Under the Mulberry Trees
By Hal Haralson
[Hal Haralson practices law in Austin, Texas, and is a regular contributor to Christian Ethics Today.]
He pushed back the canvas flaps that served as a door to the dugout. Dawn was beginning to break and he heard coyotes on the prairie telling each other it was time to go home.
The land they had homesteaded, 160 acres near Hobbs, New Mexico was covered with brush and it was soon to be theirs. The law required them to be on the land for 6 months out of the year for 5 years.
Oscar and Bertha Barber had made the 3-week trip from Colorado City, Texas to Monument, New Mexico 2 times each year.
It was 1900. This land, after nearly 5 years, was almost theirs. Oscar left his wife and 6 small children in the dugout and knelt to pray near the mulberry trees they had planted on their first trip.
He was a cowboy turned preacher. He left his family for over a month at a time and rode horseback out to the ranches of New Mexico and preached the Gospel.
He had been a cowboy on the Swan Ranch in Mitchell County, Texas. Colorado City was the County Seat. C.P Conaway was a wealthy rancher near Westbrook. He had 7 daughters. Oscar Barber fell in love with Bertha, one of the older daughters, and Mr. Conaway approved of this match.
Oscar was tall and dark with chiseled features that came from his mother Rachel, a full-blooded Indian.
He had become ill shortly after his marriage to Bertha Conaway and he lay in bed near death for nearly a year. During this time, he prayed and promised God that he would be a preacher if God would let him live.
When he recovered, he took Bertha and moved to Abilene where he entered Simmons College to study for the ministry. The studying was rather boring for this cowboy turned preacher, however, and when he heard there was land to be homesteaded in New Mexico, he took Bertha and the children by covered wagon to the prairie west of Monument, New Mexico where he claimed 160 acres, a quarter of a section of land, that is still in the family 100 years later.
They dug a well and lived in the dugout. They planted 3 small mulberry trees that had been protected during the trip by covered wagon. Today, these trees rise 50 feet above the prairie, as sentinels giving testimony to the dedication and sacrifice, the courage and commitment of this young couple 100 years ago.
Four of their 7 children were born there without the benefit of a doctor. Six months out of the year they went back to Colorado City, a 3-week trip, where the older children and their parents worked in the fields to make money for the groceries that would be needed when they returned to the homestead in New Mexico. Bertha cared for the children all by herself when Oscar went on his preaching missions out on the prairie.
On one of these long, hard trips, Oscar took pneumonia and died. He left Bertha with 6 children under 12 years of age and pregnant with the seventh. There were 5 boys and 2 girls.
One of the older boys, Dell, told of hearing his mother praying under the mulberry trees asking God to help her to be able to keep her children together and educate them. Some of the older children had to drop out of school and work in the fields to help with expenses, but the family stayed together.
After the homestead was perfected, Bertha took her family to Abilene, Texas, where she lived near the Hardin-Simmons University campus for nearly 50 years until her death in 1955. She succeeded in providing an education for her children. Four of the 5 sons became lawyers and the daughters were both teachers with master`s degrees.
She was grandmother Barber to me, a large woman with her hair in a bun. She wore large, black shoes and she nearly always wore an apron. There was a limp in her walk and she customarily carried a cane in one hand and the Bible in the other. She always kept chickens and a milk cow. I can remember receiving gifts from her in the mail. I especially remember the colorful shirts she made for my brother and me from the sacks that held the feed for her chickens. My mother was her daughter, Adah. My mother`s sister, Myrtle, was the mother of Browning, Weston, Broadman, and Connie Ware.
Dell Barber was one of Bertha`s boys who quit school in the second grade to help provide for his younger brothers and sisters. At age 22, however, he went back to school in Winters, Texas, where he lived with his sister, my aunt Myrtle Barber, who was teaching school.
Something of a scandal was created when Dell eloped with his Spanish teacher. By the time he was 30, Dell had a law degree from the University of Texas and returned to Colorado City, where he practiced law for over 50 years.
My uncle Dell and his wife Laura were divorced after 10 years of marriage and 2 children. He married Mary and they had 3 sons. This marriage lasted 35 years. When he was 65, a 15-year-old Hispanic girl was brought from Mexico to "live in and keep house. After about a year, the maid became pregnant. The baby was adopted by Dell and Mary and the maid stayed on helping to care for the baby. (Sounds like an Old Testament Bible story)
The next year, Dell and Mary divorced and she took the child and moved to Big Spring. Sixty-seven year-old Dell then married 17-year-old Neka and they proceeded to have 2 more children with the youngest being born when Dell was 73 years of age.
The town gave him a birthday party when he was 75 years old. I wouldn`t have missed it for the world. The cake was in the boardroom at the bank and nearly everyone in town was there. Everyone that is except Dell Barber. One of his sons grabbed me and we got in the pickup to look for him. We found him on one of his ranches. He was by himself in the hot sun castrating bull calves. He said he thought there would be so many people there at the birthday party that no one would miss him.
He had his own 18-wheeler cattle truck and would drive to his ranch in Colorado with a load of cattle, turn around, and drive back to court the next day and try a law suit.
When he was 80 years old, a friend sent me a copy of the Colorado City Record. It had banner headlines stating Dell Barber Thrown in Tail. There was a 3-column picture of Dell coming out of the Mitchell County jail. He had on his boots and Levis and his trademark cowboy hat. His white beard hung majestically from his face giving him a “Gabby Hays~~ look.
The article told about a big trial that was hotly contested. In final argument, the other lawyer called Dell Barber a liar. Now this is an area of West Texas where a man`s honesty is not taken lightly. Dell came out of his chair like a wild bull, hit the other lawyer with a powerful blow to the mouth, and knocked
the offending barrister clear under the judge`s bench. The judge held Dell in contempt and put him in jail.
At age 84, he went to sleep one night after being in court all day. He did not wake up. His funeral was held in the First Baptist Church of Colorado City by a Negro preacher, and my cousin and his nephew, Browning Ware. The church was filled with Whites, Blacks, and Hispanics. The Black minister told us that, 30 years before, Dell Barber had taken on the whole town when he succeeded in getting the local Kiwanis Club to admit it`s first Black member.
i went to Uncle Dell many times through the years to tell him of a young Black student who was college material but could not go without some money. His only question was, "How much do you need?" Then he wrote out a check. My instructions were that I was not to tell anyone where the money came from. You are the first to know.
He was buried in a pine box-his instructions-with his old hat and boots on top of the coffin. The funeral wreath was made of tumbleweeds, cat claws, and flowers from the prairie. He was an authentic West Texas Character if there ever was one.
Dell Barber was the last of Bertha and Oscar`s children to die. My mother and the others had been long gone. Bertha and Oscar Barber`s grandchildren number over 21, with an almost equal number in the ministry and practicing law. The commitment of these two hardy pioneers has affected my life and the lives of many like me. Those prayers under the mulberry trees have been answered.
