Matures
THE BATTALION Pag© 11
THURSDAY, JANUARY 22, 1981
iVhorehouse-motel now legal
FBI agent flashes his badge
develop
installj|jj | United Press International
ithly fet KILGORE — It is doubtful a hit
The pit oadway play will be written about
roe as (fo e Pines Motel. Kilgore likely will
compreh, main known as the birthplace of
anistVanClibum in the tough East
have step aas oilfields.
the sysl^ Nonetheless, the Pines Motel —
eonveniij hich undoubtedly was the best lit-
local MD ! whorehouse in Kilgore — de-
alprogm ;rves a mention,
ms or n e It was the source of many a good
process me for oilfield workers and youths,
rosinesjp he Pines also turned out to be a
rime source of income for a few
nblic officials, and that is what
used its downfall.
The motel still operates on U.S.
)9. But “Pines Motel” has been
ainted over and it is now the Oil
atch Motel. For your money,
10.50 a night), all you get is a room
-free ice located down the
reezeway.
No more than four girls ever
as-Cente orked the Pines, but only the most
Corp.,»i live in East Texas didn’t know ab
ler Intels at the goings-on there. It was not
alike the fabled Chicken Ranch in
satp ||l, j aGrange, the basis for the musical
Delta lli ® est kittle Whorehouse in
■ecraftll™' , p . .
interacts ^ ow L' nes 15 gone, resi-
c field is ents ta ^ anc * j°^ e ^out it among
lemselves. But when an outsider
lakes inquiries, small-town clan-
11 be lass ishness takes over and it’s as if pros-
the \1b| tution had never been invented, —
s in uliit iuch less thrived — in Kilgore,
inandlw Especially unknowing about the
one ‘ 1 'ines’ sordid past was the man run-
llite alsoi ing the Oil Patch. The clerk at
ich for Is loses liquor store wouldn’t say a
, andaD* ord about the Pines. Norwould the
vy navi® ran at Lacy’s Garage. The girl be-
imia. ind the counter at the fast food store
te w jy lushedand said she hadn’t been liv-
Deltaanff*" Kilgore very l ong -
u j n "Of course, I don’t know a thing
JU ^ but it,” said the attendant at the
; asoline station in nearby Hender-
atellitesii an, “I don’t know anything about
ny of those kind of places. I work
even days a week. ”
A record store clerk refused to
ive his name but was more candid
“8 i un most — not to mention con-
ised — about his attitude toward
I lie whole business.
’ l "I never been there but once and I
on’t really know who all went
lere,” he said. “I think the people
in Kilgore were kind of disappointed
when it closed.
“It was a place you could go on
weekends. I guess they’ll have to
open up another, but there’s still a
couple more they need to get
closed.”
The good times ended for the
Pines Motel in a series of indict
ments from a federal grand jury in
vestigating prostitution, gambling
and corruption in Gregg County. A
number of officials were charged
with felonies and several resigna
tions followed.
Gregg County Sheriff Tom Welch
was convicted of trying to arrange
the murder of three men, including a
former sheriff s dispatcher who rob
bed the Pines and is now serving a
life sentence for capital murder. One
prostitute was killed and another
wounded in the 1974 holdup.
King Russell, a former justice of
the peace, and Dwight Watson, an
ex-constable, were accused of taking
bribes from the operators of the
Pines but pleaded guilty to lesser or
unrelated charges.
The most recent convictions came
in early January when Perry Russell
Tunnell, owner of the Pines, and
portly Odessa Mae “Mildred”
French, the lady of the house, were
found guilty of racketeering — brib
ing public officials to ensure the
money kept rolling in. They could be
sentenced to 10 years in prison and
fined $20,000.
The testimony in the trials was as
rollicking as payday night at the
Pines. Prostitutes told of having sex
with Tunnell, Russell and Watson at
French’s orders and how an en
velope was stuffed with $1,200
monthly for Watson.
Referring to testimony about two
14-year-old boys patronizing the
motel, U.S. Attorney John Hannah
Jr. almost went so far as to apologize
to the jurors for "splattering you and
this courtroom with sordid stories of
selling flesh.”
Tunnell, 61, claimed whenever he
heard his motel was a wide-open
whorehouse, he threatened to close
it. When French sent hookers to the
room he kept at the Pines for a
“date,” Tunnell compared it to being
offered a free plate lunch.
“I never turned down a plate
lunch either, ” he testified. “I didn’t
think they (the prostitutes) all loved
me all that much but I wanted to
think so.”
Tunnell and French’s court-
appointed attorney. Dale Long, said
the Pines wasn’t allowed to operate
because of bribery, but because of
favorable public sentiment in Kil
gore, a tough oil town of 11,000.
“The community simply tolerated
it,” Long said in his closing argu
ment.
Regardless of who was for or
against prostitution at the Pines, it
ended Jan. 17, 1979, when an FBI
agent retired to a room with a hooker
and showed her his badge.
An era had ended.
“It (the motel) grew up in the oil
boom days some 35 years ago,” said
Assistant U.S. Attorney Chris Harri
son. “According to testimony, prosti
tution was there since the begin
ning.”
TEXAS A&M
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PRESENTING
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7:00 P.M. RUDDER TOWER, ROOM 607
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