The childrenround-faced, their heads a mass of silky curlsrest placidly in diapers on a pile of blankets in front of a donated color television tuned to a childrens cartoon show. At last San Diego could have the world it wanted, a world of its own making, in its own imagethat so-often-dreamed-of paradise in the desert. When his mother went to answer, no one was there. On July 29, 1949, a crusading radio commentator in Alice, Bill Mason, a critic of Parr, was shot to death by a deputy sheriff, a friend of Parrs. The appeal was turned down last week by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit at New Orleans. Frankie had known Robert GarciaHim too?ever since they had been altar boys together. Implicated in the assassination of the son of a Parr enemy, Alaniz was acquitted in the fifties. He pictures Torres assaulting his wife and fights the urge to ram the car of the he once considered a friend. Never did it occur to the people here that they had exchanged one form of tyranny for another. She couldnt think straight. Hispanics lined up behind one man whose loyalty had never wavered: Archer Parr. TEXAS: Death of a Duke - TIME Also that year, George's father appointed him to complete the term of George's brother, Givens Parr, as Duval county judge. They didnt want to hear their assessments of illegal cockfights; they didnt want to hear their analyses of the Mexican character. One man was charged with murdering his wife and son, the son of a leading citizen had committed suicide. Unlike her husband, Linda has the curiosity of someone who has not given herself to only one place. After telling me that he had no intention of trying the case in the newspapers or of smearing Linda Gaitans reputation, Alaniz offered a preview of coming attractions, as he had done for several other reporters and countless coffee drinkers in town. As news accounts of the crime increased in number and intensity, hate mail poured into San Diego, like the letter addressed to Whomever might possibly care in the Police Department of San Diego, Texas. A group of Banditos threatened to come to town and eliminate the rapists forever. Send a note, share a story or upload a photo. You can send your sympathy in the guestbook provided and share it with the family. In truth, San Diego had been turning a blind eye to these young men for years. The people would not speak out against one another, and in refusing to choose sides, they chose one: Linda Gaitan had no family in Sand Diego, her husband had some but little compared with the defendants. Sign up for service and obituary updates. He said no note had been found. The truth will come out at the trial, I was told with great assurance by defense lawyers and other champions of the accused, a curious sentiment for a town that has always viewed the law with a jaundiced eye. He challenged the results, arguing that all votes in Precinct 13 should be discarded. Do Not Sell or Share My Personal Information. As the nine oclock hearing approached, the men took their places at the courthouse. Search historical records Family Tree. The motion to revoke probation in 1984 included information that in November 1983 Garza had tried to run over a woman with a car. SAN DIEGO, Tex., April 1George B. Parr, political boss of Duval County, Tex., and a former millionaire oilman, banker and deputy sheriff who was facing a prison term for income tax evasion, was found dead today in a pasture of his South Texas ranch with a bullet wound in his head. For a time, prosperity obscured deeper divisions. George Berham Parr (1901-1975) - Find a Grave Memorial Men like Alex Bear and Ruben Vela had served probationary terms for petty theft. Frankie, his chest and arms covered with his own tattoos, has a face that is deeply lined for his age, a combination of sun, cigarettes, and hardship. Archie Parr retired from politics in 1934 and moved to Corpus Christi, where he lived on Saxet Drive. George was machohe hunted and whored and was afraid of no one. In 1954 Governor Allen Shivers declared war on the Parr Faction and sent down a team of Texas Rangers and state investigators. Linda turns and looks at Frankie hard, an unmistakable challenge in her eyes. Jake Floyd, an Alice attorney, was a leader of anti-Parr forces in Jim Wells County. George Berham Parr - TEXAS HISTORY NOTEBOOK One day in 1883 Parr got off the train at Benavides and asked if anyone from the Sweden Ranch was at the station to meet him. The liberator has become the oppressor; Parr sealed San Diego off from the world. She was afraid. When Parr's machine collapsed soon after his death, Duval County's small Anglo white (but large-landowning) minority attempted to retain control of the county politically but was unable to halt the take-over of the county Democratic party by the now overwhelmingly large Mexican-American population. His mother misses him, and he misses his friends, who thought of him as kookya sweet guy.. The grave site of George Parr / Plot 82101181. He enjoyed traveling to Europe and ocean cruising. Parr, who had sided with the Mexicans against the Anglos in an earlier attempt to move the county seat to a neighboring town, came forward again on behalf of the oppressed. No one believes the fourteen-year-old will ever be prosecuted. Though women whispered their disgust, few men would admit that gang rape is the result of a world that lets boys be boys to a grotesque extreme. Death record, obituary, funeral notice and information about the deceased person Gaitan could face up to seventeen trials, though no one in San Diego believes such a thing will come to pass. A young man in aviator glasses is walking towards us; he has the long-legged gait I recognize from television clips. [citation needed], The alliance between the Parr-controlled commission and the Hispanic populace made the county a bastion of Democratic strength. Established law was something Parr cut to fit his needs: Anglo ranchers tried to roust him by