Edgar Houston Wade, Jr. was born on June 15, 1915, to Edgar Houston Wade, Sr. and Annie Myrtle Lewis at 12:00 midnight in Mabank, Kaufman County, Texas during the second year of World War I. Woodrow Wilson was President and the U.S. was still neutral in the War; population in the country was a just a little over 100 million prior
Houston and Sister Ruth
Click Photo to Enlargeto the Spanish Flu outbreak in 1918. Houston was the middle child of three siblings. Aunt Ruth was born in 1909 in Purcell, Oklahoma and Uncle Horace, the youngest, was born in 1920 in Mabank. Houston's parents moved to Dallas, Texas a little after 1920, and raised their family in South Dallas on Marburg Street. His dad was a hospital engineer at the Dallas Medical & Surgical Hospital on Ross Avenue, and his mother was a homemaker.
Houston met Tommie Lou Blackstone when he was 17 and she was 15 years old at a Church of Christ youth party on a Frida
y the 13th in Dallas. One of his friends wanted him to meet the "cute little blonde." Houston and Tommie Lou both graduated from Forest Avenue High School, and Houston went on to graduate from Peacock Military Academy. They married on December 2, 1937, one year after the Texas Centennial, at Tommie Lou's home on Colonial Avenue in Dallas. Tommie Lou's friend Mary E. Hambright was the pianist; the music was "Liebestraum."
(Click Photos to Enlarge)Before beginning their family, Houston and Tommie Lou had many enjoyable times with their best friends, Frances and Bob Monroe, who lived next door in a small neighborhood in Southeast Dallas, and later both couples would tell stories to their children about the wonderful times they had together. Houston and Tommie Lou raised their three children, Tommy, Jeanine, and Carolyn in this small community where aunts and uncles lived nearby, attended the same church, and visited frequently. Church attendance was twice on Sunday and every Wednesday night at the nearby Pleasant Mound Church of Christ that began meeting in the Monroe's home in 1950 Friendships were close in this small congregation that grew to no more than 80 members, and several courtships and marriages later occurred that bound these families together in relationships that would last for a lifetime. Entertainment for the family included watermelon or hamburgers on Saturday night, church fellowships, family get-togethers, miniature golf, ping-pong, picnics at White Rock Lake, and nights at the Drive-In Theatre.
Houston was employed in the earlier years with Bruton and Brown Automotive Parts and Fuller Uniform Company. He later retired after 15 years in the Dallas County Clerks Office as the Court Commissioner's Clerk. Tommie Lou was a homemaker for many years until she worked as an Assistant Librarian at a local junior high school. They were proud of their jobs during a time when longevity was valued, loyalties were strong, and the sense of community was rewarding. Tommie Lou and Houston made many close friends with their co-workers, with their neighbors, and with those who attended their church.
In their later years, Houston and Tommie Lou enjoyed the friends they had made over the years, as well as the families of their three children. On December 2, 1987, their children celebrated -- along with friends and relatives -- their 50th Wedding Anniversary in the fellowship hall of the church.
Houston died at age 79 on September 15, 1994 in Dallas, and Tommie Lou went on to live 15 more years, dying at age 91 on March 4, 2009 at Christian Care Center in Mesquite, Texas. They are buried next to each other at Grove Hill Cemetery in Southeast Dallas. Their children are proud of the lives their parents lived and of the lessons of honesty, integrity, and kindness that were passed on to them.
CONTACT: cwjeter@sbcglobal.net
