The Baytown Sun from Baytown, Texas • Page 11

THE BAYTOWN SUN Sunday, May 17, 1987 3-B Pruetts pioneered city Family homestead in heart of Baytown The year was 1898, the man was 26-year-old Price Pruett, the place was a 298-acre ranch slap; dab in the middle of what is now Baytown. The cowboy from Dayton a pioneer Baytonian left his brand on Baytown's birth certificate with son R.H. "Red" Pruelt taking over the reins after he was gone. Joined by their son, Holland, and Jackie Pruett relaxed lin their Gulf Street landmark to reminisce about the family history. Price Pruett was born on a ranch near Dayton, where he learned to be a cowboy.

In the 1880s being a cowboy was making a living. Price was an exception in his cowhand duties. Unlike most of his counterparts, he graduated from college Southwestern University in Georgetown. The business administration knowledge learned by cowboy Pruett would be put to use in his cattle dealings and later in a partnership with Ross S. Sterling.

For years Price Pruett rode the range, rounding cattle from ranchers between Beaumont and Houston. Each rancher would be given a mark for each head of cattle and Pruett would return from the stockyard at Dayton to pay each one in gold. He never used the same trail to return to a rancher's house because he was carrying from $15,000 to $18.000 dollars in gold coins. In 1898 hard work and good sense were the beginning of a new era for Price Pruett near the banks of Goose Creek Stream. In 1902 Price married Georgea Estelle Lawrence and the couple built their home where the Weingarten store building was later located near the corner of Lee Drive and Market Street.

A fine home for its day, it had" three bedrooms. The kitchen and. dining room were separated from the living quarters by a dog-run porch. The pasture covered a wide area. At the present site of Lee College, football games used to be played by high school boys.

The area became widely known as "PrueU's Pasture." Price Pruett's barns were located where the pavilion in Bicentenial Park now stands. Where Sterling Library is today was once the bustling ranch house of Wiley Shriver, who was Pruett's partner until the mid- 1920s. The early 1920s found Price Pruett and Ross S. Sterling teaming up to start Goose Creek Realty. They created the downtown Texas Avenue area, adding a major chapter to the history of Baytown and its growth.

On a 90-acre plot they sold lots and developed the streets in the vicinity of Texas Avenue. Ten acres were given to the railroad for promotion of the area property and the venture Son staff stories lr Vr proved to be successful. Pruett and Sterling built the Citizens Bank building in 1922 on the corner of Ashbel and Texas. At that time the bank was the only steam-heated building between Beaumont and Houston. The Texas Avenue oak tree was actually bigger in the early 1900s than it is today.

Red Pruett remembers his father telling him that the tree was the oldest oak around these parts as far back as 1918. Asphalt and concrete choked the tree for years but never quite killed it. Thanks to the efforts of the Pruett family, the tree lives today. Although it is somewhat dwarfed and not up to par these days, the symbol of the city still lives. Its age has been estimated at more than 200 years.

As Texas Avenue flourished and creeped closer to the Pruett ranch house, a corral gate was built to keep stock from roaming downtown. The gate was located about where the front door is to the former Culpepper Furniture building, which, incidentally, was constructed by the Pruetts. Price and Georgea had two sons and a daughter born at the ranch house. Freeman "Potsy" Pruett was born in 1905 and died in 1970. Mavoureen "Polly" Taylor was born in 1910 and died in 1979 in Houston.

The surviving son is Rolland Henry "Red" Pruett. who is as well-known in Baytown as the oak tree itself. R.H. AND JACKIE PRUETT At their home on Gulf Street Former mayor also served on Port of Houston Commission Born in 1911, R.H. "Red" Pruett is widely recognized in Southeast Texas as the man who breathed life into the new city of Baytown.

He graduated from Horace Mann, Robert E. Lee and Massey Business School. He was a familiar sight at his filling station on the corner of Pruett and Texas from 1930 to 1936. He left the filling station to go to work at Humble's Baytown Refinery, where he stayed until 1947. After leaving the refinery, Pruelt started his development and construction company.

