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Texas US Representative Brady Preston Gentry (1896-1966) Owned Carved wood and<br>Sterling silver star gavel. I acquired this from a direct descendant of Brady<br>Preston Gentry, it belonged to him. It's the nicest gavel I've ever seen. The<br>carving is amazing, sterling silver stars in gavel and plate, the bag appears to<br>be moleskin, it has carved wood pieces on each side one shaped like Nevada, one<br>Texas, there's even a separate pouch inside the bag for the block. The gavel is<br>8 7/8" long, block 3 1/8" long. My guess is this would have been a gift to him<br>upon his appointment as County Judge in 1930, but it could be from when he was<br>elected to congress in 1952. It looked to have 90 years of tarnish on the silver<br>when it came into my posession, I hand polished it to not remove any patina.<br><br>GENTRY, BRADY PRESTON (1895–1966).Brady Preston Gentry, legislator and lawyer,<br>was born on a farm near Colfax, Texas, on March 25, 1895, the son of Benjamin<br>Whitfield and Virginia Caroline (McPhail) Gentry. He attended Cumberland<br>University and Tyler Commercial College. He was admitted to the bar at the age<br>of twenty-one. During World War I he served as an infantryman in France and rose<br>to captain. He entered public service as a clerk in the office of the Van Zandt<br>County tax collector. After moving to Tyler he served as assistant city tax<br>collector. He was elected county attorney, and in 1930 he became county judge of<br>Smith County, an office he held for four successive terms. During this period he<br>was instrumental in developing the county's road system. In 1939 he was<br>appointed chairman of the Texas Highway Commission by Governor W. Lee O'Daniel.<br>He was the first man to serve as chairman of the commission for a full six-year<br>term.<br><br>During Gentry's tenure on the highway commission, first steps were taken in the<br>development of the state's extensive farm-road program. His work attracted<br>national attention. In 1943 he was elected president of the American Association<br>of State Highway Officials. He also served as a director of the Texas Good Roads<br>Association. When his highway commission term ended in 1945, Gentry turned his<br>full-time efforts to his Tyler law practice. In 1952 he was elected to the first<br>of two terms in the United States Congress from the Third Texas District. As a<br>member of the House committee on highways and roads, he was instrumental in<br>shaping the legislation that launched the development of the national system of<br>interstate and defense highways. In 1957 after his retirement from Congress, he<br>was tendered another appointment as chairman of the Texas Highway Commission. He<br>declined the appointment, however, because of business and personal commitments.<br><br>Throughout his life Gentry was a staunch supporter of Southern Methodist<br>University; he also was a benefactor of Tyler Junior College. Shortly after<br>World War II, he helped form the Tyler Junior College District, and the old<br>college gymnasium was named Gentry Gym in his honor. He died in Houston on<br>November 9, 1966, after a lengthy illness.<br>isshelf
