Johnnie Carpenter a long time resident, fondly tells his memories of growing up in River Oaks when it was a very rural area, with not many people, and very few roads, and most of them were dirt roads. A very interesing and enjoyable story. Not only is Johnnie very knowledgeable, he is an extremely nice person. Check below for his story!

Memories of Johnnie Carpenter
Of the 1930's and 1940's
September 13, 1999

After being introduced and the room settles down from a nice round of applause..... Johnnie opens with the line: "When they ask me to speak to this group, I didn't know that some of you old reprobates as old as I am were going to be here tonight...and that includes you Hoople!" Then he goes on to explain that the modern name for the person he's talking about is Alvin Littlefield. In return Mr Littlefield comes back with some comments of his own....all in fun and admiration of course.
Someone from the room says " Alvin says he likes your curly hair". To that Johnnie says, " As Dub Ray once said to me, quite a few years ago,
I said, "Dub, your hair sure has turned white", he says yes it has, and now we have something in common..... mine has turned white and yours has turned loose!"

Johnnie began his story with the fact that Alvin Littlefield lived on what was known back then as Whiskey Lane (Gillam Rd), and is an offspring of the Ladd family. Then he mentioned that Vernon Hooper has been out here all his life, and lived on Springer. Doris (Holley) now Askins also lived on Springer.

He goes on to say that one of the patriarchs of the community is the Willett family. And for quite a few years he was very close to them. And said that really and truly the Willett family hasn't gotten the credit that they are justly due for what their contribution was to our community.
A lot of us out here didn't work regular and didn't have a regular income back then, but we all had something that we could depend on..... and that was the Willetts. The Willetts carried people for groceries, that was his first exposure to credit. They were very generous, after his stepfather died, he said that there were times that we would have gone hungry if it hadn't been for the Willetts.
The Willetts opened the gas station at 5418 Meandering Rd in 1938 and hired Johnnie to run it, he spent three years working very close with them and saw how very generous they really were. The gas station was directly in front of the house that Hugh and Helen Willett lived in. Johnnie said he could go to the back window of the station and talk to Helen and Hugh while they were still in their house. The Willett house was just that close. A short time later they built a building on the east side next to the gas station. Along about this time Alvin Littlefield joined Johnnie in operating the station. Johnnie then started working part time in the grocery store. Johnnie worked for the Willetts for about three years.
In the early 1940's, Helen and Hugh moved their house to the back of the lot and turned it so it would face Yale Street. They then moved the gas station to the northwest corner of Meandering and Yale St. and built a larger grocery store at 5424 Meandering Rd. (site of the original gas station) For a while the former store became Cody's Bar BQ. That building was torn down later.
When the original grocery store was put in, it was the first grocery store in River Oaks. Pop and Mom Willett lived in the back of the store. Hugh and Helen lived next door. Later the grocery store went into the new building which is now a church. The house located at 5412 Meandering Road that belonged to Bud Neace is the one that Pop and Mom Willett bought and moved into after they vacated the old store building.
The Willetts had several shops in one building, one was the barber shop, then there was a beauty shop and two other businesses. In later years, on Yale St close to the corner was a day care that Helen Willett ran for years. Due to the fact that there were businesses or homes owned by the Willetts on several areas of Meandering and Yale St, the area soon became known as "Willett's Corner."
The first barber for Willetts's barber shop was Johnnie's great uncle,
Dick Holland, his grandmother's brother. The barber shop must have had a very faulty hot water heater though because everytime Mr Holland would disappear to check on the hot water heater, you could ...always hear something gurgling..... then when he came back........ he could cut more hair, better, than most people could when they were sober...... The whole room laughs
Jackie Campbell Sparks remembers Dick Holland. She said he bought her father's barber fixtures when her father came down with Tuberculosis. Her father
Jackie Campbell, was the first barber of River Oaks. They moved out here in June of 1936. His shop and home was located on the north west corner of Tulane and Oxford and faced south. At this time Jackie shared another first , as a child she wondered why her classmates always wanted to come home with her after school.........her family had one of the first five indoor toilets!! Laughs come from the room again
Across the street from Jackie Campbell's house was a grocery store that faced Tulane, and was on the south west corner, behind the Cole house named Loyds Place.

