The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 55, July 1951 - April, 1952 Page: 302
562 p. : ill. (some col.), ports., maps (some col.) ; 23 cm.View a full description of this periodical.
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Southwestern Historical Quarterly
called the Cibolo Church. Doubtless had he known that the First
Presbyterian Church of San Antonio was in process of organization,
he would have proceeded twenty-five miles further to that place.
The First Presbyterian Church of San Antonio, Texas, was organized
on October 19, 1851, with an enrollment of six members.
William Robert Wiseman bought five hundred acres of land for
one thousand dollars cash and went to work farming and raising
livestock. Later he acquired fifteen hundred acres more. A fellow
churchman in writing of him in the St. Louis Presbyterian said that
"by energy, industry and perseverance, he was successful in all his
undertakings." This was an overstatement, but he did succeed in
saving nearly all the money he made, which he put to work at 18
per cent interest. A private banker for years, he had one son, four
grandsons, and two great-grandsons to become bankers. Around the
log cabin were many buildings including the rock kitchen, the slave
quarters, the barns, the cotton gin, the Rector Chapel Church, and
the homes of his two younger sons. The fine water well from which
the old man and his family drank is now used by his great-grandson,
Herron Wiseman, banker and cattleman, to water cattle and to water
the last two oaks which remain of the once great grove of beautiful
oak trees. "Live Oak Grove," the old man called his home, and thus
he headed his letters in the years before the town grew up near by.
The old man's oldest son, James Oliver Wiseman, fought with
Hood's Brigade in the Civil War. He died in 1872, leaving one son,
W. M. Wiseman, who was educated at Seguin and at Austin College
in Sherman and became a banker, farmer, and ginner of La Vernia.
The second son of the early settler, Hugh "IV" William Wiseman,
had ten children, was a successful farmer at La Vernia, and with
one of his sons, W. R. Wiseman, a graduate of the law department
of the Cumberland University at Lebanon, Tennessee, opened a
private bank at Floresville in September, 1900oo. Another son, L. B.
Wiseman, also a lawyer, was the junior partner of former Governor
John Ireland in Seguin before establishing the law firm of Wiseman
Brothers in Floresville. A third son, R. A. Wiseman, a 9go1 graduate
of the University of Texas, was cashier of his father's bank and a
vice-president and director for twenty-five years after it became
nationalized.
He also helped to organize and served as secretary-treasurer of the
Floresville National Farm Loan Association for thirty-two years, being
succeeded by his son, Hugh "V" William Wiseman, who now holds
that position.
The pioneer's third son, John Erskine Wiseman, born on Decem-
ber 31, 1851, soon after the family came to Texas, was the richest in
friends of all the Wiseman clan. A kindly man, of a jovial disposition,
he always looked upon the bright side of life. He made friends with302
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 55, July 1951 - April, 1952, periodical, 1952; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101139/m1/350/: accessed April 23, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.