TRUE STORIES OF REAL PEOPLE
Richard Parmer grew up in Central Texas. Born the youngest son of Filmore and Irene Parmer October 5, 1940. He was delivered at home, three blocks from Lometa’s school, by Dr. Biggs for the generous fee of $12.00. By the time he started to school his mother and father had moved two or three times but stayed in the Lometa area. As all the children did in 1947, he started at one end of the building and finished at the other end in 1959. By the age of seven his father, Filmore, was working for a young entrepreneur that had just purchased the Lometa Cattle Auction. Charlie Boyd had unloaded a few head of cattle at the auction on Friday morning but did not sell them because of price. The owner of the auction helped Charlie load his cattle and asked him if he would be interested in buying the business. They worked out the terms and a week later Charlie was the new owner of The Lometa Cattle Auction. Charlie needed help and Filmore needed a regular job. World War II and the Great Depression had taken a toll on the economy and the timing was right for both Charlie and Filmore. Lometa being a very small town didn’t have much opportunity but Charlie and Filmore’s timing was good for both men. The cattle auction business took a dramatic upswing during the draught of 1948 through 1955. There were many ranchers in Texas who eventually had to sell their livestock because of the lack of water and grass. The Lometa Cattle Auction became one of the best ones in the state. Charlie did extremely well as did Filmore. Richard always had a job working cattle, gathering cattle for ranchers to sell, feeding cattle, hauling hay, and working for the area ranchers as a ranch hand. Richard was never a serious student, but he did okay. After graduating high school in 1959, he enrolled at Trinity University, transferred to Southwest Texas State, LBJ’s school of choice. Then to North Texas State. He married Mary Lou Wittenburg July 3, 1964, a young lady with whom he attended primary school through high school and dated off and on for almost eight years. Mary Lou taught in the Texas public school system for 25 years and Richard spent almost 50 years in the freight transportation industry working for three major less-than-truckload companies and ended his career in the airfreight forwarding industry. He retired from the freight industry in 1999, ranched for six years, then helped a new start-up forwarder for another five years. Richard and Mary Lou have three grown children, five grand children and five great grandchildren. After selling the ranch they retired in a small but wonderful community on the Colorado River about thirty miles west of the State Capital. Richard has always loved ranching and livestock. His hobby at one time was in the cutting horse business. He discovered that you can become a millionaire in that business if you start out with ten million. His hobby today is family and discovering his writing skills.
