H.M. LaFont was a name well-known in Plainview, Texas, and beyond. The Hale County Historical Commission recently was gifted a few of his photos from his grandchildren.
An item in the July 3, 1930 edition of The Herald noted that H.M. LaFont has opened a law office with P.B. Randolph in the Skaggs building. A native of Missouri, he has spent the last several years in Washington, D.C. and has been assistant principal for the Woodward School for Boys in that city the past two years.
A native of Conran, Mo., he also lived in Cape Girardeau, where his Sunday school teacher was the lawyer grandfather of radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh.
After coming to Plainview, he soon was appointed deputy county attorney and served as county judge from 1932-39.
While serving as district attorney, he tried the famous Hunt murder case three times. The case stayed in the national press for several years.
He served as county judge and was state representative for this area in the Texas Legislature from 1949-53 and 64th District Judge from 1957-64. He was a member of Committee on Penal Code and Code of Criminal Procedure from 1960 to 1961.
He was a member of First United Methodist Church where he taught a men´s Sunday school class for 50 years and then a women´s class for several years, was a member of Kiwanis Club for more than 60 years, a 32nd Degree Mason and had served as attorney for Central Plains Hospital and Plainview Cemetery Association.
He was longtime chairman of the board of First National Bank. He also had served as a Scout leader and was a former member of the Chamber of Commerce board.
He and his late wife, Jane, were married for 60 years.
He said in an interview that he misses the courtroom he stepped out of 30 years ago. But he continued to be active until declining health slowed him down about a year ago.
A quiet, mannerly gentleman, he told a Herald reporter several years ago that he attributed his longevity to a good night´s sleep, eating right and attending church.
Good advice for a man who dispensed much wisdom in much of his 96 years on earth.
Waggoner Carr was born in Fairlie, Hunt County, on 1st October, 1918. Educated at Lubbock High School and Texas Technological College. During the Second World War he served in the United States Army Air Corps.
Carr graduated from the University of Texas Law School in 1947. He established his own law office with his brother Warlick. The following year he was appointed assistant district attorney in Lubbock. He was also and from 1949 to 1951 as county attorney for Lubbock County (1949-51).
A member of the Democratic Party, Carr won a seat in the Texas House of Representatives (District 19) in 1950. He served for the next ten years and during this period focused on issues such as water, tourism, industrial development. Carr also helped establish a code of ethics for legislators and lobbyists. This included two consecutive terms as Speaker of the House.
In 1960 Carr left the Texas House of Representatives to run for the post of Attorney General, but lost to the incumbent, William Wilson. He stood again in 1962 and this time he was elected. Over the next few years he was involved in the prosecution of Billie Sol Estes and Jack Ruby.
Carr led the investigation of the assassination of John F. Kennedy and participated in the work of the Warren Commission. Carr testified that Lee Harvey Oswald was working as an undercover agent for the Federal Bureau of Investigation and was receiving $200 a month from September 1962 until his death in November, 1963. However, the Warren Commission preferred to believe J. Edgar Hoover, who denied Carr's affirmations.
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