WHITEHOUSE, Texas — The Whitehouse Mobile Home & RV Park community is still recovering from the damage and from losing a neighbor.
"He had a heart of gold," James Coggins, a Whitehouse resident said. "He'll do anything for anybody."
Coggins lives right next door to the home where W. M. Solomon died, the sole victim in the storms that tore though East Texas.
Solomon’s girlfriend of nine years, Sue Henson, said he worked out of town as a trucker and would typically stay with her during storms. He had to work early that day and decided to stay in Whitehouse, where the 100 mile per hour wind knocked a tree down onto his home.
"He would come over and talk to me for a little bit and do anything for anybody," Coggins said. "He’d do anything for anybody out of these neighbors."
As Whitehouse begins to recover from the storm, neighbors are helping neighbors cleanup their homes and surrounding community.
"I'm gonna walk around and look around and see what kind of damaged anybody have in," Chris Bair, a Whitehouse resident said. "Turn around to help them. Help them out. Rebuild stuff back up again."
Rebuilding not only the community but for the family that surrounded W. M. Solomon.
Solomon is survived by his 47-year-old son and granddaughter. Henson said he was known for being slightly deaf and wearing hearing aids, but describes him as treating others very well and that he would give his heart for anybody. .
"All I got to say is he was a good guy," Coggins said. "He would do anything for anybody. I know he had hard time hearing but he was a good guy."
The city of Whitehouse is giving out Smith Countywide Cleanup vouchers at city hall to those who suffered property damage.