Jessie Casey Belz Scholarship

Jessie Casey Belz 

The Casey family came to Texas when Jessie was a small child so that she and her brothers could have a Christian education. Her father set up a store and lumberyard in Keene and built a large house on Mockingbird Street for the family.

The only girl in the family, Jessie had five brothers whom she adored. They taught her to shoot a gun, which she became adept at using. Sometimes during the summer the family went to Galveston where they owned rice fields. Occasionally blackbirds would come to feast on the crop, and the family would be out all day, protecting their rice.

Later, while attending school in Keene, she met W. O. Belz. They became sweethearts, but such things were frowned upon by the authorities. However, sweethearts have always been ingenious at circumventing regulations designed to keep them apart. There were no rules preventing a thirsty gentlemen on a walk from stopping at a house and asking for a glass of water. So Mr. Belz took many walks in those days and always got thirsty in front of the same large house on Mockingbird Street.

Jessie soon became Mrs. Belz and together the Belzes taught school for many years. Jessie became famous as a storyteller, and although she never had children of her own, many of her students adopted her as a second mother. Her friends say she could do anyting she out her mind to, which included drawing plans for her brother's house.

Throughout her long life, Jessie never forgot Keene and the school where she had learned so much. Wherever she worked, she always had a home in Keene. She died in 1984 after a short illness, and after her death part of the money she had put into a trust became a scholarship in her honor.