Many Baytown structures were built by his company, including Memorial Baptist Church and many other churches located in Baytown. Pruett served as a city councilman from 1949 until he was elected mayor in 1953. He served as mayor until 1961. Pruett led the way in annexing a big part of Humble property, thereby creating new tax dollars for a growing city. "The Tri-Cities had not been Baytown too long when I was mayor," he recalled, "and at the time we were pulling in three directions.

"After Humble property was annexed into the city it seemed to make for everyone pulling together." In 1963 Pruett was appointed Father and son always a team In the 1940s and '50s, the Pruetts made waves in boat racing. R.H. "Red" Pruett and his son, Rolland, were known back then as two of the best and fastest speedboat drivers in the south. Rolland won several state championships and the world championship. Rolland, now 56, graduated from Robert E.

Lee in 1949. In recent years he has followed in his father's footsteps in city government, serving on the Baytown City Council. Rolland and wife Joan have been married 36 years. They have a daughter, Pam Sutton, and a son, Sammy Price Pruett. The Pruetts of Baytown are now and have been since 1898 those rugged individualists type people who have prospered and made Baytown prosper to be what it is today.

They're a rare breed who started in America when Beasley Pruett great- grandfather of R.H. "Red" Pruett walked down the gangplank of a ship of Jean LaFitte, arriving in New York Harbor in the late 1700s, to the Port of Houston Commission. He worked diligently for 10 years to help better both the Port of Houston and Baytown's connection with the ship channel. He was the instrumental tool while on the commission in ramrod- ding the S29 million needed to upgrade the birth of a modern facility at Harbours Cut. Red Pruett retired in 1972 and leaves a siring of a c- complishments that stretches from Goose Creek to Houston.

He spent two years on the Offshore Superport Commission, appointed by then-Gov. Preston Smith. He had one of the longest tenures in city government in Baytown and served as president of the Harris County Mayors and Councilmen's Association. He also was scoutmaster of Troop 101 at Memorial Baptist Church and was a volunteer fireman. He has served on the Citizens Bank Board of Directors and Citizens Bank Loan Committee.

In view of all these accomplishments and activities, he was asked about his greatest satisfaction. He pointed to a brass statue on the mantel in his living room, explaining it was given to him by Edna Oliver when he was mayor and she was the city secretary. The inscription reads "Boss of the Year." HE PRICE Pruett home was located in vicinity of late Freeman Pruett. The barn in the rear was in terket and Lee Drive, where the old Werngarten the area of the present-day Bicentennial Park hilding stands. The boy in the foreground is the pavilion.

This photo was made in about 1914. HISTORY HIGHLIGHTS GEORGEA AND PRICE PRUETT Married in 1902 IKE FATHER, like son, Rolland Pruett is serving the Baytown City Council. When first elected, he eceived a hearty handshake from his father, R.H. "Red" Pruett, who served first as a councilman and later as mayor of Baytown. HIS PHOTO of Price Pruett fas taken in 1940 a year before is death.

Starting out as a cowboy, he became a uccessful developer in Baytown nd the patriarch of the Pruett Ian here. One of his business ssociates became the governor Texas Ross S. Sterling. Kindness not forgotten The year was 1919 when the young Italian sailor came to the door of the Price Pruett home, seeking shelter and help. The sailor was in a strange country and, not knowing where to turn after jumping ship, thought maybe someone would help him.

They did. Georgea and Price Pruett bought him groceries. When the sailor realized he had made a mistake jumping ship, he wanted to go home. The Pruetts helped the young Italian sailor with money to get back home to his native Italy. Before the young man left he took a piece of string and measured the top of the Pruett's oak dining room table.

With one piece of string he knotted both ends for the length and with another piece the width. Because of the language barrier, the Pruetts had no idea why he had measured the table. Two years later the Pruetts received a notice of a package to be picked up in Houston. After futile efforts in Houston, they were told the package was at the railroad depot in Dayton. The Pruetts hitched up the horse and wagon and headed for Dayton.

To their amazement, the package from Italy was a polished black and white, Italian marble table top. Five feet long, 4 feet wide, 1 inches thick, it was an exact fit for the oak table in the Pruetts' dining room. The Italian table has been a story for the Pruetts to pass along for nearly 70 years. It still sits in the dining room on Gulf Street..