The house on the corner of Yale and Baylor St was the Shetter property which backed up to the Willetts property. The Shetter's family home faced Baylor and they had a small house at the back of their property that faced Yale St.  The house was built for Mrs Eula Shetter's parents, the Robinsons.

Johnnie Carpenter's family moved out here in 1934 and moved to Baylor St, which was pretty significant in his family because at one time there were 3 generations that lived on Baylor St. In the 5300 block (5351) lived his uncle & aunt, in the 5400 block (5405) is where he and his family lived, in a very small pier and beam house. There was a small house at the rear of the lot with a quarter moon cut out in the door which had the modern convenience of air conditioning.......... cold as a wedge in the winter and .....hotter than blue blazes in the summer !
They never had to wonder which way the wind was blowing..... cause it came right through it! Sure was cold down there sometimes at night he said.
In the 1940's they put in indoor plumbing and a septic tank and thought they were living high on the hog!
This area of Baylor was part of the old original Zack Castleberry farm, then later became Castleberry Gardens. An old Castleberry water well was located at approximately the 5300 block of Baylor on the Wade property. Which was previously owned by Gus Hagg.
Johnnie's family's first water was furnished by the Cole Water Company, which was located at Tulane and Oxford.
At this point Johnnie asked how many remember taking a bath in an old
No. 3 washtub? Several laugh and hold up their hands. In some of the families if you were the oldest you got to bathe first, in others the youngest went first and you were the last !!
In the 5500 block (5563) lived his Grandparents and the house next door belonged to his grandparents also. At one time a great uncle (Dick Holland)and his daughter and son-in-law ( Tom & Helen Cornell) lived in it. Then later another uncle (E.A. "Buster" Peters) lived there, so we had that street pretty well sewed up for awhile he said.

Johnnie's step grandfather, Emil Peters and his twin brother Aleck were Nile City Police officers, during part of it's short life as a city. Emil was born in 1884 in Fredricksburg Texas. At an early age he moved to San Antonio where he went into apprenticeship as a cabinet maker.
After living in North Fort Worth for a number of years, in 1934, Emil moved to River Oaks and purchased two lots. Using his knowledge he gained as a cabinet maker, he built his own home at 5563 Baylor. Aleck lived on the North Side and operated a Bar BQ resturant on 25th Street next to a grocery store where Columbus comes into 25th Street. Another of the Peters brothers lived on White Settlement Rd (4800 block) just east of the old Swaims Grocery location and across the street from Fireside Lodge. His property went from White Settlement Rd to the Trinity River.

Emil Peters(Johnnie's step Grandfather) had one full son E.A. "Buster" Peters. Emil was the only father Johnnie's mother (maiden name May Wade) really ever knew. And the only Grandfather that Johnnie ever knew because his mother's dad died when she was a child. Johnnie's parents divorced and they moved in with his grandparents, Emil and Bertha Peters. Emil would take Johnnie and his brother Billy to the wrestling matches and to the Stock Show where he worked as security. During the Stock Show, Emil would put the boys in the bandstand section to watch the rodeo.
Emil's had some long time close friends, J.D. and Myrtle Price that lived next door to him on Baylor Street.
Mr J.D. Price was the first manager of Will Roger Coliseum complex and was so, for many years. He lived in the third house up from Camp Carter on Baylor. J.D. also owned the next lot so he built a house for his mom and dad.
Lots 5 and 6 belonged to Emil, so he built his house on lot 5 at 5563 Baylor and on the 6th lot he built a house for his brother-in-law Dick Holland.

