I’ve written a letter to Daddy Wildcat. Yes, my daddy is a Wildcat, a Paris (Texas) Wildcat, who just turned 75 on George Washington’s birthday.
Paul Washington Rains had the foresight to move to the Lakewood area with his new bride, Annelle Gray Rains, in 1951. Living in the garage apartment on the northwest corner of Llano and Skillman across from Tietze Park, he had met Woodrow graduates while boarding as a bachelor in Munger Place.
In 1952, my parents bought a little house on Trammel (Daddy still owns it), which I came home to from Baylor (Florence Nightingale) Hospital in 1958. He was then 37 – my current age.
In 1960, they bought another home on the circle street of Yosemite, located just inside the Lakewood Elementary attendance area on a little creek that was my childhood Walden.
My sister, Jana Rains Stillwagon, ’78, came home from Baylor in our 1957 Buick (Daddy still owns it).
I returned from Lakewood Methodist kindergarten one day to hear that Kennedy had been shot. Mother called Daddy, who worked in the Magnolia Building.
“I can’t believe it – I just saw him,” he said.
He taught me always to respect the presidency.
My daddy fostered my love of reading by bringing home a fresh afternoon newspaper, called the business edition of the Dallas Times Herald.
He also participated in Indian Guides with me at the East Dallas YMCA. We were Navajos. He was “Red Cloud” to my “White Cloud”. His grandmother was half Cherokee and his grandfather, a soldier for the South who was born in 1839, was a quarter Choctaw.
Driving our little 1966 Mustang (Daddy still owns it) to functions at the grand homes of Lakewood did not bother my father, despite his humble background. His family had lost their possessions in the War Between the States in Tennessee and Arkansas and had come to hunt buffalo in West Texas in the following decade.
His parents, Tom and Ida Frances Crump Rains, were both born in 1885 and became sharecroppers near Paris. He was the first in his family to earn a college degree and served in the Army Air Force at West Point during WWII.
He took us on trips to New York City during the war and later, when he was marketing representative for Mobil Oil (32 years), which was inspired my love of that city. He also took us on business trips around Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas during the summers.
When I attended Woodrow, he helped me mow many lawns to earn a new car, a gray with red (of course) Camaro. I had ordered the car the fall of my senior year, and he surprised me by picking it up early and driving it home just hours before my homecoming date with Beverly Brin, ’76.
My parents sacrificed to see that I attended SMU, where my mother took a job because of the tuition benefits.
Now, my parents are both retired, and my father, who was born in a home warmed by love – not electricity – carefully has built a secure living through investments in stock and rental properties. They have homes in Dallas, Lake Texoma, Paris and regularly visit my sister, her husband and beloved grandchildren, Matthew and Julie, during their trips all over the Western Hemisphere.
My daddy helped me in my career in real estate and continues to help me manage my rental properties. I am sometimes alarmed to catch him on rooftops or mowing yards in 100-degree weather.
As a song he loves asks: “Did you ever know that you’re my hero?”
Happy 75th Daddy!
