Perry Heights People

The Perry Estate

The first photographed meeting of the Perry Heights neighbors

This photo was taken in the dining room of the neighborhood founder and resident, Gordon Perry Estate with what is believed to be the neighbors at the time. The second photo is colorized to show details of the subjects and the room.

The Perrys sold the big home and briefly lived in the house at 4327 Rawlins before moving to San Angelo. The estate has since been demolished in the 1960’s and now is the site of townhouse condominiums.

Thank you to Gordon Perry III for the family photos.

4327 Rawlins during the Perry’s residence

The Opera Stars in the Kitchen

If you were lucky enough to get an invitation, your senses would be overwhelmed with garlic, lemons, and sweet oregano while listening to the chic couple talk about their adventures living all over Europe, singing in the most beautiful opera houses, and probably tennis. Plato and Dorothy Karayanis loved to entertain in their condominium at 3327 Prescott in Park Place. He came to Dallas hired by the Dallas Opera as the General Director to save it in 1977. The Opera company was at a low point financially and needed some new ideas to survive. Plato was able to increase donations tenfold and take the budget from $1.29 million for 12 performances of four operas to a budget of $9.5 million for 21 performances of five operas achieving record ticket sales with one of the highest subscription audiences in the country.

Plato was born in Pittsburg, PA. His parents were immigrants from Cyprus and Mytilene (Lesbos) and married and settled in Pittsburg. Plato was brought up bilingual and his mother made sure he knew how to cook the Greek classics. After seeing his first opera, La Boheme in high school, Plato became a member of the Pittsburg Civic Light Opera upon graduation and began training for a life in Opera. He worked his way through college studying voice and opera. One of his scholarships was to the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia where while learning stage directing, he met the love of his life, Dorothy Krebill.

Dorothy was a mezzo-soprano and soon after she married Plato in 1956, they went to Europe for eight years performing in opera houses in Germany and Switzerland. Dorothy and Plato then moved to San Fransico in 1964 where Plato started his management career. They joined the Metropolitan Opera National Company in 1965 where she was a leading mezzo-soprano and he was an assistant stage director and administrative assistant. Plato joined Affiliate Artists, Inc in 1967 before becoming the General Director for the fledging Dallas Opera in 1977 and staying 23 years to build it into a stunning success.

Neighbors knew Plato by his bright orange BMW pulling into the complex and often washing and polishing that car on weekends. He loved tennis and regularly had tennis workouts until he was 89. He loved classical music, jazz, and hand-tailored suits. Dorothy was often compared to Mary Tyler Moore because of her beauty and her bright, dazzling smile. She loved to cook, entertain her friends, and of course, opera. Both Dorothy and Plato were also involved, neighborhood activists in Perry Heights, and often had their neighbors over for those delicious Greek feasts they both would prepare.

Plato retired in 2000, and the couple moved to Sante Fe, NM, and was active in the opera company and other arts groups there for years. Plato passed away in April of 2022 due to cancer complications and was survived by his wife of 65 years, Dorothy. The couple was known for their gracious hospitality and outgoing spirit. We should all be so lucky to have a couple like the Karayanis as neighbors, however, they give all of Dallas the gift of a world-class opera company.

Better Together: Perry Heights and Our Heroes

This drawing was a gift to Perry Heights’ neighbors commissioned by Harry S. Parker, a past 13-year resident of the Plantation Style home at Hawthorne and Rawlins. It depicts the neighborhood’s activism against greedy developers. Mr. Parker was the Director of the Dallas Museum of Art.

Over the years, the lush, peaceful Perry Heights neighborhood we see today has seen plenty of challenges. As the neighborhood turns 100, it’s good to look back at some of the challenges our neighborhood has faced over the years.

From the beginning of our neighborhood in the Roaring ’20s to today, we are celebrating what our founder, Gordon Perry, dreamed of: a well-built, brick neighborhood that attracts people from every stage of life and various economic backgrounds into a true urban dream neighborhood where we can enjoy attractive tree-lined streets, gardens, and friendly neighbors. Without air conditioning, the original homes had sleeping porches to use in the summer to catch a breeze. This was the inspiration for the Perry Heights advertising slogan, “Cool at Nights.”

