Dawson County, Texas
TOWNS / GHOST TOWNS
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Ackerly is on U.S. Highway 87 and at the junction of Farm roads 2002 and 2212, partly in the southeastern corner of Dawson County and partly in Martin County. It was established in 1923 with the breakup of the Slaughter Ranch into farming tracts. The town was named for its founder, Paul Ackerly, who was from Georgia. W. A. Wilson served as the first postmaster when the post office opened in 1924. A school district composed of portions of Dawson, Borden, Martin, and Howard counties was organized the following year, and a school was built and later expanded. Ackerly was the center for the local agricultural area and was incorporated in the early 1960s. In 1948 it had a population of 500, four gins, and thirty businesses. By 1980 the population had declined to 317. In 1990 the population was 243.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Matthew Clay Lindsey, The Trail of Years in Dawson County (Fort Worth: Wallace, 1958?). William R. Hunt
Arvana is at the intersection of U.S. Highway 87, Farm Road 2411,
and the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, five miles northeast
of Lamesa in north central Dawson County. It was established on the
Pecos and Northern Texas Railway before 1909. Ten people were living
in the community in 1933, and a population of twenty and one business
were reported in 1949. In 1980 and 1990 the population was twenty-five.
Charles G. Davis
Cline is on U.S. Highway 90 and the Southern Pacific Railroad eighteen miles west of Uvalde in southwestern Uvalde County. The site was in Dawson County between 1858 and 1866. The community was first settled by Celeste Pingenot, from Castroville, who arrived with some cattle in 1870 and constructed a home on the south bank of Turkey Creek in 1871. During the 1870s he established a stagecoach depot complete with stables and corals, commonly referred to as the Turkey Creek Stage Stop. Pingenot also built a store and saloon near his home and established the Wallace Inn, named after his friend who brought mail to the site, William A. A. (Bigfoot) Wallace.qv Turkey Creek, as the settlement was called for most of the 1870s, was located near the Old Spanish Trailqv and was a rest stop for many travelers on their way west to Brackettville or to the silver mines near Chihuahua City, Mexico. Pingenot's small enterprise was the victim of cattle-thieving Indians and Mexican bandits during its first years of operation.
On July 14, 1878, a post office was established in Turkey Creek with Pingenot as postmaster. The name was officially changed to Wallace. August Cline, a German native, settled in Wallace in 1880 and took a job in Pingenot's general store. Cline became postmaster soon after the Texas and New Orleans Railroad reached the site in 1881. In 1883 the community was renamed Cline. By 1888 August Cline had moved the post office to his two-story rock house on the north side of Turkey Creek. Although the stage horses were cared for at Pingenot's stables and corrals, stage passengers dined at Cline's place. Celeste Pingenot's wife, Minnie, and her sister Sophie were gracious hostesses to railroad and mine workers, landladies to boarding teachers, and well-wishers to the numerous travelers who passed through the settlement in the 1880s. By 1892 Cline had an estimated population of seventy-five. In 1896 seventy-one students attended the one-teacher Cline school.
