Conservancy officials, members, and others came from San Antonio, Fort Worth, Sherman, Dallas, Richardson, Bonham, Bedford, Balch Springs, Rowlett, Lindale, Greenville, Coppell, Commerce, Irving, Leonard, and Celeste.
Jim Kushlan of East Texas State University's Biological Science Department, brought ten of his ecology class members.
The walk through the shoulder high grasses was led by Madge Lindsay, prairie ecologist, of the San Antonio office. An expert in this field, she reviewed the science of prairie land formation, the native grasses, and their developments.
The Indian grass, now in dried seed stage resembles an ear of corn, as she pointed out early corn development. Breakfast cereals also come from grasses.
The meadow fires, intentional and accidental, as disastrous as they seem, leave nitrogen in the soil.
Preceding the walk, the thirty-seven people present, gathered on the porch of the "Fisher House," part of the 284 acres of the Conservancy ownership. Tom Price of Sherman told of the J. M. Clymer's colorful life in part old from "The History of Leonard" (1980). He was from Pennsylvania, settling in this area "before the Civil War, after early life as a wagon trainmaster to California, during the Gold Rush days. He bought 3,000 acres of native prairie, selling to homesteaders and retaining large acres for his families." Those families, in part, like the late Miss Louise and Miss Grace Clymer kept their heritage. "Louie" Jackson Jeter of Celeste grew up on the farm just east of the Clymer home place. The Clymer house was built by their father, J. M. Clymer with lumber hauled from Jefferson, Texas. "Louie" was named for Miss Louie. She passed two early pictures of the Miss Clymers for the group to view.
The two ladies were supporting members of the Lane Methodist Church long after their move to Leonard.
June Floyd and workers are making headway with the Arthritis Drive for funds.
The Texas Foundation report shows that over one-half million dollars were spent in 1986 for research, local and public funding, patient and community funding.
Local women campaigning are Geneva Lowe, Genelle Gibson, Gladys Lewis, Marie Little, Johnnie Stapleton, Glenda Burnett, Comer Barnard, and Gloria Patton. Jack Ruff as consistently supported the drive as a worker.
I'll tell you!!! The Celeste Blue Devils and the Dallas Replacement Cowboys have won the friends and influenced people in their "drive for winning" football games. Celeste School District people are rooting for a repetition of that great year 1983 and '84, when we rode charter buses to towns we hardly knew from the map to play, towns we'd never heard of--imagine, High Island on the Gulf Coast and Bremond--somewhere out there--and "we" almost made it. "Blue" is the name of the coach and the motif color again this year. Let's go, BLUE.
Dallas sports writers are having a field day writing up the Replacement crew's two winning games. They leave off dull stats and tell in flowering language of the team's enthusiasm. Keep fingers crossed for the Redskins next Sunday.
See you next week,
LLL
(Picture of the Fisher House with caption: A view of the "Fisher House" on Clymer Meadows, showing native grasses still left on the preserve, owned by the Texas Nature Conservancy. Photo courtesy of Floyd Jeter).
(Picture of Miss Louie Clymer and Miss Grace Clymer with caption: Miss Louie Clymer and Miss Grace Clymer, daughters of J. M. Clymer and Lucy Johnson Sewell Clymer, were in their early years native residents of the Lane community. J. M. Clymer settled five miles south of the present town of Leonard before the Civil War. The daughters continued living in the Clymer house until their move to Leonard possibly around 1928. The parents' graves are in the Lane Cemetery (large stones). These two daughters are buried in the Leonard Cemetery).
