The Pearson name is widely recognized in El Paso, partly due to the 20 years Eric spent in broadcasting. And though during those years, he became a “top dog” in the industry, his beginnings in the field were very humble. “When I first started on with KVIA in the mid-80s, I began by painting fences and shuffling tapes for commercials,” he says. He indeed wore many hats for KVIA and then for KTSM including anchor, photographer and eventually news director. He became very popular with the public as well as with colleagues. Eric became known for always going above and beyond in order to help people and benefit the community he’d grown up loving, and that is just fine for this man who embraces the title of “professional do-gooder.” “Oh, that’s just Eric. He’s just trying to save the world,” a former coworker says of him with a smile of admiration. Though Eric has moved out of broadcasting to serve as vice president to the Executive Office for the El Paso Community Foundation, he still manages to stay closely involved in the field via Squirrel Productions –a full service media agency he runs out of his home office in his “spare time.”
However, before Eric left mainstream broadcasting, something very important happened. Eric met a beautiful, talented, intelligent young woman, who just happened to ask him out on a date. Enter Charlotte O’Rourke. A graduate of the University of Texas at Austin, Charlotte returned to El Paso to help her brother with his web development company. She would spend the next seven years working for Charlotte’s Furniture and Ethan Allen – both of which are family businesses started by her grandmother, Charlotte Williams. Eventually, she would leave to pursue a career in teaching, which allows her better hours. After all, she and Eric have two wonderful young boys to raise, Patrick and Maximo.
And now, after major career changes for them both, you find a couple that are extremely busy, but whose lives truly center on family. They have chosen a home that holds a lot of nostalgia for Charlotte; it is, in fact, her childhood home, which was built in 1939. Patrick now claims the room that was hers when she was his age. Though now, it has been adapted to suit him and is alive with color, including a mural of an airplane flying happily among puffy white clouds. As you walk the long sage green and cream hallway with its plantation shutters and wainscoting, your shoes sounding on the cherry wood floors, you can’t help but imagine Charlotte as a young girl, braids flying as she ran happily up and down this space singing. You now see a form of pure joy in her face as memories of her childhood mix with memories she’s had as a wife and mother. “I love being a mother,” she says.
Charlotte also loves to cook and bake and spends a good deal of time in their beautiful country-style kitchen with seemingly endless pine cabinets brushed in soothing Wedgwood blue. And just around the corner, the distinctive dining room with its primary wall painted in a striking color called Tomatillo, a beautiful Ethan Allen table, chairs from Charlotte’s Furniture and a truly unique chandelier come together to demonstrate eclecticism at its best.
All in all, the house is a reflection of its owners. There is history in this house. There are places to run, places to sleep, places to play, eat and gather. This house is a place where past generations are not forgotten and stories for future generations are being made every day. This is not a house; this is a home – a difference you can feel.
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