THE PITTS LEGACY: GENEALOGY BEFORE THE AGE OF CONVENIENCE

by Lillie Miller

Alice Ellison Pitts was an authority on Collin County genealogy. She was a researcher, editor, and self-publisher at a time when none of those roles were easy. Long before searchable databases, online family trees, or DNA kits, Alice was out in the field doing the work the hard way. She stored the inventory of her self-published books in the garage of her home in McKinney, turning her personal space into a hub of local history. In addition to the books discussed here, she also self-published several works on her own family histories and a four-volume set on Collin County Marriages.

In the early 1970s, Alice and a group of equally determined women took on what can only be described as a heroic task: documenting the county’s cemeteries…all of them. Pitts, Wanda O’Roark and Doris Posey spent the better part of a decade walking every cemetery they could find in Collin County, recording every grave they could find.

These were not leisurely strolls. They pooled their money for gas and spent long days outdoors, navigating heat, cold, mud, brush, ants, uneven ground, and the knowledge that weather, vandalism, and progress were erasing history with every passing year. The Waddill Street Baptist Church in McKinney donated the scrap paper the trio used to record the grave monument inscriptions.

The result was Collin County Cemetery Inscriptions, Volumes I and II, books that modern researchers now treat like gold. Volume II became necessary not only because Volume I grew so large, but also because many of the cemeteries were so overgrown with brush that they could not be recorded during initial attempts. Today, many of the grave markers recorded in both volumes are no longer readable or gone entirely.

In the early 1980s, Alice had another idea—one that was, frankly, enormous. She envisioned a book that would tell the stories of Collin County’s earliest families, written by their own descendants, in their own words, complete with photographs and personal histories all preserved in one place. In a 1983 letter to the editor of the McKinney Courier-Gazette, Alice announced the project and called for submissions.

Families responded. Stories and photographs poured in. Notes accumulated, hundreds of them, each on its own piece of paper. This was all happening before computers, scanners, or email. Submissions arrived typed on various typewriters, handwritten, or copied however people could manage.

In the midst of this monumental project, Alice Pitts passed away in 1983 at the age of 75. Her daughter Minnie then took on the formidable task of shaping the mountain of notes, stories, and photos into something publishable. It was, by all accounts, quite an ordeal.

Collin County, Texas, Families, Volume I was finally published in 1994, 11 years after the project began. Minnie carried on her mother’s self-publishing legacy. Volume II followed in 1998. Inside are hundreds of photographs and stories of families crossing the country in covered wagons, carving homesteads out of wilderness, building farms, churches, and communities. There are accounts of military service, farm life, and everyday resilience, along with amusing stories of charmingly nonconformist relatives. The kinds of details that don’t always make it into official records, but matter deeply to anyone trying to understand how Collin County became what it is today. Minnie dedicated both volumes to her mother.

The Pitts’ books remain foundational resources for Collin County researchers. They are used regularly for historic home research, family history research, cemetery documentation, and other historical inquiries.

Deeply involved in her community, Alice was a founding member of the John Abston Chapter of the National Society of Daughters of the American Revolution, a member of the Collin County Historical Society, and an appointed member of the Collin County Historical Commission. She was also active at Waddill Street Baptist Church and served as secretary for several churches over the years, including the First Methodist Church in McKinney.

Continuing her mother’s tradition of service and scholarship, Minnie served as a District Representative for the Texas State Genealogical Society, was a former president and editor of the Dallas Genealogical Society, a founding member of the North Collin County Genealogical Society, founder of Irish Genealogy Co., and shared her expertise through lectures, tours, and presentations.

Though these books are no longer in print, they are still very much in use. They can be found in libraries throughout Collin County and other parts of Texas, occasionally through online book sellers, and most conveniently, right here at the Collin County History Museum. Come see them. Touch the pages. Marvel at what was accomplished without Wi-Fi.