Castleberry Church of Christ was first organized in Jewell Robinson Armstrong's house. (Mrs Armstrong is now Mrs Kuykendall and lives on Tyra Lane.) She lived on the south west corner of Yale and Baylor. The people met later in a church on the corner of Cambridge and Baylor. The Masonic Lodge bought the church property and the adjacent lot on the corner of Harvard and Baylor. The Masons met in the church until they completed the building of the Lodge.
The church had dirt floors and Effie Volder got a group of kids together (including Johnnie) and they worked hard all one day and hauled off all of the loose dirt and really cleaned things up. Unfortunately the first service that they had after the church was cleaned up, was Effie Volder's funeral. She tragically died in a fire accident two days later.
Effie's husband, Charlie Volder, was a baptist and attended Trinity Baptist and later River Oaks Baptist Church. More about Charlie later in the story.

This community was certainly changed with the development of two residential areas, one being Castleberry Gardens where Johnnie lived and the other was Forrest Acres.
Quite a few families lived on Springer, but not too many were on Ohio Garden Rd, the families that were there, included: Bettes, Volders, Hensons, Poores and the Hoeflein family (owned the Glass House.) Also the Circle Inn was there.
Up on Meandering Rd there were the Schramms and Cunninghams, then J.M Higgins and his son Al Higgins. Then he asked how many remember J.M. Higgins, who helped name the streets in the college district of Castleberry Gardens. Then you come on around to Sam Calloway, there were the Littlefields and the Ladds then Max Green's family. The Green's dairy was located on Sam Calloway Rd and later on Camp Carter property on the west side of Castleberry Gardens.

Roberts Cut-Off did not go across White Settlement Rd. Where the Zion Church is now was the old Blair property, on the east side of the Blair property was the Hagg feed store and home, then on the south west corner was the Gurlich store. This land ended up being owned by the Littlefields.
White Settlement road was an old gravel road and folks used to bring their quilts and sit out in the middle of the road in front of Charlie Gurlich store and he had an old Philco radio and they would listen to the boxing match.
Someone mentioned a little grocery store named Gillespie, then it became Tallants, that was located on Meandering Rd just as you make the curve before the bridge that crosses the Trinity River. There was an older bridge that used to be there that was Johnnie and his Grandfather favorite place to fish.

Someone asked how did folks get around out here. Johnnie said that the original bus out here was an old fashioned car, that was owned and driven by Charlie Burns.(Duane Burns & Kathleen BurnsTucker's dad)

Johnnie's wife Jewel Vick, Carpenter's father, Clarence Vick, bought the old Spooler place in 1939, that was located at 4650 Barbara Road, and they moved to Castleberry. The Spooler house was very unique. Mr Spooler was a railroad man and the house was built out of railroad material. It was built with a big Elm tree right in the center of it, it was very unusual. They had one daughter our age Johnnie recalls. This house is now the home of Joe and Nancy Carpenter, Crews. (Mr & Mrs Vick's grandaughter)
Mr Vick when he bought the house, tore it down and built the current house and the rock and brick wall that has been there for many years . The old Elm tree is still there with a swing on it.
After Trinity Baptist Church burned in approx 1944-45, Mr Vick built the church auditorium back.
He helped build the River Oaks Theatre. And built one of the educational buildings of the River Oaks Baptist Church. He was asked to build the basement for the church and he turned them down. Later problems arose due to the basement being dug too deep and a person was needed to help them out of the mess. Someone said there's only one fella that can help us here. Charlie Volder asked Mr Vick to help him out. Being very tender hearted, Mr Vick helped Charlie Volder build the forms for the beams of the foundation of River Oaks Baptist Church, and those beams still hold the basement floor of that church. He built the basement, they sealed it off, and used that part of it until some years later they built the present auditorium.
Mr Vick also built Johnnie and Jewell's house at 616 Harrisdale.

