Parrs widow, Eva, lives there now with her second husband. Others who did took their lives in their hands. For San Diego is a kingdom of cursed. No Linda. It was George Parr who had orchestrated the stuffing of ballots in the infamous Box 13 that sent Lyndon Johnson to the Senate in 1948. From then on, his story matched those of Gaitan and Briones. Marked by history, they had only one place to feel at home. That the money came from the country treasury (and that Parr regularly helped himself to it) was of little importancefamilies could keep their land, their way of life, their identity. Pressed to turn on their own, townspeople recalled the agonies of the Parr days and found themselves paralyzed. He graduated from Shades Valley High School and earned a degree in electrical engineering from Auburn University. For a time, prosperity obscured deeper divisions. Leaving the courthouse to go back to jail, Chew shot the bird at a television cameraman. He cared a lot about it, and would tell you what was worth it, what wasnt and why. You can send your sympathy in the guestbook provided and share it with the family. He controlled the vote by giving handouts to supporters and through fraud and coercion. I just dont know what happened.. Meanwhile a new evil has been introduced into the garden. Frankie drinks a beer, studies the water, and then squints down the sidewalk. Rape is a confusing crime in most places; in San Diego, where machismo still thrives, people are particularly ambivalent. They would acquiesce to their own: When toughs took over the club at the towns only hotel, the respectable customers simply moved on. He played end on the football team. Then after sunrise on Palm Sunday, Frank Gaitan, betrayed by his buddies, betrayed them in turn. The accused were finely woven into the fabric of the town; news accounts frequently noted that nine out of ten of the suspects were related through either blood or marriage. Indictments against Parr for fraud and tax evasion totaled 656 counts by the sixties, but nothing stuck. Few, if any, were foolish enough to assume the sheriff was on their side; Parr controlled not just law enforcement but the law as well. The two had known each other for some time, but tonights was not a friendly outing. It was only when Frankie turned and saw a familiar figure limping toward him that the crowd vanishedin a hurry, it seemed. Average Age & Life Expectancy George D Parr lived 8 years longer than the average Parr family member when he died at the age of 79. No laundry hung on the line, and the curtains were knotted behind open windows and rusted screens. Faced with a weak case, the DAs office struck a deal: Chews charge was plea-bargained to possession of marijuana. Alex Bear, a small man whose face is dotted with acne scars, raped her; so did Roberto Garcia, a young man with a haunted look, and Roberto Perez, Corandos heavy-set older brother. These were men he had grown up with, gone to school with, gone drinking with, gotten into trouble with. Garzas criminal record begins with a 1983 theft indictment. Mimi Swartz is a staff writer based in Houston. He had two daughters. He was a Mexican: Archer Parr had spoken a mangled and halting Spanish; George, who took over from his. Loving grandfather of 13 grandchildren & 3 great-grandchildren. Sometime around eleven oclock, a maroon car pulled up with four men and a young woman inside. Established law was something Parr cut to fit his needs: Anglo ranchers tried to roust him by convening a grand jury in 1914 to investigate his abuse of county funds; months later a mysterious fire engulfed the courthouse, destroying records that would have been used as evidence. "[7], Most contemporary observers accept that Parr used his influence to affect the Jim Wells County vote totals in Johnson's favor. After a group of Anglos shot down three local Mexicans on election day in the dusty main street of San Diego, Archie Parr, who spoke Spanish, took the side of the Mexicans. a TIME subscriber. He went on trial in 1974 in federal court in Corpus Christi on charges of tax evasion. Garza caught her, however, threw her on the hood of a car, and began raping her again. The Dignity Memorial brand name is used to identify a network of licensed funeral, cremation and cemetery providers that include affiliates of Service Corporation International, 1929 Allen Parkway, Houston, Texas. Like all of Texas between the Nueces and the Rio Grande, it was settled slowly. I never gone to one of those rapes before, he says with a shudder, as if it were something he expected to get used to. Send a note, share a story or upload a photo. The neighbors began to crowd around Frankie and threaten him. 3148, 18 U.S.C. They were further protected by South Texas attitude toward sexual morality. Archer Parr of Alice, Jim Wells County, Texas was born on October 3, 1925. For more than 60 years Southeast Texas has been known as the Land of Parr. They divorced and remarried, and divorced again in 1949; Parr subsequently married Eva Perez. (In 1934 Archie's reelection to the Texas State senate was in doubt and he hoped that building a road to Corpus Christi across the King Ranch, which was owned by the Kleberg family, would save his political career. But the curse of San Diego is found not in the cruel mixture of poverty and passion but in its own hunger for accommodation. Archie Parr b. Dec. 25, 1860 d. Oct. 18, 1942. To preserve these articles as they originally appeared, The Times does not alter, edit or update them. He died at his house in Bloomsbury on 27 May 1732. There they plotted with Texas State senator Alvin J. Wirtz, Texas state representative Samuel Ealy Johnson, Jr., and the Bexar County machine to defeat four term Republican Congressman Harry M. Wurzbach in the upcoming election. Number of people Loyal to their friends, afraid of reprisals (it is somehow revealing that the person most vocal in his support of the Gaitans was Richard Yaegar, a semiretired soldier of fortune with little family left in town), the citizens of San Diego turned inward. Under advice from Johnson and other prominent figures, he relinquished control of his machine to his nephew Archer III, by the early 1970s. Actually, a few weeks in San Diego will turn a nagging question into an anxious aria: one comes to wonder whether Linda Gaitan will receive justice in any form. His mother misses him, and he misses his friends, who thought of him as kookya sweet guy.. The bullet wound was in the right temple. Six months later Mr. Parr and 10 codefendants were convicted by a Federal court jury in Houston of charges of using the mails to defraud the Benavides school district of more thn $220,000 in tax funds. English is spoken only intermittently in San Diego. She enjoyed it.. Theyre not bad guystheyre assholes, he tells me, using pachuco logic; to give his former friends credit for the evil they are accused of is to elevate them to a powerfulness they do not deserve. Works 1724 mezzotint of Sir John Coke, after unknown artist. The cause of death was not disclosed.". If his father had won the hearts of the townspeople because he tried to understand them, George, a burly young man whose smile glistened with mischief, captivated the people because he was one of them. It may take up to 1 hour for your comment to appear on the website. At least two men were shot to death by deputy sheriffs loyal to Mr. Parr. The truth will come out at the trial, I was told with great assurance by defense lawyers and other champions of the accused, a curious sentiment for a town that has always viewed the law with a jaundiced eye. After Archer's death, George inherited the Parr political machine, and the populace passed on the name, "El Patrn", to him as they did his father. In 1958, Parr was found guilty of mail fraud by a federal jury and given a 10-year sentence. Historical Person Search Search Search Results Results George Parr (1866 - Unknown) Try FREE for 14 days Try FREE for 14 days. Sometimes he made money by doing tattoos, like the penguins he applied to the chest of a wrestler known as the Ice Man. There will be deals, there will be payoffs, knowledgeable cynics say with certainty. I'll gut you if it's the last thing I do.") Now Garza made sexual advances; when the woman refused, they argued. Instead, the reality of the gang rape has made her small world even smaller. He graduated from Shades Valley High School and earned a degree in electrical engineering from Auburn University. George Parr passed away at age 79 years old on May 13, 2004. Given her pick of restaurants, Linda opts for Chuck E. Cheese because the kids like it. Stevenson showed up at a bank in Alice which had the precinct boxes. They were going to catch me anyway is the way he explains his confession. Afterward, Perez drove back into town, dropped off Garcia and Bear, and then proceeded to a third location, where he raped the woman again and warned her to keep quiet. For five days after the election, Stevenson believed he had won the closest senatorial election in U.S. history. It is Roel Torres, one of the men accused of raping Linda. The event wasnt a typical South Texas cockfight. He was afraid to go outside. A decade later he was hired as the foreman of a ranch near Benavides, the Sweden Land and Cattle Company. In his statement, Frankie told law-enforcement officials that Ruben Vela bragged to him and Roel that he had had sex with a woman at the Gallegos ranch. Act like you dont see him, he hisses. In truth, San Diego had been turning a blind eye to these young men for years. Linda pulls her daughter close and winces from the pain that has returned to one side of her head. In late June pretrial hearings were held for the accused. Archie made sure there were no opponents on the ballot. Small for his age, he walks with a confident swagger and has a few tattoos, crosses mostly, on his arms and legs. The boys mother had not known he had gone to the cockfight, nor did she know he had contacted the district attorney. Archie Parr retired from politics in 1934 and moved to Corpus Christi, where he lived on Saxet Drive. The few spacious Spanish colonial mansions, their windows covered with extravagant grillwork, overlook the shacks of Naked Citya poor neighborhood so named because the babies run around without clothes. Alfredo Cardenas, the editor and publisher of the weekly Duval County Picture, editorialized that regional and national news media have raped this town in a fashion not too unsimilar to the gang rape itself. The publicity had struck a nerve. Ruben Velas mother worked as secretary in the sheriffs office. Faith soothes, fate rules: The Catholic church on the town square brims with people on Sunday mornings; on a weekday a young boy, pumped by a friend on the handlebars of his bike, crosses himself as he speeds past. She is simply a sturdy, pigeon-toed girl who wears that air of stolid resignation common to poor women who, raised to expect nothing, get even less. A fourteen-year-old took part, and then, while the men held her hands and feet, he placed his hands over the womans mouth to try to stop her from crying out. Do you have some details youd like to pass on about an upcoming business or development in the Portland food scene? Its almost a must around here. Women may be idolized or scorned, but they are never equal. Deftly, Alaniz told a tale highlighting that crucial element, reasonable doubt. He had a 112-vote lead out of a million votes cast. In 1958, Parr was found guilty of mail fraud by a federal jury and given a 10-year sentence. Any follower of Duval County or Texas politics is familiar with the name of George B. Parr, the patron and political kingmaker. 4,750), seat of Duval A doctor prescribed medication for his heart. Most days she minds the children and waits for Frankie to come home from his donated job at a department store so she can eat and sometimes go to the counseling crisis center. For years after Texas won its independence from Mexico, the region remained disputed territory, and even when the issue of sovereignty was settled, the issue of which race and culture would rule was not. He wouldnt let you breathe, one citizen said. Texas Monthly Studio Produces Love & Death Companion Podcast in Partnership With HBO Max, Texas Monthly Is Nominated for Two 2023 Media Awards by the James Beard Foundation. That another round of publicity would begin on the gang rape made San Diegoans edgy; they wanted to forget while the outside world seemed to remember. The Press Herald has published an obituary of Parr. Seven cronies received prison terms. In person Linda is neither the shy saint her in-laws have fashioned for the media nor the sinner the town rumor mills have generated in response. A curtain was drawn against the outside world; few were tempted to look beyond it, and even fewer asked to be let inside. Frankie plots vengeance as quickly as he dismisses the notionhe knows all too well the odds are stacked against him. To survive, the people of San Diego learned to submitor to be cast out into a world they did not want, that did not want them. There is not a thing to do in this lonely land but drink and fornicate, a turn-of-the-century traveler wrote, and to speed across Duval County today is to believe little has changed since then. 2023 SCI SHARED RESOURCES, LLC. But he wants the accused to know he has their number. His growing political power was based on his long association with Mexican-Americans in Duval County. Once there, the boy noted the arrival of Garza and the others and saw Linda Gaitan struggling to get away. [citation needed], George's father Archie Parr founded the Dynasty of Duval County. Both Frankie and Linda had grown up in poverty. The progenitor of Texas's most notorious machine politicians, the elder George Parr, was born in 1829 in Virginia. Cocks and dogs have the run of their blocks, where ancient adobe houses graciously permit frame bungalows and trailers on adjoining lots. If your aunt was sick or your son needed money for schoolbooks, you went to Mr. Parr. They Chose Mine. Along with the drought, there had been a series of incomprehensible tragedies that sent the small town reeling. Search historical records Family Tree. In its heart, it is a Mexican town begrudgingly located in Texas. There seemed to be only one person in San Diego who was not afraid of the boysa real boy, aged twelve. The compliant coastal plain gives over to the wild and inhospitable brush country here, land that submits to nothing but the inexorable pressure of the sky. The old bills have come due for San Diego too. We are sitting in the living room of the Gaitans donated apartment, a small, dark place in front of a trailer park in Corpus Christi. One of the oldest towns in Texas, San Diego is a place shaped by violence, oppression, and domination: first, as Anglo and Hispanic settlers battled bitterly for control of the landMy grandfather killed her father, a resident told me, her way of introducing a character into her family narrativeand later, as the people of San Diego fell under the spell of Archer Parr and his son George. Only Federal agents and the Texas Rangers ever successfully questioned his authority. She couldnt think straight. the fugitive's 1969 Chrysler Imperial at the edge of a quiet pasture, The town remained one of the poorest in Texas, so controlling the vote (and in turn the jobs) remained the consuming passion as power passed from the Carrillos to the Urestis to the Garcias. Later in the summer, when the original trial date of July 11 was rescheduled for September 12, Orlando Garzas probation was finally revoked, and he was thrown in jail. He was a Mexican: Archer Parr had spoken a mangled and halting Spanish; George, who took over from his father in the thirties, spoke it flawlessly. George was machohe hunted and whored and was afraid of no one. It is a two-story white-washed Spanish colonial; clearly at one time it was very grand. The house is dark, the drapes pulled against the summer sun. He is survived by his wife Mayre; two children Jeanne Stadtlander (Christian) and Christopher Parr (Morgan); his grandchild Ethan and many friends. A deputy sheriff, responding to a call at Garzas house, recalls that he arrived to find the man brandishing an ax. She was afraid. Visitors can explore rooms devoted to medical history, famed political boss", "Cowboy from Matagorda founded political dynasty", "George Parr inherited his father's political dynasty", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=George_Berham_Parr&oldid=1147908956, Duval County Museum displays some artifacts from his life, Thelma Duckworth (m. 1923-divorce, remarried late 1930s, div. A young man in aviator glasses is walking towards us; he has the long-legged gait I recognize from television clips. Family and friends are welcome to send flowersor leave their condolences on this memorial page and share them with the family. The assistant district attorney, Rodolfo Gutierrez, however, is confident that Gaitan will receive her due. Corando Perez pushed Briones aside and entered the woman again while Garza shoved his crotch at her face. Parr was charged with embezzlement but beat the case. His lawyer advised him to take the Fifth. Uneasy, Frankie went back to his uncles house to round up his cousin and set out in search of his wife. The MexicanAmerican population represented the basis of his political power. Still, if the crime was not unique to San Diego, the towns response was firmly rooted in its very particular history. Hispanics controlled their destiny, but it was rarely a destiny of openness and reformthe lessons of the Parrs had been learned too well. Death record, obituary, funeral notice and information about the deceased person He was sentenced to one year in jail, which was subsequently knocked down to one years probation and a fine of $400. The only time she ventures out is once a day, when she lets her children play in a plastic pool right beside the front door to the apartment. She knew them better than she should have, he said. He lived in Mountain Brook, Hoover and at the Veteran's Affairs Nursing Home in Tuscaloosa at the time of his death. 3150, and Rule 46(e), Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. People here are epicures of talk, but the stories they embroider and embellish have the haunting beauty of a mournful corrido. People in San Diego did not want to endure the scrutiny and disapproval of outsiders again, specifically Anglos. Threading her way through the crowd, a baby on her hip and Frankie Junior toddling beside her, she could be any mother out with her family on a Friday night. This is a digitized version of an article from The Timess print archive, before the start of online publication in 1996. She would have liked to have become a cop, she would like to learn to read. Survivors: Wife of 49 years, Betty Evans Parr; sons, Jeffrey Parr of Dallas, Jack Parr and wife, Lisa, and their children, Nathan, Reid and Sheridan of Frisco, and Jonathan Parr and wife, Kamela, and their children, Hunt and Hayden of Amelia Island, Fla.; as well as his beloved dog . The people learned what he wanted them to learn; when the American Legion campaigned to raise the countrys literacy rate, Parr abolished Duvals veterans training program. When he does see someone he knows (Orlando Garzas brother was a recent shopper), Frankie runs to another part of the store, which gets him in trouble with his boss, who doesnt understand his behavior. Scheduled for deportation, Chew was out on bail at the time of his arrest for the rape of Linda Gaitan. Sign up for service and obituary updates. Seeing one of those guys can ruin your damn day, he says. The childrenround-faced, their heads a mass of silky curlsrest placidly in diapers on a pile of blankets in front of a donated color television tuned to a childrens cartoon show. The state investigated Archie Parr in 1914 over misuse of county funds. It did not matter so much that the hotel soon closed as a resultno one cared about visitors anyway. San Diego is a place she tries to obliterate from her memory. However, political candidates would from time to time make Parr an object of their reforming campaigns. Any land held by the old Mexican families was too much for the restless Anglos who coveted it. But there was a darker side to Parrs power that increased as his grip tightened on the town. The upstairs bedroom where George and Eva slept looks almost as it did when he was alive. George Rembert Parr, Jr. Moncks Corner - George Rembert Parr, Jr., 63, of Moncks Corner, South Carolina, husband of Kathleen Barrett Parr, died Friday, December 22, 2017. Nonetheless, the family and its network remains influential so that the county has remained one of the strongest and most consistently Democratic localities in Texas, frequently giving both national and local candidates victories greater than 70 percent. There are people on the sidewalk, kids on skateboards, two bearded, heavyset men lolling against a Cadillac parked behind us. He enjoyed traveling to Europe and ocean cruising. Taylor Prewitt is the newsletter editor for Texas Monthly. Georges burial was at the Alabama National Cemetery on December 23, 2022. In February, 1957, Mr. Parr was adjudged bankrupt by a Federal judge in Corpus Christi. If it was more wrenching for the town to choose between the woman and the accused, people slowly found the wherewithal to make the decision. Though women whispered their disgust, few men would admit that gang rape is the result of a world that lets boys be boys to a grotesque extreme. 