History: Merritt Mountain, Sabine Parish Source: Corain Newspaper, Vidor, Tex., Jan 4, 1973 Submitted by: Leatha A. Betts ********************************************************** ********************************************** Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.org/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.org/la/lafiles.htm ********************************************** ************ Dated 4 Jan. 1973, (I think it is Corian, the first letter is chopped off. Could be Corain Newspaper in Vidor, Texas) "Early Days of Parents Recalled By Vidor (Texas) Resident Editor's Note: The following story of Eddmon C. Merritt and his wife, Alice, was related by their daughter, Mrs. Gatsie Ann (Merritt/Pilcher) Tatom of Lakeview Road, Vidor (Texas). Mrs. Tatom, a Vidor resident for 11 years, the youngest of 11 children raised by her parents after settling near Hemphill, Texas. (Photograph of Edmond Columbus Merritt and Alice Ann Howard Merritt on their 50th wedding anniversary, 9 Mar 1926) Her father and mother's picture was made in the late nineteen twenties standing among their beehives of possibly 500 in numbert that covered what they call the Mountain overlooking the Sabine River. Little did they think in those days that standing at the same spot today they would be gazing across a portion of the 1250 mile shoreline of the largest man-made lake in the Eastern half of the U.S.A.-Toledo Bend Lake. Neither would they believe the huge 3 miles long concrete mass stretching out before them is the Pendelton Bridge. After all, their many trips across the river had been on a ferryboat or just finding a shallow place and fording. According to Mrs. Tatom, her father was born in Georgia (actually Mississippi), and her mother in Florida as a daughter of a doctor. As many others of that day, they migrated west to find greener pastures or 'that "Honey Island". They first settled near Hemphill, Texas and started rearing a family of 11 children. In about 1906 Eddmon Merritt thought "Honey Island" was on the Louisiana side of Sabine River and he came over and purchased farm land in the river bottom that extended to the base of the "Mountain" . He then sold his gravel hill farm in Texas and moved to his new farm with his wife and 11 children. They moved in what was known as the Old Carter House, near the Bank of Sabine River and used water from a spring. Here tragedy struck--two of their teenage boys took sick and died. They were told it was due to their spring water. Then, the baby daughter related, they bult a house at the base of the mountain and dug a well--the print of which can be seen until this day. "I never knew my daddy to work for hire a day in his life. He worked for himself on the farm growing cotton, sugar cane for syrup, hogs, cattle and a major enterprise was his bee farms," says Mrs. Tatom. She recalled how when the bees would swarm, they would ring cow bells or beat plow sweeps to make the bees settle until Mr. Merritt would come in from the field and capture the colony in a section of hollow Cypress trees called bee gums as can be seen in the picture. The daughter recalls how they would go out and get tub fulls of honey by robbing the bees. Then they would carefully cut and place it in syrup cans and sell it "For Good Money-50 cents a gallon". "Dad was an excellent trapper also." She recalled Mr. Whittney, old jailer in Many, use to come down each year and buy the fur. "Mamma was a hard worker also" says Mrs. Tatum. She recalls helping her milk up to a dozen cows and churned the butter in an old stone churn that is still one of Mrs. Tatom's keepsakes. What was happening on Merrit Mountain during her childhood? Well, Mrs. Tatom recalls that when the weather would turn dry and the crops would badly need rain, the local church would hold a service upon the mountain and pray for rain. She also added that when it was raining too much and the fields were being flooded, they would go back to the mountain to pray for the rains to stop. Did Mrs. Tatom remember the small cemetery on the mountain? Yes, she said she remembered going to a funeral up there when a seven year old girl was buried. All the women wore black dresses and the young girls all wore white. She said her father offered her 20 acres of land when she grew up. She wanted the mountain, but her father told her that he was sorry but he did not own the mountain. His farm stopped at it's base. Lumber compnaines owned the mountain, but in 1970 the Ammons family and others bought the mountain and dedicated it to a Church Park, now being built up the mountain meandering among huge moss draped trees overlooking Toledo Lake in all directions as it is on the end of a Peninsula sticking out the geographic center of the great reservoir. Groups of concrete picnic tables and benches are clustered under tall shady hickory trees where church services are held by the Toldeo Lake Ministry on occasions. On the tip top of the mountain, land was leased to the Louisiana Forestry Commission for a forest observation tower where the public can climb and get a panoramic view of Lake Toledo. They can look South for 25 miles to the vicinity of the dam or look north for 35 miles to within 10 miles of Logansport. Merritt Mountian is the most familiar land amrk on Toldeo Lake for fishermen to find themselves or aircraft pilots to find Ammons Airport just across a bay. Also there has been a beautiful swimming beach, floating pier, dressing and rest rooms and picnic area built at the south side of Merritt Mountain that was once Grandpa Merritt's farm. Youth groups from all over the state and some from out of state come to enjoy themselves where the pioneer Merritt family lived. Although Eddmon and Alice and 8 of their children have passed on, a grandson Preston Pilcher, still owns a strip of land at the base of Merritt Mountain and operates a popular marina on Toledo Lake known as Pilcher Point. Further plans for the mountain named for the Merrritt Family includes the building of an unusual chapel on its top that will be a replica of a Mississippi River Steam boat perched high, over looking the old steamboat docking place on Sabine River--only a stone's throw away.. Also, an amphitheater on the north side of the mountain is planned and possbly a land mark station similar to Christ of the Ozarks to greet people as they travel over the historic Pendleton Bridge. Eddmon and Alice Merritt carried for themselves out of the wilderness the name Merritt that will be heard reverberating for generations to come around the area as "Merritt Mountain". *********** Gatsie Merritt Pilcher/Tatom died 5 Aug. 1990 in Beaumont, Jefferson Co. Texas, and is buried next to her 3rd husband William Tatom, in Del Rose Cemetery, Vidor, Orange Co. Texas. Her first husband was Floyd Pilcher. of Sabine Parish, buried in Pendleton Assembly of God Cemetery.