Benjamin Richard Wall

Benjamin Richard Wall, born in Grapevine on May 7, 1876, attended the Grapevine free school, continued at Grapevine College and Baylor University, and studied law. In 1915, the State Bar Association issued him Card No. 1, which he carried all his life. He became mayor of Grapevine in 1912 and served intermittent terms until 1946, including during World War I and World War II. Through his weekly newspaper columns in the Grapevine Sun, which he established in 1895, he kept Grapevine's citizens motivated and optimistic about their future. In 1913, he went to New York and brought back the No. 7 Boy Scout Unit Charter, giving Grapevine one of the first Boy Scout troops west of the Mississippi. In 1900, as a young man, he went to Galveston to help with disaster aid after the great hurricane struck the island. Thoughtful toward those less fortunate, he also initiated an international relationship with the citizens of Pitcairn Island; beginning in 1912, he urged Grapevine residents to place items for Pitcairn Islanders in a box in his office, and when it was full, the shipment was sent.

Grapevine, Texas · United States