1949) Texas Rangers, deputy sheriffs and United States marshals in a helicopter found the body of the man, whose political power helped send Lyndon B. Johnson to the United States Senate in 1948. Having pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of misdemeanor assault, he was sentenced to one year in jail and ordered to make restitution to his victim in the sum of $150. They were married by a justice of the peace on Halloween 1985. Two of the women who had been at the Perez house appeared; growing more agitated, Frankie warned them that if anything had happened to Linda and they knew it, they would live to regret it. Finally, according to the officials account of the rape, Perez dumped her near the railroad tracks around four in the morning. The death of George B. Parr wrote the final chapter in the story of the Parr political dynasty, which established a record of fraud, bribery, corruption and self-dealing unmatched in the long history of South Texas politics. Lots of them wore tattoos Frankie had given them. Finally he began forcing her to have oral sex. Discover your family history in millions of family trees and more than a billion birth,marriage, death, census, and miltary records. When Parr's machine collapsed soon after his death, Duval County's small Anglo white (but large-landowning) minority attempted to retain control of the county politically but was unable to halt the take-over of the county Democratic party by the now overwhelmingly large Mexican-American population. His mother came in, checked the window, and took him into her room to sleep, promising him that they were safe. Although detractors of the mildmannered political boss often accused him of violence, his supporters contended that he was generous with gifts to the sick and needy and had helped the uneducated and poor MexicanAmericans of his area. Perhaps the hostile glare of the outside world had finally forced San Diego to see its own in a new light. Frankie grabbed hold of his tie and warned him not to make that joke again. George Christopher Parr , age 85 of Hoover, Alabama passed away on December 20, 2022. Habitues of a local drive-in run by two brothers who opposed Parr were often arrested for drunkenness by Parrs deputy sheriffs. Gaitan could face up to seventeen trials, though no one in San Diego believes such a thing will come to pass. When the time came to choose between the world of men and an insignificant woman, the choice was easy. The gang rape was the final, most primitive extension of that bond; to refuse to participate made one less of a man, and also less of a brother. An unusually large heroin problem developed, and townspeople joke that anyone with a flashy new car must be selling dope. San Diegoans didnt consider George Parr an American, an Anglo, or even a Texan. Although investigations into Mr. Parr's activities usually fizzled out, he did serve nine months in a Federal reformato43, for income tax evasion in 1936. The cockfight was really just an excuse for a bunch of guys from the tough side of town to get together and party. As news accounts of the crime increased in number and intensity, hate mail poured into San Diego, like the letter addressed to Whomever might possibly care in the Police Department of San Diego, Texas. A group of Banditos threatened to come to town and eliminate the rapists forever. They made it into a crisis.. He didnt mind that, after he announced he would go on to another party with his cousin Roel Soliz, Linda said she wanted to go home to check on Frank Junior, sixteen months old, and Sara, who was just four months old. This time he ordered her to tell him what had happened. Because winter was coming and most people at the time heated their homes with coal, President . Finally, because she was scratching him, Garza told Briones to hold her down. The town had taught the men that they would not be held accountable; there was no reason for them to fear harsh judgment for anything they did. CANDLE HAS BEEN LIT CANDLES HAVE BEEN LIT, We are reviewing your submission. Their courtship, Frankie says, shaking his head, grinning, and dragging on a cigarette, wasnt all champagne and wine. He met Linda after a basketball game, when he bet a friend his last cigarette that he could get her to tell him where she lived. The people would not speak out against one another, and in refusing to choose sides, they chose one: Linda Gaitan had no family in Sand Diego, her husband had some but little compared with the defendants. The shame of San Diegoans felt at their decades of submission would be forgotten.
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