A Collection of Memories: A History of Armstrong County, 1876-1965 Page: 44
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Armstrong County
Mrs. John Scott's Music Class
The John ScottsTaken from Volume I, Armstrong County
History compiled 1937-1940.
By Herbert M. Timmons
Black leg serum and musical culture. The
two seem far removed, but the panhandle of
today should thank Mr. and Mrs. John Scott
for both these things.
From a baronial castle in Ireland to a
dugout home on McClelland Creek; from a
peasant boy to the owner of 2,560 acres of
land and many cattle.
Back in Ireland, John, the peasant boy,
and the baron's daughter, were sweethearts
from childhood, but a stern father decreed
that the union could never be unless Jack
John amassed a fortune or distinguished
himself in some worthy manner. Nan was
sent to the Musical Conservatory of London
with instructions to forget all that foolish-
ness. John Scott found work in the Texas
Panhandle.
When the Texas Panhandle was opened to
settlers in 1886, John saw his opportunity.
He filed on four sections of land on Mc-
Clelland Creek, and secured some cows.
The young man then wrote Nan's father
that he was the owner of 2,560 acres of
land and many cattle. This removed all
parental objection to the union.
Things were not so rosy as they seemed,
however, John wrote his sweetheart, just
graduated, and planning to visit an uncle in
New York, and told her of the wild region
where the lobo howled, the coyote prowled,
and the panther screamed by night; where
the Indians lately returned to their reserva-
tion still looked with longing eyes on theirlamented hunting ground. It was no place
for his girl. He told her to wait until he
could provide a suitable home for her, but
Nan had other ideas. The next letter John
Scott received told him his sweetheart was
even then on the high seas, and that she was
certainly coming to Texas.
The Fort Worth and Denver Railroad was
then building through the Panhandle. On the
first through train came the Irish lass eager
for a sight of her laddie, but John was not
there.
Nature seemed unkind that day. The salt
fork of the Red River was out of its banks
between Clarendon and McClelland Creek.
Oldtimers tell that a short, heavy-set, young
Irishman tramped out several acres of grass
on the north side of the river that day,
they even aver that the spot is still bare,
while a strange girl waited in the Atterbury
Hotel in Clarendon.
At last the Salt Fork subsided. The wed-
ding ceremony was performed by Rev.
Graham, a Methodist minister,
By slow freight the bride's beloved piano
came to Clarendon to be hauled to a new
room dug into the hillside home on Mc-
Clelland Creek.
It was not long until the Scott home was
the social center over a wide radius, cowboy
and nester families coming to hear the mus-
ic.
Both Mr. and Mrs. Scott were deeply relig-
ious. Sunday services were held in the com-
munity, and each Sunday afternoon the scat-
tered pioneers assembled for Sunday school,
with everyone singing from one hymnbook.
The Christian Herald came weekly to the
Scott home, and at that time each issue
contained a sermon by Dewitt Talmage. Af-
ter Sunday school, prayers from the Epis-
copal prayer book were read, then Mrs.
Scott stood in the center of her dugout home
and in her rich voice read the sermon. The
Sunday service was always dismissedby all
repeating the Lord's Prayer in concert.
It was not long until Mrs. Scott had a
music class; girls rode for miles across
the country for lessons. Several accom-
plished musicians of Amarillo recall these
horseback rides and lessons in the dugout.
After a good many years on McClelland
Creek, and when the daughter, Nellie, was
old enough to go to school, Mr. and Mrs.
Scott moved to Goodnight. Here Mrs. Scott
soon found her place as a teacher and Mr.
Scott was in great demand as an entertain-
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Armstrong County Historical Society. A Collection of Memories: A History of Armstrong County, 1876-1965, book, 1965; Hereford, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth91040/m1/52/: accessed April 23, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .