Dr. Grady Early, Distinguished Professor Emeritus, taught math and computer science at Texas State University for 29 years, serving briefly as interim chair of the newly-formed Computer Science department. After retirement, Early began researching his family history and gained some familiarity with various research tools: ancestry, familysearch, newspapers, San Marcos Record archives, findagrave and many more. This made it easy for him to segue into the histories of non-family members, which is how he began to write a story about Southwest Texas Normal in San Marcos, also known as San Marcos Normal, which is now Texas State University. This series will highlight the first staff at Southwest Texas Normal.
“John Edward Pritchett was very apt in declining Latin nouns; a friend to Julius Cæsar and Marcus Tullius Cicero; can give any information on political questions up to date,” According to the 1907 Pedagogue.
Pritchett was born in 1852 in Warren County, Missouri, soon followed by his twin brother Henry Carr. Their parents were William Ira Pritchett and Martha Ann Hubbard; the family lived in Hickory Grove township, a short distance west of St. Louis. William Ira’s brother Carr Waller Pritchett and his family lived in Richmond, Missouri, a short distance east of Kansas City. In between was Glasgow, Missouri, where Carr Waller, in 1866, became the first president of Pritchett School Institute, soon to be renamed Pritchett College.
In due time, both John Edward and Henry Carr received B.A. and M.A. degrees from their uncle’s college. John Edward did two years of graduate work at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland, majoring in foreign language. After leaving Johns Hopkins he taught Greek and Latin at Pritchett College for two years.
Pritchett College offered preparatory, collegiate and post graduate courses, and there were fifty graduates in the first ten years, with twenty- four receiving the B.A. degree and two the M.A. degree. Those two M.A. degrees went to John Edward and Henry Carr.
By 1882, Pritchett was in Texas, where, in Gonzales County, he and Roberta Lee Belvin were married. Roberta’s father was Rev. Robert Hixon Belvin who played a critical role in the Coronal Institute in San Marcos.
From 1883 to 1885, Pritchett was the 4th president of Coronal. He took time out, 18861900, to practice law in San Marcos, then returned to Coronal as its 7th president from 1901-1903.
Meanwhile, joined in life as in birth, John Edward’s twin Henry Carr was also an educator. He taught at Sam Houston Normal 1881-1900, spent two years as Superintendent of Public Instruction, then returned, in 1901, as president of Sam Houston Normal where he served until his death in 1908.
In 1903, Pritchett became Headmaster of the Department of Foreign Languages at SWTN; his specialty was Latin.
Complementing those duties, Pritchett became president of the Coronal Institute Board of Curators. And, in 1917, taught Latin, civics, and bookkeeping in SWTN’s summer normal.
Pritchett taught at SWTN until his death in 1919.
He was a lover of the Greek and Latin classics, a short, chubby scholar whose fierce-looking mustache failed to hide the humor in his eyes.
John Edward and Henry Carr share a grave marker in the old part of San Marcos City Cemetery. It is a sight worth seeing, a genealogist’s dream.
Information about each of the first faculty members’ graves can be found at this link findagrave. com/virtual-cemetery/ 1934255?page=1# sr-127222943.