By 1914 many of Cline's seventy-five residents had telephone service. The Uvalde Asphalt Paving Company had established a business office, and four apiarists resided in the community. Cline had an estimated population of 150 by 1927 and was the terminus of a railroad spur from asphalt mines twenty miles southeast. Cline reached its highest estimated population of 250 in 1940. A resident of the community recalled that soldiers from Fort Clark maintained a contingent of cavalry near the Pingenot home during World War I.qv Although a school, a church, and two businesses remained in Cline in 1946, the population had dropped to an estimated fifty. The post office was discontinued in 1952. One year after the 1965 annexation of the Cline Independent School District to the Uvalde district, an estimated ten people lived in the community. Although there is evidence that ten residents remained in the community in 1974, Cline had by then lost its church, school, and businesses. The century-old Pingenot home was showcased in the 1982 publication Uvalde Heritage Homes. In 1990 an estimated ten people remained in Cline.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Jane Knapik, Uvalde Heritage Homes: From the Uvalde Leader-News Bicentennial Series, 1976 (Uvalde, Texas, 1982). Ruben E. Ochoa
Key is at the junction of U.S. Highway 180 and Farm Road 178, twelve miles east of Lamesa in east central Dawson County. It had a population of ten and three businesses in 1930. The Key Baptist Church was consolidated with the Pioneer Bethany and Mount Olive churches in 1914. After a church fire in 1923 part of the church community moved three miles south to build the Midway Baptist Church, while the remaining congregation built a new church at Key, which was expanded in 1948. In 1947 Key had a school, a church, five businesses, and seventy-five people. The population was seventy-five in 1950 and forty in 1980. In 1990 it was reported as twenty.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Mathew Clay Lindsey, The Trail of Years in Dawson County (Fort Worth: Wallace, 1958?). William R. Hunt
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Lamesa Field, at Lamesa, Dawson County, was established on June 10, 1942, to give elementary and advanced glider training to army aviation cadets. Lt. Walter S. Power, Lt. James V. Mesita, Maj. Walter W. Farmer, and Capt. John B. Keller were commanding officers of the Twenty-eighth Army Air Forces Glider Training Detachment until its deactivation on February 15, 1943. In April 1943 the Third Army Air Forces Liaison Training Detachment was moved from Plainview to Lamesa, and the field gave liaison training until it was deactivated on February 26, 1944. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Airport Directory, Continental United States, Vol. 1 (Washington: Aeronautical Chart Service, U.S. Army Air Forces, 1945).
Lamesa, the county seat of Dawson County, is on U.S. highways 180 and 87, State highways 137 and 349, Farm roads 179, 826, and 827, and the Santa Fe Railroad, and Sulphur Springs Draw, sixty miles south of Lubbock in the central part of the county. It was platted in July 1903 by Frank Connor, J. J. Lindsey, J. F. Barron, and several others. A. L. Wasson, a member of the first town committee, impressed by the tabletop flatness of the surrounding terrain, offered La Mesa and Lamesa as possible names. Although he preferred the Spanish version, the committee voted in favor of the other. A post office was granted in 1904 with Harrison B. Oliver as postmaster. Lamesa won the county seat election by five votes over the rival town of Stemmons on March 20, 1905. A town meeting the next day invited the citizens and merchants of Stemmons to move to the new county seat, with an offer of free lots for businesses and help in moving houses. The offer was accepted and effected within several days. Early businesses in Lamesa included a hardware and furniture store, a hotel, a blacksmith shop, and several general stores. A school was first established in 1904. The town had a brass band by 1908. The Santa Fe Railroad secured the town's future when it arrived on August 4, 1910. Electrical service became available in 1916. The first church building in Lamesa was the Methodist church, which was completed in 1907 with help from other local denominations. Baptist, Church of Christ, and Presbyterian churches followed by 1915. Lamesa prospered from farming and later through the development of the oil industry. The population was 1,188 in 1920 and rose to 6,038 in 1940 and to 10,706 in 1950. The peak years came in the 1960s, when the United States census reported 12,438 residents. Afterward the population fell slightly and stabilized around 11,559 in the 1970s and 1980s. In the mid-1980s Lamesa, the county's banking and marketing center, produced agricultural products, oil services, food processing, clothing and textiles, farming equipment, and cotton. Howard County Junior College, the Dawson County Museum, a hospital, a library, and several nursing homes are located in the city. In 1990 the population was 10,809. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Leona Marguerite Gelin, Organization and Development of Dawson County to 1917 (M.A. thesis, Texas Technological College, 1937). Mathew Clay Lindsey, The Trail of Years in Dawson County (Fort Worth: Wallace, 1958?). Charles G. Davis
