Family in America records one family line settling in Texas before the Civil War^[18].