Leana's mother, Abbie Frances, was the daughter of Melissa Roe and Pleasant Roe. Melissa Roe was the older sister of Roseanna Roe Brian, the mother of Francis N. Brian, thus making them second cousins. Leana's great uncle, Samuel Roe, Jr. older brother of both Melissa and Roseanna, visited his niece, Abbie Frances, in the New Hope Community and asked to take her teenaged daughter, Leana, back to Louisiana with him for a visit to her many relatives there. While there with her great Uncle Sam Roe, she visited in the home of her great aunt, Roseana Roe and Rev. B. F. Brian, and met their son, Francis Nathaniel. It was love at first sight for them and even though they were second cousins, they soon became engaged. He came to Texas to marry her on September 13, 1893 at the home of her parents, Thomas Jefferson Tull, Sr. and Abbie Frances Roe Tull, in the New Hope Community by the Rev. Joe James, a Baptist Minister. He took her back to Louisiana to make their first home.
Papa and Mama Brian
Francis Nathaniel Brian and Cynthia Leana Tull made their first home with his parents at Pollock where Francis Nathaniel was in the logging business with his father and in which he was successful. He was in the logging contracting business for many years that necessitated his moving to the areas of uncut timber. There is a spot in Grant Parish named for him --"Brian's Spur" where a railroad spur was extended east from the "Iron Mountain" (now the Missouri-Pacific) to his operations. This area is still known as "Brian's Spur" located just a short distance northeast of Pollock, Louisiana, which was at one time called Oction, and which about this time was the largest saw milling area in the world.
Their first two children were born while living with his parents, in 1894 and 1895, and then they moved to Friendship where their third child was born in 1899. Afterwards they moved to Salem and there the two oldest started to school. Then they moved to the Spur which was still in walking distance of the Salem School, and it was while living here that Francis was involved in a logging accident which broke his nose - it was here, too, that his brother, Harvey, worked for him and lived nearby. From here they moved to Verda where their fourth and fifth children were born in 1904 and 1908. At Verda, they built a large, new home and across the street he and his brother, Hardy, built a home for and moved their mother and youngest sister, Emeline, who was still single, from Pollock to Verda to live close to them.
In 1908, they moved from Verda to Harlingen, Texas, in response to the flowing tales of the fabulous Rio Grande Valley of Texas where he tried his hand at farming, only to live through a terrific Hurricane that all but wiped them out. So, in 1910, they moved up to Edgewood in Van Zandt County for a year, but the Rio Grande Valley was still attractive, and so in 1911 they moved back and found a temporary home in Mission until they could get a more permanent home at McAllen where they lived a year. In 1912, the family moved to Pharr, Texas, only six miles from McAllen and bought a farm, which is now in the center of town, and it was their home when their sixth and last child was born. The Valley was growing and many northern prospectors were brought in to buy the land and develop it, but all the while there was much trouble along the Texas-Old Mexico border with the Mexicans. The trouble became so intense that the decision was made to leave and so in 1915 the family moved to Lubbock, Texas in the northwest Panhandle. For three years the family farmed here, first at the "Pounds Place", the second at the "Hightower Place" and then on a farm about 1 1/2 miles from town where their oldest daughter was married and from where their oldest son went into World War I.
In January of 1918, the family moved to East Texas and settled at Hughes Springs in Cass County, Texas. While waiting for possession of the farm that they had bought, they lived in town, first at the "McMillan Place" and then at the "Lizzie Wilson" place. For seven years they lived on this farm where the family worked so hard but where the three younger children spent the major portion of their happy, carefree childhood.
In December of 1924, Mama Brian went to stay with Zenobia, the oldest girl, who was desperately ill in the hospital in San Angelo, Texas, after the birth of her baby girl. The illness stretched into weeks, then months, and finally years with Mama Brian staying close by. In August of 1925, Zenobia was brought to Dallas on a stretcher and placed in the hospital there. As her continued critical illness kept Mama Brian close by, the decision was made to sell the farm in East Texas and move the family to Dallas. The move to Dallas came in October, 1925, and Papa Brian found employment for his fine horses and his truck at gravel pits in the big city. From this meager beginning, he accumulated a fleet of twelve large trucks which he contracted to large scale builders, to furnish the sand and gravel for numerous Dallas buildings, bridges and viaducts spanning the Trinity River in the growing city.
At the time of the move to Dallas, a home for the family was rented at 503 Texas Street, just as near the Samuel Clinic where Zenobia was confined as was possible. In the Spring of 1926 they were able to rent an apartment at 2619 Florence, only one door from the hospital and she was brought home, but taken back daily in a wheelchair for treatment of the Osteomyelitis in her hip which had left her crippled. She made progress and was able to be on crutches when the family moved out into the suburbs of East Dallas to 1506 Fairview Street in 1927. However, in 1928 they moved to 603 Cameron Street to be near the Woodrow Wilson High School from which their youngest child graduated in June of 1929. In 1931, they moved back to 1506 Fairview Street and bought the home that was to be their home for nearly 30 years, the one they loved until death took them.
Linda B. Shull
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All contents copyright ? 1996, Linda B. Shull. All rights reserved.
Created May, 1996
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