In 1893 Curtis Fitz Fisher was born to Will and J.N. Fisher. Curtis was the youngest of three siblings, two sisters and one younger brother. At around the age of thirteen Curtis was orphaned and then raised by her sister Lela and her brother-in-law Maxcy Callaway, who was a conductor for the Santa Fe Rail Road Company. Sometime during the first decade of the twentieth-century Curtis met Virgil Watters and they were married on December 6, 1910. Curtis had three daughters with Virgil Watters: Virginia (1911-1981), Sue Maxcy (1914-?), and Mollie Nan (1918-1975). Shortly after Mollie Nan was born Virgil left Curtis to raise their three daughters alone.
With her three daughters Curtis returned home to Temple, Texas where she worked for the division office of the Santa Fe Railroad Company. A few years later Curtis worked for the Texas Highway Department in Wichita Falls. Eventually, Curtis would become one of the first Certified Medical Record Librarians in Texas. She would work for Scott and White Hospital, King’s Daughters Hospital in Temple, and the Clinic Hospital of San Angelo Clinic. In addition Curtis would serve as the President for the Texas Association of Medical Record Librarians, one of many professional associations that she was a member of.
In the 1930's Curtis began dating William Veery Smith (also known as Bill), a Division Engineer with the Santa Fe Railroad Company and a soldier in both World War I and II. William Veery Smith and Curtis Watters never married but remained devoted to one another until William’s death in the 1970's.
Virgil Watters was Curtis Watter’s husband and father to her three children. Watters was born in 1891 to James Butler Watters and Nanie Jane Wright. After leaving Curtis in 1920, Virgil would proceed to marry four more women and die in 1987.
SECOND GENERATION
Virginia Watters Worden, also known as Din, was the first of three children born to Curtis and Virgil Watters. Din married Ralph Worden, who was in the Army Air Corps, before World War II but divorced him in the late 1940’s. They had no children.
Sue Maxcy Speir (1914-?) Sue Macy Speir was the second born of three girls. Before the start of World War II she married Leslie Speir, who was in the Coast Guard. Sue separated (in 1943) and divorced her husband shortly after the war ended. They had one daughter named Margaret Ann (also known as Maggie, M.A., Punk, or the Brat). After her divorce Sue returned to school and became a Registered Lab Technician.
Mollie Nan was the youngest of Curtis’s three girls. Like her older sisters, Mollie was married before the United States entered World War II. Unlike them, however, she remained married to her husband K.B. (Karo) Hallmark till her death in 1981. Together, they both had one son named K.B. Hallmark III who also worked for the Highway Patrol like his father.
THIRD GENERATION
Margaret Ann, the daughter of Sue and Leslie Speir, was born in 1940. Margaret Ann was also known as Maggie, M.A., Punk, or the Brat in the various correspondences within this collection. Margaret Ann and Bob Sheerin produced three children: Jim (Jimmy), Carolyn, and Jack.
K.B. Hallmark III was born in Austin Texas in 1946. K.B. was the only child of Mollie and K.B. Hallmark (also known as Karo). K.B married Janet Schuchardt and together had two children Amanda Laine and K.B. IV.
FOURTH GENERATION
Amanda Laine was born on September 16, 1972 to K.B Hallmark III and Janet Schuchardt and died on December 3, 1979.
K.B was born on August 3, 1974 to K.B Hallmark III and Janet Schuchardt.
Jim was the first son born to Margaret and Bob Sheerin.
Cynthia was the second child born to Margaret and Bob Sheerin
Jack was the third child born to Margaret and Bob Sheerin.
The Curtis Fisher Watters Papers document the life of a Texas woman and four generations of her family and friends through photographs, scrapbooks, books, correspondence, newspaper clippings, and ephemera ranging from programs to handkerchiefs.
See also, The Watters and The Hallmark Family Trees through these online addresses:
Watters: http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Fields/5576/watters.html
Hallmark: http://www.geocities.com/Heartland/Fields/5576/hallmark.html
A compiled list, alphabetical by sender, for each type of correspondence is available. Please contact Special Collections to request a copy (speciallcollections @ utsa.edu).
This collection is housed at UTSA's Main Campus and must be accessed via the John Peace Library Special Collections reading room. To request access, please use the
Permission to publish material from the Curtis Fisher Watters Family Papers must be obtained from University of Texas at San Antonio Libraries Special Collections.
Researchers are required to wear gloves provided by staff when reviewing photographic materials.
[Identification of item], Curtis Fisher Watters Family Papers, 1863-2000, MS 120, University of Texas at San Antonio Libraries Special Collections.
The materials of this collection were donated by Margaret Ann (Maggie) Sheerin in 2001. (Acc. 2001-13).
Processed by: Lea Domingo, July 2003.
Encoded by: Nikki Lynn Thomas, Manuscripts Archivist, October 2007
This series contains a small collection of genealogical information collected by Curtis and written by some of her grandchildren on the family’s history. There are family trees, genealogies, correspondence discussing family history, and military records.
This series contains material from Curtis’s professional life. There are pamphlets, newsletters, and miscellaneous material from the various professional organizations Curtis participated in and conferences that Curtis attended. Also included are newspaper clippings and correspondence highlighting Curtis’s career.
This folder is organized alphabetically by organization.
A large portion of the collection consists of a variety of correspondence such as letters, cards, telegrams, postcards, and v-mail (war correspondence that looks very much like telegrams). Curtis received the majority of this mail from family members and friends. Subjects include war letters, seasonal letters/Cards (Christmas, Easter, Birthdays), and sympathy for deaths in the family. This series does include some letters written by Curtis or addressed to other family members.
The largest series of the Collection is photographs. The bulk of the photographs document family and friends, unless otherwise indicated.
It is divided into two sections – black and white and colored photographs. They are organized by decades and then subject matter of family and friends, and professional life.
This series consists of photocopies of the original scrapbook pages. The materials from the scrapbooks have been moved into other series.
Originally there were ten scrapbooks filled with letters, cards, newspaper clippings, and photographs. For preservation purposes the scrapbooks were scanned then disassembled.
This series consists of newspaper clippings train tickets, hotel receipts, books, Curtis’s personal journals, poetry, programs, and personal items. Curtis liked to travel and it is reflected in the train tickets and photographs. Curtis also seems to have had a fascination with death. There are funeral books, locks of hair, photographs of graves, and obituaries some of which have no apparent connection with her.