Advertisement from 1923 in The Dallas Morning News

The ’40s, ’50s, and ’60s were a time of togetherness and community, with neighbors giving each other wedding showers, holding weddings in their homes, sending men to fight in WWII, and caring for war widows. After the war, a surge of children in the neighborhood would constantly be playing in front yards and in the park. But as we know, every neighborhood has cycles.

The late ’60s and ’70s were a difficult period for Perry Heights and the Oak Lawn neighborhood. As in the rest of the country, white flight and panic over integrated schools drove families into the nearby suburbs. Areas in and around Oak Lawn became less desirable. Many of the homes in the neighborhood turned into rentals and their tidy appearance began to suffer. Counterculture types such as hippies and artists, attracted to the low rents, began to move into the area. The decline in value also attracted developers who wanted to buy up lots, demolish homes, and build more dense apartment buildings. About this time developers purchased the old Perry Estate and eventually tore it down and built Park Place condominiums in 1968. Developers demolished most of the homes around Perry Heights along Lemmon and Cedar Springs by the mid-1970s and built apartment buildings, retail strip centers, and fast food businesses. The Wycliff-Douglas couplet that was created to connect the Dallas North Tollway to U.S. 75 (Central Expressway) had already claimed 30 homes in Oak Lawn that had to be demolished for the project. The increase in density also brought crime, traffic, homelessness, and prostitution into the neighborhood streets.

In the 1970s, the neighborhood faced a new challenge. An absentee owner had inherited his parent’s home in the 4400 block of Vandelia. He was offered significant rental income to turn the home into a group home or halfway house. Because our neighborhood is zoned for single-family use, the neighbors hired an attorney and fought successfully to keep this type of housing category out of the neighborhood.

It was around this time that a group of Perry Heights neighbors also realized that they needed to do something to protect what was left of Perry Heights and preserve the peaceful, quiet community they knew. They banded together and, in a two-year struggle, were able to convince the city to close off vehicular traffic with curbed diverters at three intersections: Herschel and Lemmon, Herschel and Cedar Springs, and Prescott and Lemmon. Not everyone in Perry Heights was in favor of the closures, but 90% were, according to the petition. The closures reduced cross-traffic by an estimated 6,000-8,000 cars per day and helped unite the neighborhood. A block party with entertainment by the Paul Guerro Orchestra celebrated the achievement. Thus, 1974 saw the beginnings of what would become the Perry Heights Neighborhood Association.

Neighbors had other concerns including the noise from Love Field airport. Oak Lawn Residents began what was called the Oak Lawn Preservation Society in 1973 to fight some of these local problems. The founder and many of the members were also Perry Heights residents.

In 1985, the neighborhood thwarted an attempt by a developer to take additional land from Craddock Park to create a northbound entrance to the Dallas North Tollway and build a large-scale rental development between Lemmon and Cedar Springs. The Springs project was defeated by the neighborhood opposition. The Springs was developed, but in a much more pared-down form and without the tollway entrance ramp or the retail plan.

In 1985, the neighborhood formed the Perry Heights Neighborhood Association (PHNA) making everyone who owns a home in Perry Heights an automatic member of the association.

By 1991, absentee apartment building owners and the real estate crash left buildings and construction projects surrounding Perry Heights abandoned. This created more serious urban problems such as drug houses, prostitution, and increased homelessness. The city didn’t have the money to raze the two dozen buildings on 17 acres beginning with 4500 Cedar Springs Road that, according to news articles, was referred to as Beruit, because the area looked like the bombed-out remnants of war. It would take another decade for the area to be rebuilt.

It was during this time that PHNA began working with the city and had fundraisers such as neighborhood sales and other events to build the walls at the blocked intersections. The intent was to stop the flow of pedestrians from Cedar Springs and Lemmon by way of Prescott and Herschel. This goal was finally achieved in 1995 when the city conditionally deeded the dead-end streets to the Association. The conditions include keeping the Association active, maintaining the walls and streets, paying property taxes, and carrying liability insurance. Much appreciation goes to David Wagner and John Mahoney for making certain many of these conditions have continued through the years with the voluntary contributions from the neighborhood residents.

