The Wood Farm

It has been a while since I have written and I apologize for that! I guess I let life get in the way of history. As always, my little posts in no way tell a complete story of our family history. I try my best to tell as much as I know and have learned over the years from stories passed down amongst the family and my own experiences.

 I recently found some lovely old pictures of the Wood family farm right before it was sold in 1930. I thought I would share those pictures and tell the story of the farm.

Wood farm, c. 1930

As I've shared before, George and Maud Wood along with their kids, Jewel and Harrel Wood, moved to Lubbock County about a mile south of the Carlisle Community in October 1913. George (Grandpa) Wood paid cash for a full section of land. The section was located between what is now west 34th and 19th streets, Milwaukee and Upland avenues. L.D. (Dad) was born the following year on January 23, 1914. Grandpa built a fine house and started clearing land immediately so he could plant his first cotton crop in the 1914 season.

Wood farmhouse, c. 1930

In 1920, during the Spanish Influenza Pandemic, everyone in the little family caught the flu. Grandpa contracted pneumonia and died within a few days. Dad was only six years old and Grandpa's death hit him particularly hard. Six months after Grandpa's death, Grandma married a con artist who was already married, unbeknownst to her. Within several months, the man's wife showed up at the Wood farm and Grandma learned her husband was a bigamist. He went to jail, the marriage was annulled and Grandma stayed single until Dad was about 12 years old. During this time Grandma and her children continued to farm cotton and were very successful. Dad described those years with happiness and contentment. He had a good childhood.

Milking barn, 1930

Grandma Wood married a man named Roy M. Wood (no direct relation to our branch of the Wood family.) Roy M. had several children and the family became what is now called a blended family. Roy M. had three children: James (Jim) Wood, Mary Wood, and Virginia Wood. Dad and Jim got along very well and stayed in touch throughout their lives. Jim moved to Oregon and settled there, marrying and having a family. Mary married a man named Lemon and they moved to Houston, never to return to West Texas. Virginia married Jake Waldrop and they lived, farmed, and raised a family in the Levelland area. Virginia loved Dad like a blood brother and would become quite defensive and offended if someone called her a stepsister. Virginia was loud and gregarious, which was the complete opposite of Dad, but he loved her like a blood sister too and they remained close all of their lives.

Grandma Wood and Roy M. (called the "old man" by Dad) became deeply involved with the Jehovah's Witnesses early in their marriage. Grandma had been a committed member of the Church of Christ all her life. Her dad was even a Church of Christ preacher. She was a charter member of Broadway Church of Christ. She raised her kids in the Church and of her four children, only Dad remained in the Church all of his life. When Grandma got so heavily involved in the Jehovah's Witnesses, Dad was shocked and felt betrayed as she turned away from what she had so firmly believed in and taught her kids all their lives. Grandma and Roy M. became so involved in the Jehovah's Witnesses that they attended conventions all over the midwest, often leaving the farm for the boys to tend for extended periods of time.

When Dad was just 16, everything came to a head. The Jehovah's Witnesses' leader (Judge Rutherford) was firmly convinced, and lead his followers to believe, that Armageddon ws just around the corner. Jehovah's Witnesses were urged to sell their properties, give up all their worldly goods and shackles, and prepare for Armageddon when the world as they knew it would end and the thousand year reign of true believers would begin with a new world order and no one would own individual property. Dad was shocked when Grandma and Roy M. took up the call and decided to sell their farm. The problem with this plan was that Grandma didn't own the farm completely. The farm had been left to her and her four children. Harrel had left the area and wasn't particularly attached to the farm so he felt no remorse in signing over his portion of it. Jewel and Ray had become Jehovah's Witnesses so they easily signed over her portion as well. Dad was the hold out on the deal. He refused to sign away his right to the farm and a great rift arose between he and his mother. He couldn't believe she had been so easily duped and would do something as foolish as selling the farm for next to nothing just because an overly zealous religious leader said that they should. Apparently the battle between Dad and his mother lasted for a little while. The ultimate betrayal to Dad occurred when Grandma had one of his Price cousins forge Dad's name on the bill of sale/quit claim. The farm was sold for practically nothing and Grandma sold or gave away all of their farming equipment, horses, everything and went to Ohio to await Armageddon.

Dad was 16 years old when the farm was sold. This event was a huge defining moment of his life. He suddenly went from being a fairly well-to-do land owner to a penniless young man on his own. He was devastated and very angry. As a testament to his already well-developed character, however, he didn't feel sorry for himself very long or allow himself to remain at loose ends. He found a sharecropper's farm for rent in the Woodrow area and started farming for himself, working to buy the equipment and animals he needed to plant and farm the very next growing season. The old Wood farm was sold in 1930 so that was his first season farming for himself.

L.D. Wood, Farmer, 1930's

In the end, for the future generations of the Wood family, the sale of the Wood family farm and Dad moving to the Woodrow area was a good thing. His farm was about a mile down the road from the Gill family and, of course, he eventually met and married Inez Gill in 1934 when he was 20 years old. Their marriage lasted 66 years until her death in January of 2001.

Periodically throughout his life, Dad would tell the story of how his mother lost her mind, betrayed him, sold away his inheritance, and, in a sense, abandoned him. It strongly affected him, but he moved on and made a life for himself. He always loved his mother, but with less intensity than before. He took care of her all of her days, especially after Roy M. passed away. Armageddon didn't come, of course, so Grandma frequently needed help and assistance.

All his life Dad would return to the "home place" as he called it to see the crops there and investigate things. Sunday afternoon drives often took us by there and Dad would tell me of what it looked like when he was growing up and what life was like then. His heart was attached to the land, even though it was no longer his. A golf course was put in on part of the land and is still there. Eventually, in the last 25 years, the land was developed and now is covered with a high end subdevelopment. The big trees that were planted in 1914 were still there the last time I drove by. I, myself, find those trees to be a touchstone and a symbol of hope. Those trees are like our family. They started as tiny saplings, grew and survived through decades and now are strong and tall, deeply rooted. Just like our family.