Johnnie remembers having a lot of fun with his friends, things that would make mothers shudder if they knew. Playing in the river bottom, when the river was up, they would get on a log and ride it down the river as far as they could, get off, come back and do it again. There was only one problem, they couldn't go too far because they didn't have any bathing suits on. One day some of them didn't get off the log soon enough and ended up at Schniders Lake (Burger's Lake Now) and had to find limbs, leaves and other stuff so they could get back up the river bank!
Schniders Lake used to be the entrance to the South side of Lake Worth. Meandering Rd went straignt on to the lake right there by the dam, and followed the lake around on the West side of it. At one time Johnnie's Grandfather had Bar BQ , minnows and a bait place right across the entrance to Schniders Lake (Burgers Lake.) The Schnider family had a gold fish hatchery and they built the original swimming pool, and Johnnie and brother Billy learned to swim there before it was opened to the public. On down the road was Knights Lake, later became Knights Lake Road, which later became Tarrant Field, then another addition opened up called Timber Lake Heights, which was closed and taken in by Carswell Air Force Base. A house that used to be in that addition that was built by Mr Vick was moved to the north west corner of Purdue and Yale St, it has a garage built under it. Is still there today.

He asked Alvin Littlefield if we should explain how the name Whiskey Lane came to be. Alvin laughed and said that he had two uncles that made shine! (whiskey) Everyone laughed
Then he mentioned the Piper family that Piper Lane was named for (later changed to Black Oak). Another pioneer family that he mentioned were the Pribbles. He talked about some road that he thought was an extention of Springer, and extended into Ohio Garden Rd. He asked the group what it was called, someone answered Ester Drive, where the Andrews family lived.

River Oaks Methodist Church started out where the Castleberry Elementary school is now.(Ohio Garden Rd.) It used to be next door to the old original school building. The church bought the property.
Mildred Andrew's grandfather , Pop Andrews, made a deal with the church that he would cut all the trees down and remove all the stumps, to be used at home in the wood stove. He wasn't a very big man but he covered every inch where he stood. He traded with the Willetts and Johnnie had standing instructions from Hugh Willett that anytime Pop Andrews came down that he was to put a 7 gallon can of kerosene for the cookstove, and put it in the panel truck and take him home. Pop Andrews would always argue but Johnnie always won out.

Not many people know why the city limits of River Oaks goes down Barbara Rd to Isbell, then goes north to White Oak, then back to Churchill.
On top of the hill on Springer, was the Weatherford house. Mr Weatherford was one of the organizers of River Oaks. He said "By Golly if we're gonna have a city, my place is gonna be in it." So the city limits dip down on three sides in that one block square.
The Weatherford house had a lot of property behind it and a creek ran by it. Another pioneer family that later lived in the Weatherford house were the Bloomfields (Mert Bloomfield family). Johnnie said there were a whole bunch of them.

Many years ago this was a very rural area, not many people and very few roads. The main roads being White Settlement Rd, Roberts Cut-Off, and Ohio Garden Rd. If you were coming from downtown you came out White Settlement Rd.
If you came from Arlington Heights, you could come down Burton Hill Rd, if you could make it all the way to the bottom! I had a lot of trouble making it to the top sometimes in my Model T pickup truck he says, then goes on to say, although there was some times I had to turn it around and back it the rest of the way up that hill !

Miscellaneous Information ---- Johnnie's Birthday - November 29, 1920
Johnnie has been retired for 16 years.
Has been married to Jewel for 58 years.
Jewel's Birthday - September 3, 1920

His first girlfriend was Bettye Hagg. He was so bashful, that he wouldn't ask
her out, he asked her sister (Mary Dee Hagg, Quayle) for their first date.

His mother remarried when Johnnie was 13 years old to a man named Blair.
His mother dated Mr Blair when whe was a teenager because she lived out
here. She lived where Fireside Lodge (White Settlement Rd) is now.
Around 1915-1916.

F.M. Crittenden and Johnnie thought that one time they would get different dates than their usual girlfriends.They asked every girl in town and was turned down by all of them!