By the 1990’s, Oak Lawn had become a destination for the GLBTQ population in Dallas. Many whom had been renters were now purchasing homes in Perry Heights and renovating them. This new gay wave in the area was not without some controversy. So many gays and lesbians were moving to Perry Heights that it was often referred to as Fairy Heights.

With the increase in renovations in the neighborhood, some residents began pushing for a Conservation District to preserve the look and feel of the neighborhood. Although noble in theory, some homeowners did not want a committee restricting what they could build or how their homes should look. The Association experienced its first “civil war.” Ironically, the same owner that wanted the group home on Vandelia, demolished that house and began building a house that many felt did not share the same character of the neighborhood. During the quarrels and calls for code enforcement, a group of Rawlins residents splintered off and established a Rawlins-only Conservation District in 2007. This left some neighbors feeling abandoned and bitter.

There was a call for significant change to the PHNA bylaws at that time. The change in articles of the Association’s updated bylaws was to be more equal in the representation of the entire neighborhood and more transparent and inclusive. Current resident, Howard Weinberger, along with David Ellis, Weston Woods, and Mike Sawicki were the architects of the updated bylaws. Since the unification of our Board, the Association has successfully worked with the developer of a townhouse project at the edge of Perry Heights at Wycliff and Vandelia and the apartment building on Wycliff and Cedar Springs to alter the plans to be less impactful to our neighborhood. Many Perry Heights residents are also members of the Oak Lawn Committee, which is designed to protect the Planned Development District 193 district (est 1985) and work with developers requesting variances on projects in Oak Lawn. This district stretching from downtown to Inwood has different zoning and building restrictions than other districts within Dallas. The neighborhood around us has become more gentrified and this has lulled many in the neighborhood into a false sense of security and, unfortunately, apathy. This is troubling as there is a significant uptick in development in the last few years.

We have recently elected a new Perry Heights Neighborhood Association board. They will serve an important role in protecting and preserving Perry Heights for generations to come.

While it’s impossible to note every neighbor who fought to protect Perry Heights over the decades, there are numerous past neighbors whose names, initiative, and leadership should not be forgotten:

Celeste and Paul Guerro, Ann & Bill Gilliland, Brian Hayes, Plato and Dorothy Karayanis, Cay and Key Kolb, Howard Okon, Harry S. Parker, Patsy and Arch Swank, Patricia Evans, and Stephen Rosenthal .

There are also many neighbors that are still in Perry Heights and continue to fight for our neighborhood.

We owe each of them our thanks and our appreciation for being active and taking their time, concern, and resources to preserve our unique neighborhood.

Marvelously Modern in a 1930’s bungalow

Austin, Chris, Parker, and Bentley ( photography by William Bichara Photography)

Austin and Chris moved into their 1931 bungalow on Vandelia in 2020 and have already transformed the house into a stylish home. The house reflects the young couple’s fresh sense of style. It’s also a testament to how to retain the charm of the past while still accommodating modern needs.

As soon as they saw the white cottage and opened the door to the expansive living area and then caught a glimpse of the backyard pool, they were hooked on this house. The pool needed work with its old coping and cracked concrete and the largest bedroom was still tiny without access to a bath, but they knew the bones were there. They made the changes to the primary bedroom, borrowing spaces and creating a fabulous owner’s suite with a walkout onto the pool deck. They then took a while to decide on the main color of the home, which would be painted everywhere for cohesion. (They finally decided on Ibis White by Sherwin Williams, by the way) The decorating began at that point. All whites and creamy neutrals give the interiors a California coastal look, especially with the light wood flooring.

The couple loves to gather around the fireplace in the colder months and watch television on the sectional and then spend most of the warmer months around the pool and outdoor decks, entertaining.

Chris enjoys pairing up high and low-end items to give the home a relaxed and lived-in vibe. Not only the placement of items, but the fragrance is important to him as well. You will find perfectly placed, luxury candles in every room. There is a front den off the living room where you can entertain a few friends and see the neighbors walk by. The guest house is a favorite of anyone visiting since it shows a sense of fun and you almost expect to look out the window and see the waves come softly up the sand. Of course what you do see is a chic, perfectly arranged pool with loungers, a table shaded by a pergola, usually set for an alfresco meal.

