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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Sept. 7, 1988)
Wednesday, September 7, 1988AThe Battalion/Page 5 llayside old-timers hang around at ‘Domino Hall’ waiting for mail "willspe; afres ^' B AYSIDE (AP) — The mail a read y- so R- oss Downs said, H’s go across the street.” OClATioj M ver there, just across from the irTI ' »ide Post Office, is what some ®|)lecall Knox’s Domino Hall. I| used to be the biggest grocery ln th %tore in town. Now it’s where some ieei r [he old-timers hang out when "‘ hey are waiting for Postmaster Dan dy tj fea( .lawyer or his assistant Myrtle Mc- nance - Wheon, to sort and P ut U P t h' e fl. r eavaila.y ■ 3pt.16. On weekends, some of Ernest ft Box's friends will gather to play a ■ games. They don’t gamble, he ^ I 01 R"aid. It’s just for fun. heMSC'ii 02Rufe Knox and Lee Greer were sitting at a table under a ceiling fan shoot ing the breeze. Knox had to talk quite loud, because Greer can’t hear much nowadays. He will be 90 years oldjan. 7. “I open this place up in the morn ings so some of these fellows can have a place to wait for the mail,” Knox said. The lobby of the post of fice is not much bigger than a stamp, and there is no place to sit down. Downs, who is 88, gets around with the aid of a cane. He lives a cou ple of blocks down the street, “I can make the trip walking, if 1 have a place to rest before I start back,” he said. meet a for anyr» I social at: >mber. ^ It 7 PJIL ato. let meetly Law partners coexist as friendly political foes offering nthous ) p.m. at CE:A*. : prog-a-; bs office it 7 p.m r lection it i of Brts book y-;- J Cantu :30p.r ■ Eh PASO (AP) — Politics make for strange law partners in El Paso, where the county Republican and Democratic chairmen are partners with their opposing political party’s local presidential campaign man- agei. Ron Ederer, chairman of the El Paso County Republican party, is a law partner with Bob Neill, who is running Michael Dukakis’ campaign in El Paso. And Tom Diamond, the county’s Democratic chairman, is a law[ partner with Alan Rash, county chairman of George Bush’s cam- m n - .... pphe situation gives rise to mis chief at Ederer, Holmes 8c Neill. Re publican campaign material shows iilregularly on Neill’s desk, but the devout Democrat always has a prime silspect. ^■That’s OK. I have been known to ■the same thing to Ron,” Neill Over at Diamond, Rash, Leslie & Smith, the rhetoric gets more heated as election day approaches. Diamond described his relationship with Rash as being “kind of like a husband and wife with different political viewpoints.” In 1964, Diamond and Rash were chairmen of their respective parties. Diamond worked for Lyndon John son; Rash rooted for Barry Goldwa- ter. Four years later they teamed up in a law practice. Diamond describes Rash as his closest friend, but he still disparages Rash as an elitist Republican who prefers to meet with friends at the country club. “Other than that, he has many sterling qualities,” Diamond said. Diamond characterizes Republi cans as the silk-stocking set — a ste reotype that Rash disproved by pointing out his nylon-acrylic socks. Greer also uses a cane. He has a bum knee he got when playing foot ball for Mississippi A&M (now Mis sissippi State University). He drives to the post office, though. “They laugh about me and my bum knee,” he said, “but I don’t know what I would do if it weren’t for my friends to help me.” “He’s a bug man,” Downs said. “He used to inspect cotton for the government.” Greer was an entomologist for the U.S. Department of Agriculture for 40 years. He’s been in Bayside since 1951. Some others came in. There was Ethan Wicks, who used to farm but decided he had it made when he was 72 and retired. He is 78 now and still likes to kick up his heels when he hears some good music. “I go to two or three dances a week,” he said. He refers to himself and his friends as the senior citizen action group. Knox isn’t much on dancing, but he said he likes to go up to Refugio now and then on Wednesdays for the senior citizen get-togethers. He sits out the dances and concentrates on the potluck suppers. Bill McCutcheon came in. He’s Myrtle’s husband. You know, she works over at the post office. Bill worked for Reynolds Metals for 22 years before he retired. “He was a cow puncher when he was a young ’un,” Downs said. “He rode bulls.” No, he didn’t make the rodeo cir cuit. “It was local,” Bill said. “Just us boys around town in those days,” he said. “Yeah, he slings more bull than he’s rode,” Knox said, drawing a laugh from everybody, including McCutcheon. Bill was the youngster in the) group. Only 74. Some people call him Little Bill. His father was Big Bill. They came to Bayside from Sea- drift right after Bill was born. “His daddy and his uncle were bringing the family down here in a boat,” Downs recalled. “It was a day like this. No wind. They sat right out there in the bay. His daddy and his uncle got out in a skiff and towed the boat across the bay. Bill and his sister were burned up.” Down knows a lot about Bayside and its people. He’s been around since 1909 when his family came down on the railroad from Sedalia, Mo. That was when Bayside was just getting started. The promoters sold five-acre tracts and with each sale went a lot in town. “There’s people all over the country who own lots in Bayside because they bought those 5-acre tracts,” Downs said. There wasn’t much here in 1909, and hardly anything was left of St. Mary’s, right next door. It had been a bustling seaport before and after the Civil War. The town went down hill after a storm in 1886. By then, Rockport had emerged as a seaport and was nearer the Gulf. Today, the only thing left of St. Mary’s is the cemetery out by the highways and, if you want to count it, the big mansion John H. Wood built in 1877 at the southern extrem ity of St. Mary’s. It is right in the cen ter of Bayside, which stretched about two miles along the Copano Bay shore. Downs recalled coming to South Texas on the railroad, they rode as far as Rockport and had to take a boat across Copano Bay. The only vehicular road to Bayside was a dirt road out of Woodsboro. It was three years before it got a shell cover. By 1912 Bayside had five grocery stores, two blacksmith shops, a hotel — the Wood mansion was the hotel — and some gas sta tions. 1/2 Off Your Prescription Lenses With Any Zeiss Frame! Zeiss frames. . . beautifully crafted in Germany and guaranteed. . .for life! And now, during our Grand Opening, your basic prescription lenses are 1/2 price when you choose any Zeiss frame! 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