Memories of Ennis

Few Ennis residents are left who remember Katie Daffan, once a famous literary figure in Texas during the early 1900s who lived her final years in Ennis. “Miss Katie,” as she was affectionately known, was born in Brenham but grew up in Ennis. She later moved to Austin and Houston where she spent the bulk of her most successful years. Daffan was not only an author and journalist — she was the first woman to head a state agency in Texas, being superintendent of the Confederate Woman’s Home.

As indicated in the above item, Ennis and surrounding communities haven’t always had the market cornered on the state flower. It looks like our Navarro County neighbors in Corsicana started a Bluebonnet Trails tourismaimed affair 14 years before Ennis began its annual event.

Ennis in its formative years wasn’t exactly squeaky clean but it managed to seem sweet. Along with saloons and “gambling dens,” there was rumored to be a string of houses of ill repute near the city on a rural road in the Bristol area known as Sugar Ridge. This area is wellknown to wildflower lovers during bluebonnet season.

The following nugget of interest, which I mentioned in an earlier column, is relatedto bluebonnets. It has to do with the hamburger stand that Ellis County-born Rose Stivers operated for years in Dallas. I wrote about her a while ago and, if you remember, the name of her café was “The Bluebonnet Sandwich Shop.”