A glimpse of the gorgeous backyard from the kitchen

The bedrooms carry an airy, casual vibe throughout the house.

Image gallery image — The private quarters of the home

The office, although lovely, is the next to get a makeover into more of a sophisticated gentlemen’s lounge where you could choose from collected bourbons and have conversations. The house is perfectly dreamy and perfect for this busy, professional couple.

The Collector

The 1923 built house at 4415 Vandelia as it looks today after an expansion and renovation.

Edgar Lee Smith moved into the house at 4415 Vandelia with his mother, Ethel Smith, in 1955 when he was 28 years old. He had just received his MA from the University of Texas after graduating from SMU with his BA. Before he could obtain a higher education, he served in the Navy during World War II. The family had just lost their father, Ray V. Smith, and moved out of the family home at 1820 North Pearl St., now the site of the Myerson Symphony Theater. Ray was a shipping manager for Western Union Paper in downtown Dallas. The family had already lost their other son, Ray Jr., who was two years older than Edgar, in France during WWII.

Edgar and Friend during roadtrip to Mexico to find plants to collect

Edgar in his latter years in his home filled with Antiques

Article reporting on first Gay Rights March in Dallas demanding Equal Rights

Edgar’s mother had some medical issues and Edgar always made his mother his first priority since it was just down to the two of them. Ethel was very involved in the Gold Star Mother’s Organization and became the Dallas Chapter President. They both enjoyed searching for antiques and spent their days looking for the perfect additions to their collections. Edgar also had a passion for bromeliad plants and began collecting several varieties along with orchids. Edgar would persuade his friends to go on road trips just over the border in Mexico so he could find new plants to add to his collection. After several years, he formed the Dallas-Ft. Worth Bromeliad Society served as President and then was voted into the International Society, serving as Director, Vice President, and President between 1974 and 1987. He also enjoyed hybridizing bromeliads and served as a judge in regional shows into the 1990s. Bromeliads encompass over 3,000 different species, the pineapple being the most recognized.

His friend, Jim Apkin, recalls that Edgar was a bit of a loner, and wasn’t much of a drinker or barhopper, however, he loved going to the movies. Edgar most likely avoided bars in the 1950s and 1960s known to be requested by gay men for fear of being raided, beaten, and outed. Edgar also enjoyed going to parties with his friends who appreciated his very dry sense of humor. He enjoyed being a member of the leather community of Dallas, which at the time was very underground, gathering in private residences and using speakeasy codewords to enter parties. He and his friends were very involved politically in Dallas and fought for better treatment of gays by the city and the police. At that time in the 1960s and 1970s, it was still against the law in conservative Dallas for gay men to drink, dance, dress in non-gender-conforming clothes, and kiss in public. Police raids were carried out frequently to suppress attendance in what was known to be gay establishments. Being arrested meant having your name listed in the crime section of the newspaper and being fired from your job or being turned out by your family.

After his mother passed away, he lived with his collection of antiques and his plants in the Vandelia house. He drove well into his 80s and all of the neighbors knew him by his large green 1970 Chevrolet Impala sedan. Because voting for the candidate that has the best interests of the community is so important, he was at the Oaklawn Library volunteering as an election worker for every election. Several neighbors on Vandelia routinely checked in on him and helped him when needed. When he died in 2014, his collections were actioned off and his house was sold. The house still has the front facade that it did when Edgar lived there and the small oak tree twigs he planted when he first moved there in 1955 are huge and still strain for more room in the parkway in front of the house.

Perry Heights Home of Oak Lawn Pioneer

Llora Cullum Pierce moved into this home at 4322 Hall Street in 1924 when she was 59, with her three children after her husband died after two years of ill health in 1923. Her husband was Rev. John Foster Pierce who taught at Southern Methodist University since 1920 after preaching all across Texas in various churches. He first became an attorney and then decided that being a Methodist reverend was his calling. For the last two years, he served as a junior paster at Oak Lawn Methodist during his illness.