convening a grand jury in 1914 to investigate his abuse of county funds; months later a mysterious fire engulfed the courthouse, destroying records that would have been used as evidence. Early life [ edit] In 1914, when Parr was elected to the state Senate, he took his 13-year-old son, George Berham Parr, with him Austin to serve as his page. For more information, please visit TIME's Privacy Policy. She would have liked to have become a cop, she would like to learn to read. Average Age & Life Expectancy To this day, the family's network has limited influence in Texas politics giving its patronage to both Democratic beneficiaries. He controlled all jobs. County moneys, school district moneys, water district moneys, were transferred to private accounts as Parr and allies were paid with public funds for uncertain purposes. This was the approach taken by defense lawyer Nago Alaniz, an ancient attorney who had been a lawyer for George Parr. Marked by history, they had only one place to feel at home. Archer Parr was married to Syleta M. (Baker) Parr on October 15, 1976 in Kleberg County, Texas and they separated on May 14, 1980 in Jim wells County. In a slow, insidious shift, the couple became outsiders in the place they had called home. If you are accessing TIME.com on a public computer, you are advised not to click on the "Remember me" option. He graduated from Shades Valley High School and earned a degree in electrical engineering from Auburn University. It was George Parr who had orchestrated the stuffing of ballots in the infamous Box 13 that sent Lyndon Johnson to the Senate in 1948. Other defendants had close ties to local government and law enforcement. County in the heart of the south Texas triangle, a team of sheriffs, With the end of the Johnson administration in 1968, Parr lost his primary political protector. Frankie and Roel went home. He listed assets of $532,106 and liabilities of $1,925,093, including $654,697 in Federal, state and county taxes, some of which he was disputing. He walked up to her and asked for a light; Linda reached into her pocket and produced a handful of lighters for him to choose from. Frankie grabbed hold of his tie and warned him not to make that joke again. Being from San Diego, he can accommodate his own homesickness and his nager at what happened to his wife; he is pulled back by a powerful psychic tidefor a few days each month, for Memorial Day, for Fathers Day, to have the baby baptized. By the 1880s Duval Countys population had soared to around five thousand; San Diego was a sheep-ranching boomtown, a rough-and-tumble stop on the railway between Corpus Christi and Laredo. Parr garnered popular support with his charisma, his fluency in Spanish, and Robin Hood tendencies with sharing the Duval County and Benavides Independent School District coffers. GEORGE PARR OBITUARY. After Archer's death, George inherited the Parr political machine, and the populace passed on the name, "El Patrn", to him as they did his father. Him too? was all Frankie could say, as he sobbed along with his wife. But what looked like another victory for the Anglos was actually the beginning of the end. Arvada Obituaries | Local Obits for Arvada, CO - Legacy.com [1] Mezzotint of Francis Charteris, around 1730-1732. Slumped over the steering wheel, a bullet in his brain, was George B. Parr, 74, the "Duke of Duval," an affable, unimposing man who for decades reigned as one of America's most autarchic political bosses, the man who reputedly put Lyndon. Finally he began forcing her to have oral sex. It is fitting that a violent crime would be the definitive event that catapulted a shrewd ranch manager named Archer Parr to power. Frankie would hitch a ride to her ranch every weekend, or he would mail her pictures he had drawn on handkerchiefsof the Virgin, of two horses rearing, of an eagle flying. He reported in Minnesota and then went on to be a journalist for the New York Times and the San Francisco Examiner.He also worked at two Texas newspapers, the San Antonio Light and the Alice Echo, before taking a post at KBKI Radio.. This memorial website was created in memory of George Parr, 73, born on September 14, 1892 and passed away on June 0, 1966. There are people on the sidewalk, kids on skateboards, two bearded, heavyset men lolling against a Cadillac parked behind us. He appeared alone at the DAs office a few days after the gang rape and told his story. Outsiders donated a Corpus apartment to the couple when it was reported that they were being threatened by the accused. By then the town had wearied of the gang rape. I never gone to one of those rapes before, he says with a shudder, as if it were something he expected to get used to. No laundry hung on the line, and the curtains were knotted behind open windows and rusted screens. Historical Person Search Search Search Results Results George Parr (1866 - Unknown) Try FREE for 14 days Try FREE for 14 days. Habitues of a local drive-in run by two brothers who opposed Parr were often arrested for drunkenness by Parrs deputy sheriffs. Reconciled to close quarters, San Diegoans present sunny faces to one another. Alex Bear, a small man whose face is dotted with acne scars, raped her; so did Roberto Garcia, a young man with a haunted look, and Roberto Perez, Corandos heavy-set older brother. TSHA | Parr, George Berham [1901-1975] - Handbook of Texas He went on trial in 1974 in federal court in Corpus Christi on charges of tax evasion. Family and friends must say goodbye to their beloved George C. Parr of Vestavia, Alabama, who passed away at the age of 85, on December 20, 2022. I'll get you. George Christopher Parr September 15, 1937 - December 20, 2022 George Christopher Parr, age 85 of Hoover, Alabama passed away on December 20, 2022. In 1958, Parr was found guilty of mail fraud by a federal jury and given a 10-year sentence. Only two rapes have been reported in San Diego in the last two years, which might indicate the