Go West Jacob Routh

Jacob Routh was born in Dandridge, Jefferson County, Tennessee on December 22, 1818. Dandridge, the home of Douglas Lake, is billed as the second oldest city in the state. The Routh's descended from the Huguenots who had become Quakers by religious persuasion. 

After the death of his father in 1841, Jacob and his brother Joseph operated the farm and grist mill, raising horses and hogs to pay off the bills that their father left. In the off seasons the brothers took turns selling Currier & Ives prints, picture frames, shoes, and feathers. In 1845, Jacob built a house for his mother on the Dumplin Creek Farm. It was sold in 1851. 

Jacob heard the "Go West Young Man" call and headed to Texas October 2, 1851.  The entourage included his mother, sister Elizabeth, brother Joseph, nine year old slave Thomas. They were accompanied by Robert Fleming Campbell's family, wife Mary Ann, infant son, and six children from a previous marriage, plus an elderly slave named Aggy and another slave of whom I don't have a name.  Squire Campbell, a planter, lost all of his crops in 1850 due to a flood and felt that Texas would be a better place to live.  Both families headed west together. They arrived at their destination 45 days later. 

Jacob bought a thousand acres of land on Spring Creek paying $2.00 an acre, and built a house near present day Renner Road and Central in Richardson. While Robert built a house near where Campbell Road and Central Expressway intersect. Routh Road in Dallas is also named after Jacob. 

Love made an entrance to the scene on the long route to Texas. Jacob fell in love with Robert's daughter Lodemia Ann Campbell and they were married in 1853, and in the same year Jacob decided to become a Baptist minister.  Routh founded a church in the one-room log cabin he built for a school-house on his farm. 

Jacob and Lodemia produced nine children from their marriage. His daughter Clara said this about her father in a letter, " Father was a man of great hospitality and home was seldom without guests, sometimes friends, but often people who were passing though the country and wanted a place to stay. He took delight in experimenting with fruits, flowers, and vegetables, not minding work, or expense. He was very affectionate and devoted to his family. Father was a great believer in education and progress in all things."

Jacob Routh passed away April 30, 1879 of Tuberculosis at the age of 61.  A Pioneer who helped to make this world a better place to live in. 

Sources: 

The Jacob Routh Papers, Uniiversity of Texas at Austin

Historic Richardson by Gwyn Gillespie

Findagrave.com

Procrastination has a deadline

What is on your bucket list?  We call a list of things that we want to do before we pass away a "bucket list" or before we "kick the bucket." As you age time goes by faster than you realize and before you know it your lifespan is nearly to the end. Most people scramble to get it all in before they are no longer able to able to get around like they did in their younger years.  I want to encourage you to move quickly and not look back.  You are not going in that direction.