Llora was the oldest surviving Cullum pioneer who came with her parents and her eight other siblings from their Civil war destroyed Plantation in Tipton County, Tennessee by stagecoach, boat, and then train to Dallas and settled on ten acres of Oak Lawn in the land just north of Turtle Creek all the way up to where Oak Lawn Ave is today. The Cullums also built several homes in that area close to the church for their growing families. Llora’s father was Marcus Hirum Cullum, who was the founder of the Oak Lawn United Methodist Church. Rev. Cullum started to hold services in 1872, outside under a huge oak tree at the current site, which gave the church and later, the area its name. The men of the church, armed with saws and hammers, erected the frame church building on the site. Pastor Cullum named the church Oak Lawn United Methodist. After 15 years, the brick sanctuary was built that still is standing today. All of the Cullum sons and daughters served the church with devotion, even after their father’s death. In addition, Llora’s brother, A.W. Cullum started a grocery store that became a regional grocery chain with the name Tom Thumb.

Llora’s son, George F Pierce, became the president of his Uncle Thomas M’s sporting goods store named Cullum & Boren. Her other son became a manufacturing agent in Dallas, and her only daughter, Ella Katherine married J. H. Webb in the Pierce’s Hall home and then moved to Rochester, NY. Llora’s neighbor, J.B. Rucker, hosted a supper reception for their wedding at their home at 4409 Rawlins on the night preceding the wedding. Llora was very active in her father’s church throughout her life serving as a Sunday school teacher and in the women’s club. She was a member of the Shakespeare Followers Club and had several events and receptions at her home. Llora later moved elsewhere in Dallas and lived until she was 90 years old and had her funeral in the church her father founded. She left eight grandchildren and 15 great children when she died in 1956.

The Flamenco Genius on Vandelia Street

Eddie Freeman, musician, Flamenco instructor and arranger, inventor, guitar maker

Eddie Freeman was a noted English jazz musician of the first half of the 20th century (1909-1957) and a transcriber and teacher of flamenco music in the latter half (1957- 1987) while living in Perry Heights in Dallas. Edward J. Freeman was born in London and ran away from home at 14 and survived by playing the violin in pit orchestras of silent movie houses in England. While playing in movie houses he took up the tenor banjo. To better master that instrument, he traveled to the United States, where he played with Ricardo Giannoni in New York, with a dance orchestra in Baltimore at the Summit Roadhouse near the Pimlico Racetrack, in a Harlem speakeasy; and in engagements with Billy Lustig and the Scranton Sirens. While convalescing from an illness in Baltimore, he developed a method for adapting the tenor banjo techniques to the guitar, which later led to his development of a four-string tenor guitar, the Eddie Freeman Special, using his new method.

He returned to London to play in the Harry Roy Orchestra at the London Pavilion. When noted bandleader Al Collins, heard of Freeman and listened to him play, Collins signed him up for his orchestra at the Savoy Hotel in London. When Collins switched to the Berkeley Hotel in 1932, Freeman went with him.

In the early 1930s, Freeman designed the “Eddie Freeman Special 4-String Guitar” for Selmer Music Company, to implement the guitar method he had developed in Baltimore. One of the Selmer-Maccaferri guitars, the Eddie Freeman Special had the scale-length and body size of a standard guitar and used a reentrant CGDA tuning, that had a better sound for rhythm guitar than the normal tenor guitar with its very high A. Since it was still tuned CGDA, it could be played by tenor banjoists. Selmer-Maccaferri tenor guitars were produced from 1932 until 1934. Nearly 100 of the some 300 genuine Maccaferri guitars that were built were Eddie Freeman Specials

An advertisement for the Eddie Freeman Special and a close up of the guitar

Freeman spent the war years in Belfast, Ireland playing trumpet and conducting a seven-piece Dixie combo in The Embassy Club. He met his future wife, named Maureen Mckeown there as a young girl. After the war, he played trumpet in the Knightsbridge South American Club in London and doubled with a jazz guitar in the Bag O’Nails Club.

