KERRVILLE, Texas (Nexstar) — At the ‘wall of hope’ in downtown Kerrville, one piece of furniture sticks out. A bright red wooden chair which got washed away in the Guadalupe River, with “Kerr Co. Flood, July 2025 — Found at: 30°17’25”, -101°20’24” — Hill Country Strong,” written on top.
For a week, the owner was unknown. Until a pair of volunteers stopped by the house of Kerrville resident Mary Jane Sharp, who lives along the Guadalupe River and has three identical chairs on her patio.
“She said, ‘I know that. I know that chair,'” Sharp recalled. “I said, ‘where is it?’ She told me it was at the memorial.”
Sharp says the chairs, along with an accompanying table, are around 30 years old — mementos she took from her former home.
“This furniture was made in Ruidoso, New Mexico,” Sharp said. Despite being born in Texas, Sharp spent over 50 years living in New Mexico. “After I moved here, I ordered [tiles to put on the table], and the girls helped me. My sister helped me. We painted all of these chairs and put the tile in. This was just one of my links back to New Mexico, I would have been sad to lose it all.”
Sharp considers herself one of the lucky ones. After being evacuated on the morning of July 4, her home suffered light water damage, and she lost two of the four red chairs, a pair of kayaks, a wooden swing and lots of plants and trees. Multiple neighbors on her block had their homes completely destroyed.
While the first of her two missing chairs is already sitting on her back porch, Sharp is in no rush to take her fourth chair away from the ‘wall of hope’.
“My kid said, ‘mom, leave it for now,'” Sharp said. “[I] called him back and I said, ‘Don’t try to bring it. But let them know who it belongs to, and that I would like to have it back.”