Sugar Land Weddings

Here is a picture of my parents on their wedding day, April 14th, 1949.  They were married at my mother's parents' home at the Humble Camp south of Sugar Land.  You can see the similarities to the Blair-Phillips wedding photo I posted last week.  

By the way, Cherryl Hughes Fikes pointed out that Bertha Blair and Nick Phillips were married on January 20th, 1951.  She and her sister attended the wedding.

 

Frank J. "Tex" Schlueter

Anyone with a sharp eye will have noticed that a man named Schlueter took numerous photos of early Sugar Land.  I've found some information on him.  His name was Frank J. "Tex" Schlueter. He grew up in Flatonia. Here's an early photo of him with one of his cameras. (He used a panoramic camera, too.)

Here's a later photo of him with his car.  I'm sure he put a lot of miles on it.  (I believe the label says he's on Texas Avenue in Houston.  I'm pretty sure that's the Rice Hotel in the background.  It's the tallest building.)

Here's a photo of his studio in Houston.  Unfortunately, I haven't determine the address, yet.

(Update) I've found annotated photos that suggest Schlueter's studio was located at 3617 Main Street in Houston.  This may, or may not be that address.

I looked through a selection of photographs available online (the Houston Area Digital Archive at the Houston Public Library) and found this series of dated photos. He took them all on the same day, November 21, 1935.  Check the annotations. He probably took many more photos at other locations that day, but they weren't included in the online selection.

Here are two photos annotated "Sugar Land Oil Field."  I'm certain they show the Humble Camp field on the east bank of the Brazos River below Sugar Land.

He took the next photo on the same day on the other side of the River. 

I know there was a ferry in that area that was discontinued sometime in the '30s.  I presume it was still in operation.  If not, he drove up to Richmond and crossed there, then drove down Thompsons Highway to get to the Thompson field on the west bank of the River.  This photo is annotated as Rabbs Ridge. I'm not sure exactly where the well would have been, but Schlueter was definitely covering both sides of the River that day.
 

Humble Camp Update

My aunt, Mayme Rachuig Hause, sent me a couple more items about the Humble Camp. The first is a layout of the camp as she remembers it. The second is her short memoir of growing up out there. I enjoyed reading it.

You'll see that I was incorrect last week, when I said there were no stores out at the Camp. My aunt mentions the Erlichs, who ran the small store until 1940. Wayburn Hall (SLHS '43) told me his family moved out to the camp & ran it from 1940 to '42. Sugarland Industries operated the store rather than Humble Oil Company. Here's what Mr. Hall said:

"Chuck, my Family lived at the Humble Camp from about 1940 to 1942 in a house owned by Sugarland Industries. It was the first house on the left upon entering the Humble Camp. One of the pictures in your blog has a small building with a front porch in the front. I believe this was next to the house we lived in. Sugar Land Industries did operate some kind of a store there. The store had long been closed before we moved there. I knew all the people in the Humble Camp in the early 1940s."

I know the Industries allowed some Humble people to occupy houses in Sugar Land. My grandparents lived for a few months in the last small, brick house on Brooks Street when they first moved to Sugar Land in 1932. As soon as their house at the Camp was built, they moved out there.

Notice that Gulf Oil Company had an office at the camp. The field required co-operation between various companies, so Humble wasn't the only company working that field.

Link to diagram of Humble Camp

Link to memoir of life in the Humble Camp

Sugar Land's Humble Camp

The Humble Camp was a small community run by the Humble Oil Company. It had production & pipeline units. I always thought the production unit was very small because there weren't many wells on the Sugar Land side of the Brazos River, but based on photos I've found, I could be wrong.

The pipeline connected with sizable fields on Thompson's side of the Brazos & transported the collected oil northeastward toward the Baytown refinery complex.

Virtually all large, vertically-integrated oil companies in Texas had camps dotting their pipelines & oil fields. They were small company towns in many cases. The Sugar Land camp didn't have commercial enterprises (I believe I'm right about that), so it wasn't exactly a company town like Sugar Land, but it was a tight-knit community sustained & managed by Humble Oil Company.

My maternal grandfather, H. A. Rachuig, was head of the pipeline section of the camp, so my mother & her sister grew up out there. I've had a little difficulty in pinpointing its exact location in what is now First Colony. Oil Field Road ran from Highway 6 to the Camp in the old days. Now it's just a short street in First Colony. My best guess is that the camp sat somewhere near Manor Road. My brother has found the exact spot & taken pictures of it, which I've included in the photo album below.

(Update) My aunt, Mayme Rachuig Hause, took the modern pictures that appear in the online album. Bruce sent me this map which shows the location of the Camp in present-day First Colony.



Some of the pictures are low-resolution & a little blurry, but they'll give you an idea of life out at the Humble Camp. You'll see family snapshots of the Camp, plus photos I've found of the Sugar Land Oil Field taken in the late 1920s.

Unfortunately, the Web site where I found these photos is no longer in operation, so I can't give a lot of detail about what they show. I recall reading that Sugarland Industries leased its River bottom land for exploration, but little came of it. Maybe I can find out more with further research.

(Update) My brother Bruce found this reference in The Handbook of Texas. It offers some interesting history on the Sugar Land Oil Field. After reading it I'm uncertain if the photos show Cockburn's exploratory drilling in 1927 or Humble's producing field. It's possible/probable they show both. The photo of the River bank could be an early photo of Cockburn's exploration. He doesn't appear in my notes, but a man named Nelson does. He either worked for Cockburn during exploratory drilling or Humble as they put the field in production. (I hope I can find the Web site where I found these photos.)

Link to entry in The Handbook of Texas

The album ends with a few pictures Bruce took of the remnants of the Camp in present-day First Colony.

Link to photo album of Humble Camp