Freeman moved to the Bronx in New York in the mid-1940s and after returning to Belfast to marry Maureen. They settled in the Bronx and had two children, Gerard and Anne. By the early 1950s, they had moved to Oceanside, California where he supported himself as a piano tuner and repairman because he couldn’t work as a musician without a work visa. Inspired by flamenco music, which he first heard at the Savoy Hotel, he left his family in California and traveled to Spain to discover its fundamentals. His search was interrupted when he played violin in the Palma de Majorca Symphony, but in Palma, he met guitarist Manolo Baron from whom he learned the basics of flamenco. He somehow broke through to the Flamenco masters who were mostly gypsy masters and were resistant to allow an Englishman to learn their folk art. He then spent 18 months translating the greatest Flamenco music into sheet music which had never been done before. He later formed a flamenco group, Los Tres de Sevilla, with two dancers.

Freeman also developed a system for teaching Flamenco guitar that differed dramatically from the traditional method in which the student learns by watching the teacher’s fingerboard and copying what he is doing. Instead, Freeman insisted that his students learn to read standard music notation, and devised a very simple approach for teaching reading and basic music theory starting with the first lesson in a carefully graded sequence of familiar classical pieces and the Flamenco solos that he had transcribed. Each piece in the library of music that formed the basis of his system was carefully selected to develop a particular aspect of technique or understanding of Flamenco in a logical progression. He has trained several Flamenco guitarists over the years.

Eddie Freeman and his family first lived in the house at 4303 Cedar Springs in 1957 when the road was a two-lane street. He made the interior of the house his own by putting up wood panels with burlap as wall cloth and made his own furniture including a dining table that can be converted into a pool table where he liked to entertain his visiting flamenco artists as they passed through town. The family then moved to 4315 Vandelia a few years later and remained there through the 1960s and 1970s. They had two miniature schnauzers and enjoyed entertaining friends, students, and neighbors.

His wife, Maureen, has been described as a delightful person with a beautiful Irish wit and sense of humor. She was a lively petite lady who would always offer tea and was a great storyteller and conversationalist. She loved talking about improvements she was making to the house and the yard. His son, Gerald became a vice president for a company in Minnesota, and his daughter, Anne graduated from UT with a doctorate in English. She was also an accomplished pianist. She taught English for years at St. Mark’s School and later at Ursuline Academy in Dallas. Eddie died in 1987 at age 78. His daughter Anne died at age 60 in 1994.

Edward Gordon Perry, Sr.

Edward Gordon Perry grew up in a little town called Woodville, Tennessee, about two hours east of Memphis. As a young man in 1908, he moved to El Paso and was the first businessman in El Paso to begin selling Fords in 1912 (the model T type) along with his brother-in-law. Three years later he began selling the first Dodges in Texas with General Pershing’s army and Pancho Villa among his clients. He then moved his family to Dallas and opened a Dodge dealership, eventually having a showroom at Pacific and Pearl, downtown. The dealership, Perry Motors Company, became the 2nd largest Dodge distributor in the country. The new dealership was the most complete dealership in the South since it provided a showroom as well as service and would allow trade-ins to upgrade your Dodge.

He also developed Perry Heights as a unique neighborhood in 1922. He created a realty company with investors and purchased the land. As a part of the deal, the seller donated a portion of the land to the city as a city park running across most of the development. Craddock Park was the first privately donated park in Dallas. He had Fooshee and Cheek, architects layout the plats to provide wide streets with no overheard wires and alleyways to keep the neighborhood attractive, with several trees to provide a canopy of green. He wanted the neighborhood to be diverse in the sizes of the homes, yet restricted the building materials to brick, stone, tile, and stucco with no wooden or frame homes allowed. Rawlins owners needed to spend at least $10,000 on their homes, which needed to be two-story dwellings, Hall owners needed to spend at least $6,000 on their new home, and Vandelia owners needed to spend at least $5,000 on their home according to the abstract of the development dated August of 1922.

Edward G. Perry, Sr. ‘s wife was Melvina Vandelia Kirkpatrick Perry from Ripley, Tennessee. They married in 1910. They had two children, Vandelia, a daughter and Edward Gordon Perry Jr., a son. Vandelia, a debutante, and Edward both attended SMU. Edward Gordon Perry Jr. because a successful inventor and businessman who served as the chief research engineer for Texas Instruments. He was also a co-founder of Recognition Equipment, Inc, (REI). He is best known for inventing the first commercially viable Retina Character Reader For more information on his life, please see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Gordon_Perry_Jr.

