SCHOOL NEWS

SUN MONITOR, FEBRUARY 23, 1905 ANNIE LAURA SCHOOL.

Annie Laura school district has been in the courts ever since its organization and is not entirely out yet. Wonder if it is because it is numbered 13?

White Flat school district was too large, and a majority of the tax payers of the district were of the sort that wanted only three or four months of school and a light school tax while the minority wanted nine months school and consequently a good school tax. D.D. Tilley and C. H. Eagin were leaders of the minority and they prevailed on Superintendent Laura Moor to divide the district, their idea being to get a majority of the "long horn" fellows in the old district by themselves and a majority of the friends of good schools in the new district.

The short term fellows objected to the division and employed lawyers to knock it out. The matter was brought before the old board of county commissioners and the board decided in favor of division, but within a few hours, the members of the board--two of them at least, experienced a change of heart, from some cause, and the following day the order granting the division was rescinded and an order direct to the contrary was made and recorded.

Lawyer Eagin on behalf of the new school district appealed to the district court and Judge Irwin decided against him, giving his opinion that the board of county commissioners had the right to rescind an order made at the same session. Mr. Eagin further appealed the case to the Supreme Court and that body at its recent session sustained the decision of Judge Irwin.

To offset the effect of such decision Mr. Eagin conceived the idea of having the legislature enact a law legalizing school district No. 13. He prepared a bill and he and Mr. Tilley went to Guthrie last week and talked up the matter among the legislators. Mr. Eagin returned but Mr. Tilley camped with the legislature and finally got the bill through and this will probably settle the matter, definitely.

Meanwhile, some months ago, an injunction was issued by Probate Judge Clay preventing the board of commissioners from interfering with the new district and the new district held a school meeting, levied the limit of taxes, issued warrants and built a good school building, hired a good teacher and have been conducting a good school.

March 16, 1905, Sun Monitor, HISTORY.

Final decision in the Greer County Texas School land cases was settled in the Supreme Court. The county lost.

Following is a brief history of the case: In 1887 Texas patented to Greer county four leagues of land in Cochran and Hockley counties, Texas for county school purposes. In the same year Greer county sold all of said land except 7,236 acres to Strain & Swinburn for the building and cages of the present jail. Before the year was out the jail was damaged by a storm and the county sued the bondsmen of the contractors and afterwards compromised the suit by the bondsmen paying the county $1,400.00 in cash, costs and Judge G.A. Brown's attorney fee in bringing the suit for the county.

This $1,400.00 with $700.00 added by the people of Mangum was used to rebuild the jail as it now stands. The 7,236 acres was sold in 1887 to this same firm of Strain & Swinburn on long time. They failed to pay for it and the county employed Judge J.A. Powers to sue Strain & Swinburn and J.A. Nabors, who had bought the land from Strain & Swinburn and assumed and agreed to pay Greer county for the land, which was done and judgment obtained. The land was sold and bought by Greer county and the county now has a judgment against Strain & Swinburn and Nabors for about $20,000 balance due.

Then, the state of Texas stepped in and brought suit for all this land against William Cameron, who had bought all except the 7,236 acres, and against Greer county for the 7,236 acres. The supreme court of Texas held that William Cameron was an innocent purchaser and decided in his favor, but decided against Greer county on the 7,236 acres and that judgement was confirmed by the United States Supreme Court.

In defending this case, the county employed Lawyer George Clark of Waco, Texas, on a contingent fee for one-half the land and he to pay all expenses, so he and not the county is out on expenses.

Greer county is not coming out of the deal in bad shape, however, as she has a jail worth eight thousand to ten thousand dollars that didn't cost the tax payers a cent and also has a judgment about $20,000.

THEY WEAR FEATHERS

Sun Monitor, Feb. 5, 1904
The teacher at the Red Store has a complaint to make against her students, says a recent report from Lawton.

The Red Store is an Indian trading post, as old as Fort Sill itself, and the children who live there have grown up there attending the mission school with the Indian children and associating with them in their play. As a result the white children have learned the Indian language, wear gaudy sashes, paint their faces and put feathers in their hair. They shoot arrows as well as young bucks.

They are now attending their first district school and though holding high regard for authority, refuse to be taught as civilized people. They read their lessons aloud in study and insist on wearing feathers, sashes, paint and brass earrings and finger rings in the school room. They jabber in Comanche and continue to run away to the mission school where the Indian children are. The teacher has resolved that educating an unbroken white child in the Indian language is quite an onerous as educating the real Indian
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