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Eloise Lane
Pampa High School Class of 1932
Eloise Lane was born on April 29, 1915 on her grandfather’s farm five and one half miles northeast of Pampa. Her parents were Thomas Vyr Lane and Mary (Woodward) Lane. Her paternal grandparents were Thomas Herbert Lane and Emma (Case) Lane, whose family was the first to live at the railroad station that became Pampa. Her maternal grandfather, Charles P. Woodward, came to live in Pampa soon after his wife died in 1916 at Hico, Hamilton County, Texas. Her maternal grandmother, Eliza Jane (Lampton) Woodward, was a schoolteacher in Boone County, Kentucky before her marriage.
Both of Eloise’s grandparents were active in civic and church affairs. Charles P. Woodward was City Secretary from 1920 to 1923 and was the clerk of First Baptists Church for several years. From 1917 to 1928 C. P. Woodward and T. V. Lane owned Woodward-Lane Grocery Store at 109 N. Cuyler. The T. V. Lane home was at 320 N. Somerville. Eloise had two sisters, Leah (Mrs. A. D. Eastham), who died in 1999, and Edith (Mrs. Floyd Guinn).
In 1922 Eloise started to school in the tan brick building at 126 W. Francis and began to take piano lessons. During her years in high school she accompanied the girls’ glee club and played for physical education classes and other activities. She was first assistant editor for the Little Harvester staff in 1932 and was a member of the National Honor Society. She graduated from Pampa High School as valedictorian in 1932.
With the aid of two scholarships she began college work at Mary Hardin-Baylor College, Belton, Texas, but had to stay in Pampa for three years before some friends helped her resume college work. She received the Bachelor of Music degree from Mary Hardin-Baylor in May 1939. In August 1951 she received a Master of Arts degree from Colorado State College of Education at Greeley, Colorado. She has attended a three-week course at Westminster Choir College in Princeton, New Jersey, and numerous workshops in choral music. Eloise taught school music classes at McLean for three years, at Spring Creek (five miles east of Borger) for two years and 36 years in Pampa at Pampa Junior High, Sam Houston Elementary and Baker Elementary. She was pianist for nine years and organist for 27 years at the First Baptist Church. Also she gave piano and organ lessons and played for many weddings, funerals and other events.
Two years after she retired from teaching, she became involved in researching and recording area history. She was co-editor of GRAY COUNTY HERITAGE in 1985 and assisted with the video, GRAY COUNTY ADVENTURE in 1994. As a docent at the White Deer Land Museum, she has written a monthly series of “Museum Momentos” since 1989 and a number of pamphlets at the museum. She has written several historical articles for FOCUS magazine and assisted in preparing the M. K. BROWN LEGACY book. In 1992 Eloise received the Award of Merit in Historic Preservation from the Texas Historical Commission and an honorarium as “Historian of Pampa and Gray County, Texas”.
Eloise is a member of Pampa Retired Teachers Association, Gray County Historical Commission, El Progresso Club, Pampa Book Club, and the First Baptist Church. She is grateful for the education she received in the Pampa Schools and hopes that the Harvesters of the future will carry on the rich heritage of the Harvesters of the past.