The First Building on Old Houston Rd.
Sister Emma H. Beck started a Building Fund on January 21, 1951 by giving five dollars, which she deposited in the Huntsville National Bank.[24] In 1954, the Church created the Houston Stake. By that time, the Huntsville Sunday school had been released from the Texas-Louisiana Mission, and was now under the Houston Second Ward with Bishop Edward Moroni presiding. The fully organized Sunday school in Huntsville, as of April 4, 1954, consisted of Wilburn L. Toole as Superintendent, Stephen Archie Clark as first assistant, Thomas Fred Toole as second assistant, and Esther Beck Harper as secretary. On January 23, 1955, Stake President Jack Trunnell and Bishop Moroni Stone came down to approve a site and start to make construction plans for a new meetinghouse.
After the building fund had been started under the Texas-Louisiana Mission, the Church paid for seventy-five percent of the cost.[25]Sister Emma Beck graciously volunteered to loan the group two thousand five hundred dollars to start building sooner, “with repayment to be in two years if possible.” A one acre lot was purchased for construction of a new building on April 17, 1955. They bought the land on Old Houston Rd. from J.R. Justice.[26] The Ballews noted that “we needed $500 more than the original price of $3000.”[27] After they purchased a prefabricated building, they had to retrieve it from the railway boxcars in Phelps, Texas, six miles away from the building site.[28] They had dozens of volunteers take the pieces of the building to the lot[29] and help erect the structure on Wednesday, June 8, 1955.[30] Three days later, on Saturday, June 11th, the building was up and ready for services the next day.[31] Members remembered that there “were some finishing touches to be done, but the building was ready for … Sunday school … the next day, Sunday, June 12,” 1955.”[32] The volunteers celebrated their hard work with a barbecue at the conclusion, that Saturday evening.[33] It was clearly a time to celebrate how far they had come, since the meeting at the Becks residence. The building had a tiny chapel with five pews, two classrooms, and a small cultural hall which contained the gym. The men and women met in either the chapel or the cultural hall, and the younger kids met in one room, while the older kids met in the other room.[34] During the dedicatory speech three years later, one of the apostles stated that the chapel cost twenty-three thousand dollars.[35]
On August 7th, 1955, there was a meeting, where fifty-three members attended, to announce that Huntsville was officially a dependent branch. They were called the Huntsville Dependent Branch of Houston Second Ward with Stephen Archie Clark as president, Thomas E. Foster as first counselor, and Thomas Fred Toole as second counselor.[36] Along with the presidency, they sustained Wilburn L. Toole as Sunday School Superintendent, Jasper N. Rhoton as first counselor, and Benjamin R. Johnson as second counselor over Sunday school.[37]
In September of 1955, Brother and Sister Jesse B. Kirkpatrick gave a new piano to the Huntsville Branch.[38] Relief Society, the women’s organization which was established on March 17, 1847 in Nauvoo, Illinois, was officially established in Huntsville, Texas on December 31, 1955 with Lena Foster as Relief Society President, Mary E. Clark as first counselor, Merle Steely as second counselor, and June M. Johnson as secretary-treasurer.[39][40] As part of Relief Society, women would have callings as a “visiting teacher,” which visited many sisters in the ward to make sure they are doing okay and to see if they needed anything. Years later, Lorita Ballew reflects on her time as a Visiting Teacher saying that “[m]any times Sister Mary Clark, asked me to go Visiting Teaching with her. This was an all day affair, interesting and never dull, traveling to Willis, Conroe, Oakhurst, and Madisonville.”[41]
The Branch Conference (a quarterly event) was held on June 23, 1957, where they made plans to reorganize the Huntsville branch, and the officers and teachers were discharged from their present positions.[42][43] On July 14, new officers were sustained in the Huntsville Branch Presidency. A few of those were Arnold Foster as first counselor and Thomas F. Toole as second counselor.[44] And on January 20th, 1958, Dedicatory Services were held with Apostle Harold B. Lee presiding and Bishop E. Moroni Stone of the Melbourne Ward conducting.[45][46] Also, the apostle Spencer W. Kimball attended the services. To the Latter-day Saints, it was and is a big thing for these two apostles to come down from Utah for a small branch dedicatory service.[47] Almost fifteen years after this dedicatory service, Harold B. Lee was President of the Church from 1972 until his death in 1973. Also, Spencer W. Kimball was President of the Church from 1973, taking over President Lee’s place, to 1985 when he died.[48]
Source Footnotes
[24] James S. Olson and Lucky Beck Grissom, A History of Walker County, Texas, “Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints”
[25] Ballew, A. E. and Lorita Ballew. “Huntsville Ward History.”
[26] James S. Olson and Lucky Beck Grissom, A History of Walker County, Texas, “Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints”
[27] Sister Lorita Ballew and Bishop A. E. Ballew’s notes on Huntsville’s timeline of events
[28] James S. Olson, interview
[29] James S. Olson and Lucky Beck Grissom, A History of Walker County, Texas, “Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints”
[30] Dr. James S. Olson, interview
[31] James S. Olson and Lucky Beck Grissom, A History of Walker County, Texas, “Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints”
[32] Ballew, A. E. and Lorita Ballew, “Huntsville Ward History”
[33] James S. Olson and Lucky Beck Grissom, A History of Walker County, Texas, “Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints”
[34] Lorita Ballew phone interview
[35] Sister Lorita Ballew and Bishop A. E. Ballew’s notes on Huntsville’s timeline of events
[36] James S. Olson and Lucky Beck Grissom, A History of Walker County, Texas, “Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints”
[37] Ballew, A. E. and Lorita Ballew, “Huntsville Ward History”
[38] Sister Lorita Ballew and Bishop A. E. Ballew’s notes on Huntsville’s timeline
[39] “History of the Church,” Official Website of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
[40] Ballew, A. E. and Lorita Ballew, “Huntsville Ward History”
[41] Lorita Steely Ballew, “Reflections on the Huntsville Ward”, January 2006.
[42] Ballew, A. E. and Lorita Ballew, “Huntsville Ward History”
[43] Lorita Ballew and Bishop A. E. Ballew’s notes on Huntsville’s timeline
[44] Ballew, A. E. and Lorita Ballew, “Huntsville Ward History”
[45] Lorita Ballew phone interview
[46] Lorita Ballew and Bishop A. E. Ballew’s notes on Huntsville’s timeline
[47] Lorita Ballew phone interview
[48] “History of the Church,” Official Website of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