Los Ybanez, a mile off U.S. Highway 87 and a mile south of Lamesa in central Dawson County, was a new community in the early 1980s. In 1980 it consisted of only a few small houses-the remnants of a migrant workers' and Civilian Conservation Corpsqv camp. That year Israel Ybanez bought the site from the federal government. He repaired some existing structures and rented them to local farm laborers. The town was incorporated in 1983. In the mid-1980s its only business was Ybanez's take-out beer store; at that time Mary Ybanez, the founder's wife, was mayor. In 1985 Los Ybanez had an estimated 300 residents, twenty-two of whom were related to the founder. The community's population was reported as eighty-three in 1990. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Dallas Morning News, October 13, 1985. William R. Hunt
Lou was in an oil and farming area seventeen miles west of Lamesa in western Dawson County. The C. L. Gaultney family settled there in August 1906. They helped organize the community and build the school. They also helped R. B. Red build one of the first gins in the county. A post office was established on August 2, 1907, with Charles B. Martin as postmaster, and a small community grew up near the office. A Christian society was organized the same year. In 1945 Lou had a post office, two businesses, and a population of fifty. The post office continued until the late 1940s. County maps in the 1980s showed no evidence of the rural community. Charles G. Davis
Midway is on Farm Road 178 twelve miles southeast of Lamesa in southeastern Dawson County. It was probably named for its location midway between two schools, Mount Olive and Mullins. In 1907 inhabitants of the Mullins school area formed the Bethany Baptist Church. In 1912 residents of the Mount Olive area, five miles west, joined that church. They ultimately reorganized as the Midway Baptist Church, and built a church building in 1923 on the site of the Midway community. Soon thereafter a gin was built there, and a general store was opened in 1924. At different times Midway had a filling station, a blacksmith shop, a barbershop, a washateria, and a cafe. By 1933 the community consisted of three businesses and a population of ten, and in 1940 it had three businesses, a church, a cemetery, and scattered dwellings. During the 1940s and 1950s the population was reported as forty. In 1939 a parsonage was begun for the church, and in 1949 a new brick church was built. Midway boomed in the early 1960s, perhaps because of extensive oil drilling in the area, and its population rose to a high of 350 in 1961. It had declined to thirty by 1968, and it was estimated at twenty from 1974 through 1990. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Dawson County Historical Commission, Dawson County History (Lubbock: Taylor, 1981). Mark Odintz
Mungerville was an early farming community on Ranch Road 829 thirteen miles from Lamesa in west central Dawson County. In 1947 it had a school, two businesses, and a population of seventy. The community was not shown on the 1984 county highway map. ARVANA, TEXAS. Arvana is at the intersection of U.S. Highway 87, Farm Road 2411, and the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, five miles northeast of Lamesa in north central Dawson County. It was established on the Pecos and Northern Texas Railway before 1909. Ten people were living in the community in 1933, and a population of twenty and one business were reported in 1949. In 1980 and 1990 the population was twenty-five. Charles G. Davis
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O'Donnell is on U.S. Highway 87, the Santa Fe line, and the Lynn-Dawson county line. It lies mostly in southern Lynn County. It was established in 1910 by a group of promoters involved with the construction of the Pecos and Northern Texas Railway from Slaton to Lamesa. The brothers T. J. and A. F. O'Donnell allied themselves with Charles Doak, former sheriff of Lynn County, and H. E. Baldridge to form a town on the new railroad; it was to be called O'Donnell City. In June 1910, lots were sold and a town began; by 1912 the town had a post office, a gin, a hotel, a real-estate office, and a general store. At first the local economy was dominated by cotton farming and ginning. A bank opened at the town in 1919, when the population was 300, and a movement began for incorporation, which occurred on May 5, 1923. By 1930 the town had 1,026 residents; it grew to 1,187 by 1940 and to 1,238 by 1980. O'Donnell was the home of Dan Blocker,qv who portrayed "Hoss" Cartwright on the popular television series "Bonanza" during the late 1950s and the 1960s. In 1990 the population of O'Donnell was 1,102. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Donald R. Abbe, The History of Lynn County (M.A. thesis, Texas Tech University, 1974). Donald R. Abbe, "The History of Lynn County," Panhandle-Plains Historical Review 60 (1987). Donald R. Abbe
