The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 61, July 1957 - April, 1958 Page: 51

EdwardM. house aNid the 7overors
RUPERT N. RICHARDSON
s counselor and confidant of President Woodrow Wilson,
Edward M. House became one of the widely known men
of his generation. Not so widely known, outside of Texas,
is the fact that he helped to elect and aided and counseled several
Texas governors. To what extent this experience prepared him
for his career of later years is a matter for conjecture; but Texans
will contend that, while the stage at Washington and in Europe
was larger, the plot was no more snarled nor the actors any
tougher than those at Austin.
Colonel House, as he came to be known, was well acquainted
with at least seven Texas governors, every one from L. S. Ross
to O. B. Colquitt, both inclusive. He helped to elect and was
associated somewhat intimately with four of them: James S.
Hogg,' Charles A. Culberson, Joseph D. Sayers, and S. W. T.
Lanham. In this paper Governor Hogg is not dealt with, because
the records available are not adequate for a satisfactory account
of House's relationship with him. Culberson, Sayers, and Lanham
recognized House as the leader of their successful campaigns for
governor,2 and felt deeply grateful toward him. His political
iFor an account of the Hogg-House relationship, see Charles Seymour (ed.),
The Intimate Papers of Colonel House (4 vols.; Boston, 1926-1928), I, 27ff. The
brief sketch by Seymour is apparently based chiefly on the recollections of House
and T. W. Gregory.
The E. M. House Papers are in the Sterling Memorial Library, Yale University.
Microfilm copies of that part of the papers bearing on Texas affairs from about
1888 to about 1911, designated "Texas Correspondence (Early)," were made in
1937 by the late Charles W. Ramsdell, of the University of Texas, and are in the
University of Texas Microfilm Collection, Eugene C. Barker Texas History Center.
They are arranged alphabetically in six rolls of film. The writer is indebted to
Miss Winnie Allen, Archivist, and the University of Texas Library for the use of
the films.
The writer is also indebted to Sterling Memorial Library, Yale University, for
permission to quote from these films.
A good sketch of the life of James S. Hogg may be found in Robert C. Cotner
(ed.), The Speeches and State Papers of James S. Hogg (Austin, 1951) .
2House was Culberson's campaign manager in 1894. Letter presses containing
some 18oo items pertaining to that campaign are in the Culberson Papers ("Pri-