Perry was trying to create a neighborhood for people in various life stages and economic brackets for a more diverse neighborhood. Mr. Perry Sr. believed that homeownership created strong communities within cities. He also built his family home in the center of the neighborhood and built a large playground for his children and encouraged the neighborhood children to play there as well. He named one of the newly created streets after his wife’s middle name and his daughter’s first name, Vandelia. His home was said to cost $75,000 and included a pool and tennis court and was just across Hawthorne from the park where the Park Place townhomes are now.

In addition to Perry Heights, he was very involved in the YMCA of Dallas. He was the director from 1922 to 1947 and raised one million dollars from other business owners to open three branches of the Dallas YMCA in 1928. He was also chairman of the social welfare Association committee on inter-organization cooperation that worked with Dallas businesses in providing opportunities and funds for those less fortunate.

Perry was also the superintendent of the First Methodist Church School for 16 years and a member of the board for SMU for 15 years. Perry was also the president of the USO for two years during WW II and was active in other civic and church activities. He is quoted as saying “I have had a lot of privileges in my life and I feel very humble about it.” He felt that service to his community was of utmost importance.

He and his wife moved to San Angelo in 1947 to be close to his grandchildren and died in 1952 just shy of his 66th birthday.

The Master Gardeners of Perry Heights

We appreciate the annuals and beautiful trees in our neighborhood, however, our neighborhood has had quite a history of Master Gardeners and flower gardens. Craddock Park was known in the 1930’s for the massive rose garden that was maintained by the Women’s Garden Club. The rose garden would get 1000’s of visitors a year. Unfortunately, there was an outbreak of crown gall infection in 1942, and all of the roses were destroyed.

In 1952, The Woman’s Gardeners Club, with approval from the Park Board, debuted the nation’s very first Scent Garden in Craddock Park for the blind with braille nameplates. The garden was in the southeast end of the park.

In 1939, when Ernest Harrington and his wife bought their home at 4439 Rawlins, they extensively changed the landscaping to the gardens they appreciated in Arizona and New Mexico. They had yuccas, magueys, aloes, and cacti transported into their front and backyard. The state of Arizona had to give them their approval to remove giant saguaros and move them out of state into their Dallas home.

Major Edward A. Wood of 4321 Rawlins was a Dallas city plan engineer and a master gardener. He was president of the First Men’s Garden Club for years and had a particular affection for Dahlias.

In the early 1950s, there was an escalation of gardeners on the 4300 Block of Vandelia. Three ladies, who were all active Garden Club members wowed the neighborhood and newspapers readers with their gorgeous gardens trying to outdo each other with their skills.

Mrs. C.M. Thompson was known for her beautiful rose garden of 60 bushes in the front of her home, her favorite rose called the Fashion rose. Mrs. Thompson was also an expert on African Violets.

Mrs. Wray of 4318 Vandelia loved planting blooming perennials such as wild sasparilla vine, clematis, gardenias, and strawberries. She used peanut hulls, sheep manure, and ground cottonseed to protect and grow her amazing garden.

For Mrs. J. A. Brooks, gardens are for attracting birds. Her garden had two birdbaths and a feeding station set among flowers to attract various species. She grew coral honeysuckle, beds of irises, day and ginger lilies, and tuberose. She also brought plants and cutting from her family home in Tennessee such as english ivy, syringa, camellias, clove pinks, sedums, and phlox.

I know we all enjoy walking our neighborhood and appreciating colorful beds of flowers and shrubs. Thank you to the past and present residents who work tirelessly to make our neighborhood the beautiful garden it is.