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Patricia, at the junction of State Highway 349 and Farm Road 703, twelve miles southeast of Lamesa in southwestern Dawson County, was established in 1923 as the headquarters of the Birge-Forbes Land Company of Sherman, Texas, which owned eight leagues of Dawson County land. Matthew C. Lindsey,qv agent for the company and local historian, sold tracts to farmers, and the company built a gin. A post office was established in 1923 after the original name, Natalie, was changed to Patricia, perhaps for Patricia Hopkins, granddaughter of a company owner. In 1948 the town had seven businesses and sixty people. The population remained at sixty in 1980 and 1990. By 1980 the post office had closed.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Matthew Clay Lindsey, The Trail of Years in Dawson County (Fort Worth: Wallace, 1958?). William R. Hunt
Pride is on Farm Road 2053, fifteen miles northwest of Lamesa and two miles south of the Lynn-Terry county line in northwest Dawson County. A post office was granted on July 18, 1904; Robert B. Muldrow, the first postmaster, ran the office in his store. A Methodist church, built in 1913, served the area for some years before it was moved to the nearby community of Welch. The post office was also moved to Welch in 1934. The development of nearby oilfields stimulated growth in the area, and Pride reported a population of eighty and three businesses in 1947. Lack of major highways or railroads and a slowing oil market contributed to the town's decline. In 1980 county maps gave the location of Pride but showed no businesses.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Matthew Clay Lindsey, The Trail of Years in Dawson County (Fort Worth: Wallace, 1958?). Charles G. Davis
Sand, on U.S. Highway 180 fifteen miles west of Lamesa in west central Dawson County, derived its name from its location in an area once called the Sands of Texas. A post office was established in 1935 in Ebbie Lee's store, with Lee as postmaster. In 1949 the store and post office served a population of fifty. The post office became a substation to the Lamesa post office in 1955. The population was twenty in 1980 and 1990.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Mathew Clay Lindsey, The Trail of Years in Dawson County (Fort Worth: Wallace, 1958?).
Sparenberg is at the junction of Farm roads 828 and 26, fourteen miles southeast of Lamesa in southeastern Dawson County. It was named for George Sparenberg, the postmaster at Big Spring, who assisted W. H. Gartin in getting a post office in a store on Gartin's farm in 1903. Gartin served as first postmaster. The post office was discontinued in 1954. In 1920 the population of Sparenberg was 200. In 1930 the town had seventy-five residents and nine businesses. In 1948 the population was eighty-five, and Sparenberg had a school, a post office, three churches, and four businesses. In 1980 the population was twenty. Most farming residents had moved to Lamesa or Big Spring, and the high school was used as a storage shed. In 1990 the population was still reported at twenty.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Mathew Clay Lindsey, The Trail of Years in Dawson County (Fort Worth: Wallace, 1958?). William R. Hunt
Stemmons, two miles north of Lamesa in central Dawson County, was once the headquarters of the Bartow Ranch. The site was originally named Chicago by W. C. Bishop, the owner of the ranch, who established a post office there in 1889. Within several years a small community had developed two miles to the west of the ranch, and in 1904 the Chicago post office was moved to this more western location and its name was changed to Stemmons, in honor of Walter Stemmons, the manager of the Bartow Ranch. A rivalry soon developed between Stemmons and nearby Lamesa over which town would become county seat. Though the postal department first ordered the Stemmons post office to close when the Lamesa office was granted in 1904, postal officials later decided to allow both stations to exist until after the county seat election. The election was held on March 20, 1905, and Lamesa won by five votes. A committee from Lamesa met the next day and agreed to invite the citizens and merchants of Stemmons to move to Lamesa. Encouraged by free commercial lots and aid for moving houses and businesses, the Stemmons population accepted the offer, and most Stemmons residents left within a few days. The Stemmons post office closed on July 31, 1905.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Leona Marguerite Gelin, Organization and Development of Dawson County to 1917 (M.A. thesis, Texas Technological College, 1937). Matthew Clay Lindsey, The Trail of Years in Dawson County (Fort Worth: Wallace, 1958?) Charles G. Davis
Welch is at the junction of State highways 137 and 83 and Farm roads 829 and 2053, ten miles northeast of Cedar Lake and eighteen miles northwest of Lamesa in northwestern Dawson County. It started in 1924 when farmers near Lou donated land for a gin, and Charley Holden built a grocery store. In 1934 both the Lou and Pride post offices were closed and absorbed by the new post office at Welch, previously called Shack Town. Welch has elementary and high schools, churches, several stores, and gins serving the cotton-raising community. The population was 185 in 1949 and 110 in 1980 and 1990.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Mathew Clay Lindsey, The Trail of Years in Dawson County (Fort Worth: Wallace, 1958?). Kathleen E. and Clifton R. St. Clair, eds., Little Towns of Texas (Jacksonville, Texas: Jayroe Graphic Arts, 1982). William R. Hunt
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