Dean-Hey Heritage

In early 1885 Richard, his parents and siblings loaded all their worldly possession into two old Schoonover type covered wagons and headed south to Brown County, Texas. After his mother's untimely death, Richard and his family remained in Brown County, Texas, and Richard assisted his father with the chores on the Dean family farm.

In late 1889 John and his children again packed their belongings into the family wagon, departed Brown County, and moved east to Van Zandt County, Texas. There John and his children resided near John's brother "W. B." (William Barnett) Dean, living in the Wills Point Township. According to Van Zandt County deed records, John purchased a 100-acre farm north of Grand Saline Township, and he and his sons farmed the land. Although the farm was recorded in the Van Zandt County, deed records show that most of the acreage lay north of Grand Saline in Hopkins County, Texas.

Richard assisted his father in farming the land and there he first met his future wife, Lizzie Reeves. On Wednesday December 8, 1889, at age 20, Richard Hulan married first wife, Elizabeth Ellen "Lizzie" Reeves, in Canton Township, Van Zandt County, Texas. Shortly after their marriage, Richard and Lizzie moved to Fulbright Township, Red River County, Texas, and there Richard farmed while Lizzie tended household chores. They resided with Lizzie's mother, Lydia Reeves.

Shortly after their marriage Richard and Lizzie purchased a farm next to Richard's father in Hopkins County, Texas. Although both farms shared mutual boundaries, part of Richard's property was located in Red River County. According to family records the old Dean family farmhouse was located in Red River County near Fulbright Township, and there Richard and Lizzie received mail through the Fulbright Post Office.

On October 20, 1890, Elbert Marshall Dean, 1st child of R H Dean was born in Wills Point, Texas. Dean family records indicate that all of Richard's children were born in Richard and Lizzie's two-story clapboard home near the Fulbright Township in Red River County, Texas. On August 1, 1901, Margaret Beatrice "Madge" Dean, 5th and last child of Richard and Lizzie, was born on the same farm. (Hulan Dean family history, by Milton Forsythe)