For job seekers looking for a meaningful career working to help their community, Williamson County is hosting a career fair on Thursday, March 3, from noon to 6 p.m.

The event will take place at the Williamson County Georgetown Annex, located at 100 Wilco Way in Georgetown.

At the event, attendees will have the opportunity to learn more about Williamson County’s current vacancies, health benefits and positional responsibilities.

Additionally, attendees will have the chance to meet and greet with potential future managers and co-workers, as several departments will have representatives on-hand.

These departments include Road and Bridge, the Tax Assessor/Collector’s office, Sheriff’s Office, Parks Department, Facilities, Purchasing, Elections and many more.

Williamson County Commissioner Terry Cook: Why vote? Here are 6 reasons. (statesman.com)

Why vote?

In preparation for this topic, I perused the history of elections and voting on History.com. Apparently colonial candidates boozed up voters to, through and after the polls. George Washington is reported to have plied his potential voters with 47 gallons of beer, 35 gallons of wine, 2 gallons of cider, 3.5 pints of brandy and a whopping 70 gallons of rum punch. He won the election by 310 votes.

So who were these voters? Primarily wealthy, white, landholding, Protestant men.  However, voting did not start out with the coveted privacy of the ballot deposited in a box, but was an in-person, audible vote. The wealthy voters might have received individual visits from the candidates prior to the election. On election day, supporters in many cities rented out taverns for a boozy pre-vote party. Then everyone would participate in an impromptu parade to the polls. For the less rich, all action was on election day when the candidates were expected to greet all at the polls. Following the vote, additional tavern-parties, complete with booze and food no matter how you voted, would occur. Ah, the good ol’ days.

So how did we come to have nationwide Election Day on a November Tuesday, that fickle month for weather? We go back to 1845 when Congress passed a federal designation for the first Tuesday following the first Monday in November as Election Day across the country. Congress sought to eliminate early voting in some parts of the nation from influencing the later votes in other areas. Why Tuesday and why November? Back in the day, America was primarily an agrarian economy. Crops were planted during spring or late summer, were harvested primarily in or at the end of the summer and all that work afterward continued into late fall. 

You had to travel to your county’s seat to cast your vote – think about how big some of Texas’ counties are and your transportation mode was a horse. It could easily take over a day to reach your poll site. Sundays were church days and were not to be encroached upon. Wednesdays were market days – your horse was needed to pull the wagon into town. We are still primarily following the farm culture for the vote although mail-in voting and early voting has increased our bandwidth for casting votes.

These three Black educators had major influences for change in the lives of children of color in Williamson County through providing them educational opportunities.

S.C. Marshall

The first African American school in Georgetown began in 1910 and was in a three-room facility called The Colored School, where it offered an education for those children in first to eighth grades. The first principal was S.C. Marshall, a scholar himself who attained multiple undergraduate degrees from Tillotson College (forerunner of Huston Tillotson University in Austin), the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, and Prairie State Normal College (now Prairie View A&M) and a graduate degree from Fisk University in Nashville, TN, one of the Historically Black College and Universities.

Up until 1913, the school only offered education up to the 8^th grade, but S.C. Marshall persuaded the Georgetown School Board to allow him to educate students through high school. In 1923, a new expanded building was built, and more teachers were hired.

By the end of the 1920s, that school was fully accredited for college entrance.

The Colored School was renamed Marshall High School when S.C. Marshall went to Huston-Tillotson (Tillotson) College for a new job in 1930. It kept that name until the 1940s when the name was changed to the George Washington Carver School. It eventually closed with integration in 1965.

Standing as a testament to the positive impact and vision of S.C. Marshall, the school had many graduates of color pursue higher education at the college and university levels.

Site of Marshall-Carver High School historical Marker | Williamson County Texas History

Mary Smith Bailey

As we can all agree, a good quality preschool can start a young child on a positive road in education. Unfortunately, a preschool education was not easily attainable for children of color in the early decades of the 20^th Century.

Mary Smith Bailey’s impact was on those children of color. Ms. Bailey, from Georgetown (born about 1890), studied child development at Huston-Tillotson College in Austin, where she received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees. After a 39-year career as a public-school teacher in the predominantly Black schools of Yarbrough, Bruton (at Jonah), Corn Hill, and Jarrell, she retired in 1953 and began The West Side Kindergarten in Georgetown, so mothers could work at least half a day. It was the first preschool in the area to offer preschool services to non-white children. She believed that young children benefitted most from an educational environment that emphasized development in self-confidence,

On Jan. 1, 2022, and after redistricting, the Anderson Mill MUD neighborhoods were placed into Precinct 1.  Commissioner Cook was invited to a meet and greet meeting, and asked to address the Board. Citizens were encouraged to ask questions.

Commissioner Cook brought a large map of the newly redistricted Precinct 1 for the board members and residents to view and ask her questions.

A member of the venerable Sauls Family of Williamson County, Otto Sauls was born in 1906, one of 15 children of Wade and Louisa Sauls, and was a prolific builder and craftsman. He constructed homes in Georgetown and in and around Round Rock, as well as in Brenham and Fredericksburg. Many homes on Liberty, Burnet, Anderson, Spring and Sheppard Streets were built or remodeled by the hand of Otto Sauls. Many stand today like Papi’s Pies on Chisholm Trail in Round Rock.

Before his construction career, Mr. Sauls attended Paul Quinn College in the 1930s, an African Methodist Episcopal affiliated school which was started in Austin, moved to Waco, where Otto attended, and is now located in Dallas. Afterward, he attended the Georgetown Flying School to realize his first dream of aviation; however, he was forced to quit because he was black.  He did build model airplanes that would fly up to 50’ high.  Aviation was his first love.

Otto Sauls was an American Veteran, serving in the Army in the Pacific front during World War II.

In 1958, Mr. Sauls helped relocate and rebuild St. Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church, a church the Sauls Family helped establish in Round Rock in 1885, to make way for I-35. It still stands today in that same location off Sheppard Street in Round Rock with much of the lumber, pews, and the pulpit from the original church on the west side of now I-35 South of the location of Sprouts Grocery Market.