This neighbor knows our city’s history — she has lived it
Hanging on the front door of Rose-Mary Rumbley’s house on Vanderbilt is a sign declaring: “On this site in 1897, nothing happened.”
While this may be true for the site where the house now stands, the woman who lives inside has a life that’s anything but mundane.
Rumbley, 73, is far from retirement. A fourth-generation Dallasite, she shares her knowledge and stories about the city through books, lectures, speeches and tours. Though the insight passed down from her parents, grandparents and great-grandparents gives her plenty of material to work with, she is always in discovery mode.
“I find all sorts of new material that I didn’t know existed in Dallas. And I thought I knew it all,” Rumbley says.
Her latest book, “Strolling Through the Park,” came after the Dallas Park and Recreation Department’s Paul Dyer requested a book to commemorate the park board’s centennial. In her collection of stories about people and parks over the last 100 years, Rumbley doesn’t share any personal anecdotes. But she’s particularly attached to one story.
It’s the story of the first woman who served on the park board in 1929. The woman, Sampson Smith, was never referred to by her first name.
“In 1929, you used your husband’s name when you married. She was always referred to as Mrs. Smith in all the records,” Rumbley says, adding that it shows how much progress women have made during the 20th century.
But writing books is not Rumbley’s main activity. She considers herself more a public speaker than a writer.
“I taught speech, and a speech teacher always speaks,” Rumbley laughs. “I have three [speeches] today, and if I have time, I write a book.”
Her involvement in public forums allows Rumbley to be part of living history in the city where she was born and raised. Today she lives with her husband, Jack, in the house her father built in 1927. She grew up in the house and remembers how small Dallas was in the 1930s.
“Dallas ended at Mockingbird before World War II. There was nothing west of Inwood,” she says.
Life was simple in those days. Rumbley spent her childhood years walking, riding bicycles and going to the park, the library and the Arcadia theater on weekends. But the rapid change and growth of her native city has not provoked any drastic emotions for Rumbley.
“Change is always difficult, but it has to be,” she says.
Day-by-day living is the philosophy she has chosen for herself, and one she suggests to anyone. She sums up her approach with a quote from Mollie Bailey, the first woman to bring the circus to Texas in the 1800s: “If you’re not enthusiastic about living — drop dead!”
