In 1918 the "Spanish" Flu was ravaging Alabama very badly. They were worried about the children dying from the pandemic. So, he decided to take his whole family including his wife and four kids from Florence, Alabama to Wichita Falls, Texas in a covered wagon pulled by a pair mules.

My mother, before she died still remembered riding in the wagon, since she was the smallest child, while the older kids walked.

My grandfather was a machinist by trade and later moved on to Port Arthur, TX during the oil boom of the 1920s.