House of Lila

In 1927, after a bitter, ugly divorce, Lila Adams Titley took her two young children and moved from Oklahoma to Dallas to carve out a new life for the three of them. She went into business as an interior decorator and raised her children in Perry Heights at 4412 Rawlins. She opened her business at 3511 Oak Lawn and later at 2307 Cedar Springs and was a successful decorator and antique store owner for 30 years until she retired in 1954. She loved traveling to Europe on buying trips and she loved classic European design. Her two children were Richard John and Bonnie Jean. She was instrumental in organizing the Texas Chapter of American Interior Decorators, and served as the first Treasurer for the organization. She often spoke in front of decorators and women’s groups with very traditional views: “You can’t live with things that aren’t lovely and it is the women’s function to carry on the tradition of the pretty and retain the heritage of good design.” She thought good decoration came mostly from the 18th century and detested modern design: “Though modern architecture may have its functions, there’s nothing pretty about a slab of brick wall with a mask on it. “

She had a scare when there was a bad car accident at Lemmon and Lovers Lane with her son, Richard, driving five other seniors from North Dallas High, but only three were hospitalized and no one was seriously hurt.

After she raised her children and retired her business, she traveled extensively. She often would travel to see her son while he was stationed somewhere around the globe. She also loved traveling by ship to the Mediterranean including holy land destinations. She moved out of Perry Heights in the early 1960’s and died in 1971 in Dallas.

Richard Titley during the Korean War, during which he served as a commander of a field artillery battalion in the 25th Division. ( Photo submitted by RICHARD TITLEY )

Richard went into the army after graduating from A&M and was sent to California to start a 22 year military career spanning from WWII through the Korean war and finally the cold war where he commanded the Nike missile batteries in and around Texas. Richard married and had two sons. After leaving the miliary, he returned his family to Dallas and worked for Preston State Bank developing the bank’s first credit card. He died in 2018.

Bonnie Jean was Richard’s older sister by 3 years and graduated with a journalism degree from UTA. Her romantic life was somewhat turbulent. Her first fiancee was killed in the Pearl Harbor attack. She then married Foy Fleming who was almost immediately deployed to the Navy in the Pacific in WWII. She followed him and worked in an ammunition factory with other war wives in California. When Foy returned from war, they quickly discovered they were not a match and amicably divorced as friends. She then returned to Dallas and met Warren Leslie, a writer from a prominate NYC family, and at that time, a reporter for the Dallas Morning News. They married in 1949 at The Little Chapel in the Woods and had two sons, Michael and Warren IV, known as Rennie. They divorced within three years.

Warren Leslie was then working as an exectutive with Nieman Marcus while working on novels. He started a book soon after Kennedy was assasinated in 1963 and Bonnie worked with him as the primary researcher and editor. The controversial book sought to address the true nature of the city that stood accused by many of killing the president. As Dallas Public and Private: Aspects of an American City, the nonfiction book was nearing completion, Warren and Leslie remarried in 1964.

Bonnie was a major fundraiser for the Dallas Symphony in the 1950’s and 1960’s and through her husband’s NYC connections were able to book international talent in Dallas. Bonnie was also instrumental in helping to find work and housing for refugees from Poland and Hungary during the Soviet occupation of those countries. She and her husband were close to the proprietors of the Old Warsaw Restaurant, themselves refugees from Poland. Bonnie loved to recall how Dallasites had to bring their own liquor in brown paper bags to the Old Warsaw and other restaurants in the dry Dallas of the 1950s. She also developed a friendship with Stanley Marcus, and they shared an enthusiasm for miniature books, which they gave and traded with each other for many years.

After her second divorce from Warren, she worked in Public Relations with the Automobile Association of America in Los Angeles. She returned to NYC in the early 1970’s and marketed her own idea for ladies who drove cars at a time when full-service gas stations were declining in popularity. Her “Station Break” was a kit for women that included basic car care instructions and helpful items to keep their hands and dresses clean. She was then working for Time/Life Corporation, as a maker of documentary and promotional films, and for the YWCA Job Corps, where she helped train inner-city girls to pursue careers that could take them out of poverty.

In the early 1980s, Bonnie returned to Dallas and became an important early supporter of the Undermain Theatre and The Dallas Children’s Theater. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s in 2006 and moved to be near her son, Michael in Upstate New York. She died in 2010. Michael dedicated a bench in NYC’s Central Park in her honor that remains today.