Historic Walker County

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Above: Andrew Smither, Lee Carter,
and James "Bo" Roundtree, carpenters
at work on the Jesse Baker farm
in 1930s.
COURTESY OF THE SAMUEL WALKER HOUSTON
MUSEUM AND CULTURAL CENTER.
Below: An advertisement for
Café Raven.
COURTESY OF THE WALKER COUNTY
HISTORICAL COMMISSION.
became the sixth president of Sam Houston
State Teacher’s College (SHSTC), facilitated a
private form of job growth when he built “a
modern filling station” for the Gulf Company.
Others chipped in as well. In June 1930, Abe
Dabaghi, Fred Morris, and Stuart Nemir, Sr.,
launched their own bid against the Depression
when they opened the Café Raven on the
Huntsville Square. This well-appointed
restaurant took its name from Sam Houston’s
Cherokee title, “The Raven,” and soon became a
regional favorite. The same could be said for
Tom C. Oliphint’s Motor Company, which
expanded during the period. But, these types of
limited aid hardly made an impact on the
unemployment situation, and the county’s
economic outlook remained bleak throughout
the 1930s. Local African American workers like
George Oliphant recalled years of hard labor
during the period, explaining that his job laying
water lines and reading water meters for the
City of Huntsville paid a mere $2 a day. 73
Despite the hardships, some local businesses
like Boettcher’s Lumber Mill grew and prospered
during the Depression. Established in 1929 by
Edward Boettcher, the mill, located one mile
from Huntsville’s town square, employed 135
men, many of whom were newly-arrived
Mexican migrants. Andrew Martinez, whose
maternal grandfather was “instrumental in
helping build the saw mill,” remembered it as a
large, complex operation. By 1930 the mill
produced an average daily cut of forty thousand
feet of lumber and required several trucks for
transporting the product. Boettcher also built
forty tenant houses and a commissary for his
workers. Some critics of the operation have
argued that Boettcher exploited his workers,
paying them in script and requiring that they
3 4 ✦ H I S T O R I C W A L K E R C O U N T Y