crimes rarity or, more likely, the rarity with which it is reported. (Johnson's college student son, Lyndon, also attended.) Roberto Perez, who dumped Linda Gaitan by the railroad tracks, had been indicted in 1980 on a charge of aggravated assault for shooting a man with a .22 rifle. It may take up to 1 hour for your comment to appear on the website. [11], Another likely motivation to oppose Stevenson was that in 1944, Parr and Judge Raymond of Webb County had asked Stevenson, then the Governor, to appoint E. James Kazen (a Raymond relative) Laredo district attorney. SAN DIEGO, Tex., April 1George B. Parr, political boss of Duval County, Tex., and a former millionaire oilman, banker and deputy sheriff who was facing a prison term for income tax evasion,. When Box 13 was opened in court, the tally sheet Stevenson had seen was missing. [1][8], The Parr Machine functioned on bribery, graft, and illegal donations. After a group of Anglos shot down three local Mexicans on election day in the dusty main street of San Diego, Archie Parr, who spoke Spanish, took the side of the Mexicans. When their heretofore political ally Robert Kleberg, Richard's brother, refused, George replied in anger. [12] He was found dead at his ranch on April 1, 1975, after apparently committing suicide. Floyd rushed home, where he found his son shot to death in the driveway. George Berham Parr (March 1, 1901 April 1, 1975) was an American politician, who controlled a Democratic political machine that dominated Duval County, Texas and, to a lesser extent, Jim Wells County. Parr, 71, the revered fishmonger who supplied seafood to some of the Portland areas most prestigious restaurants, died of pancreatic cancer on Sunday in Naples, Florida, while visiting his brother-in-law with his wife, Kathleen. Later that morning, tearful and disoriented, Linda stood before an elderly justice of the peace and named her attackers so that warrants for their arrest could be issued. She was sixteen, he was twenty. If you are already a subscriber sign up registration is free! John Parr 1839-1901 - Ancestry Any land held by the old Mexican families was too much for the restless Anglos who coveted it. There was only one law in San Diego, and it was brutally, elegantly simple: To stay on the insideto surviveone did as Parr ordered. In this town of five thousand, everyone belongs. A fourteen-year-old took part, and then, while the men held her hands and feet, he placed his hands over the womans mouth to try to stop her from crying out. Still, after a century, the Anglo had been driven out and with him the days when little boys were told not to bring taquitos to school or were rapped on the knuckles for speaking Spanish in class. Ten more years would pass before his rule was ended; he was finally convicted of tax evasion in 1974. George Christopher Parr , age 85 of Hoover, Alabama passed away on December 20, 2022. Friend turned against friend, brother against brother; one learned to go along or face expulsion. Your California Privacy Rights/Privacy Policy. He failed to report a $25,000 bribe from a road-building contractor. If rape was misunderstood, so too was the difference between it and gang rape. George Parr Obituary - Tribute Archive He died in 1942. Beneath the surface runs the age-old assumption that men are weak-willed and women corrupt. Occasionally the digitization process introduces transcription errors or other problems; we are continuing to work to improve these archived versions. Visitors can explore rooms devoted to medical history, famed political boss", "Cowboy from Matagorda founded political dynasty", "George Parr inherited his father's political dynasty", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=George_Berham_Parr&oldid=1147908956, Duval County Museum displays some artifacts from his life, Thelma Duckworth (m. 1923-divorce, remarried late 1930s, div. (In 1934 Archie's reelection to the Texas State senate was in doubt and he hoped that building a road to Corpus Christi across the King Ranch, which was owned by the Kleberg family, would save his political career. Wurzbach apparently lost the 1928 election, but was eventually seated in the House because of election fraud.[8]. George Parr Obituary (2004) - Legacy Remembers That the money came from the country treasury (and that Parr regularly helped himself to it) was of little importancefamilies could keep their land, their way of life, their identity. Comfort the family with flowers or a sympathy gift. Although she hasnt eaten all day, she spends thirty minutes letting her children play on the mechanized toysshe smiles when Frank Junior grins in a car that shudders down an imaginary highway, and she giggles and pats his belly when he leans out of a rocket that twists four feet off the ground. It did not matter that city-hall windows in San Diego had to be boarded up and white-washed because, one woman explained, we have a man who doesnt like glass. In San Diego it is better to sit in the dark than to punish the man with the rock in his hand. Few, if any, were foolish enough to assume the sheriff was on their side; Parr controlled not just law enforcement but the law as well. He was a Mexican: Archer Parr had spoken a mangled and halting Spanish; George, who took over from his father in the thirties, spoke it flawlessly. John Spong writes primarily about popular culture. Number of people There will be deals, there will be payoffs, knowledgeable cynics say with certainty. That marked the beginning of a long relationship between Parr and Duval County. Corando Perez occupied himself on an east-side landing, clicking his heels and snapping his chin when a woman passed who struck his fancy. Frankie found work intermittently on construction crews; they supplemented their income by selling homemade tamales or scavenging aluminum cans. His father was Archer "Archie" Parr, a prominent local political boss.
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