USA > Texas > Tarrant County > Fort Worth > History of Texas : Fort Worth and the Texas northwest edition, Volume II > Part 46
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Throckmorton is a small country town of about 700 inhabitants. It was founded as the county site in 1879. Until this time Williams- burg had been the seat of county government, but with the founding of Throckmorton its central location resulted in the removal not only of the county government but of the town as well. Nothing remains of Williamsburg now but a few scattering stone foundations of old buildings. Highways to Graham, Seymour, Haskell and Albany radiate from Throckmorton. The community has three churches, one modern stone high school building, one gin, one flour mill, eleven mercantile establishments, three garages, two hotels, and one bank, with a capital of $75,000.
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UPTON COUNTY
This county, though given formal boundaries in 1887 and detached from original Tom Green County, long remained among the unorgan- ized counties of West Texas, and the county government was estab- lished in 1910. Previously it had been attached to Midland County for judicial purposes. Until very recently it has been essentially a stock raising country, and its limited population almost entirely engaged in that vocation. Since 1910 two important developments have occurred. The first demonstrated that Upton County lies in the area of the "shallow water belt," and by means of pumping it is possi- ble to irrigate large quantities of land on an economic basis. About 1912 the Kansas City, Mexico & Orient Railroad was constructed across the southern border of the county, and that railway promises to inaugurate a new era of improvement, and the coming of new settlers of a farming class will bring about a more general utilization of the natural resources of this section.
The population of Upton County at the last three census years was : In 1890, 52; in 1900, 48; in 1910, 501. In 1920 the population was 253. The county seat town is Upland, which is located near the center of the county and was the only postoffice until the coming of the railroad, since which time the station of Rankin has been located on that line.
The report of the last census furnished only meager statistics on agricultural development. One hundred and five farms were enum- erated, as compared with eighteen in 1900. Of a total area of 764,800 acres, 1,638 acres were "improved land," while at the preceding cen- sus only eighty-five acres were so classified ; 9,959 cattle were enum- erated, 1,239 horses and mules. Assessment values in 1903 were $364,440; in 1909, $1.122,850; in 1913, $2,672,275; and in 1920, $2,220,365.
WHEELER COUNTY
The oldest organized county in the entire Panhandle, Wheeler, has had rather more than its proper share of the vicissitudes of growth and progress, and only in recent years has it begun to develop on a substantial basis. The figures of population would indicate one phase of its history. In 1880 there were 512 inhabitants, probably more than all other Panhandle counties combined. By 1890 the population was 778, and then followed a decline so that only 636 inhabitants were found in 1900. Since then a new era has been inaugurated, and in 1910 the population of the county was 5,258, in 1920, 7,397.
As elsewhere noted, the pioneer stockmen began operations in the Panhandle about 1876. A year or so later Fort Elliott was established as a military garrison in Wheeler County, and in that general vicinity a number of stockmen established their headquarters. One of the results of this settlement in the Panhandle was the organization in 1878 of Wheeler County, parent county of all the Panhandle counties. The organization was effected by the Commissioner's Court of Clay County, to which all the Panhandle counties had up to that time been attached. Then Donley and Oldham counties were organized by the
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Commissioner's Court of Wheeler County, and soon the Thirty-first Judicial District was formed, its court being the only one in the Pan- handle for a long time and its seat being Mobeetie, which is a town with many pioneer associations, and practically all the old time law- yers practicing in Northwest Texas, and many of the cattlemen and merchants have many recollections of that old court town. Wheeler County was the nucleus of settlement in the Panhandle until the rail- road came. After the Fort Worth & Denver City began building from Fort Worth, it was expected that the line would pass through Wheeler County, and a considerable impetus to building was given to Mobeetie. When the railroad did reach the Panhandle in 1888 its line was many miles south of old Mobeetie, and no railroad pene- trated Wheeler County until 1903, when the Choctaw, Rock Island & Gulf, now a division of the Rock Island System, was completed along the southern border to Amarillo.
A statistical report on the county in 1882 estimated that about 1,000 acres were in cultivation, while stock raising was the almost exclusive pursuit of the inhabitants, and the assessment rolls for that year indicated about 65,000 cattle in the county. The same report said : "Mobeetie, the county seat, has about 200 inhabitants, a good free school and a number of general merchandise stores. Religious con- veniences are meager, and the population is as yet so scattered that free schools have not been thoroughly organized." Wheeler County in 1882 had an aggregate of taxable property valued at $764,838, over two-thirds of which was represented by live stock; the valuation in 1903 was $1,302,120; in 1913, $3,811,538; in 1920, $4,914,370. The principal shipping points in the county are Shamrock, Benonine and Ransdell.
The rather rapid development of the county in recent years is indi- cated in the increase of "improved land," as designated by the United States census, from about 12,000 acres in 1900 to about 169,000 acres in 1910. In 1900 there were about 119 farms, and in 1910, 736. The total area of the county is 572,800 acres, of which 458,080 acres were reported in farms or ranches in 1910. In 1920 there were enumerated 38,767 cattle, 6,866 horses and mules. The county is well watered, with both a surface and underground supply, and there are splendid possibilities for agricultural development, which, up to the present time, has only fairly begun. In 1919 the acreage in the principal crops was as follows: Corn, 43,198; hay and forage crops, 10,638, including about 950 acres in alfalfa ; kafir corn and milo maize, 4,777 ; cotton, 3,590; wheat, 1,631; also a limited acreage in oats; about 550 acres in potatoes, sweet potatoes and other vegetables, while consid- erable progress has been made in horticulture; about 19,000 orchard fruit trees have been enumerated, besides a number of vineyards and small fruits.
WICHITA COUNTY
Wichita County has come into special fame in recent years as one of the chief centers of oil and gas production. The gas field at Petrolia in Clay County had been opened in 1907. In June, 1911, the bringing in of a 1,000-barrel well at Electra in the western part of
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Wichita County inaugurated the development of a field which at the beginning of 1913 had over 300 producing wells, and is now regarded as the chief center of oil production in the state. During 1911 the production of the Electra field was nearly 900,000 barrels. In July, 1912, at the north side of the county and three miles from the town of Burkburnett, near the Red River, another successful well was brought in. The development of these fields has brought a wealth to Wichita County which excels that of other productive industries, but so recent as to furnish no reliable statistics to measure their results. Gas and oil have contributed to the making of Wichita Falls, already a flour- ishing railroad and commercial center, one of the most attractive cities for manufacturing enterprises in North Texas.
Wichita County was created in 1858, but was not permanently organized until June, 1882. Practically all of its history has been
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HIGH SCHOOL, WICHITA FALLS
written within the last thirty years. The Red River is its northern boundary, and, like other counties adjoining, its position was too exposed with reference to the Indian Territory to allow settlement and substantial industry until the beginning of the '80s. At the census of 1880 the population was only 433, and the stock raisers who inhab ited the county attempted a minimum of agriculture. During 1882 the Fort Worth & Denver City Railway was completed from Fort Worth to Wichita Falls, which remained its terminus until 1885. At that time there were three postoffices in the county. Wichita Falls. Gilbert and Toksana, the last two having disappeared from local geography.
With the railroad the county progressed rapidly, and by 1890 its population was 4,831 ; in 1900, 5,806; in 1910, 16,094 ; in 1920, 72,911.
Small farmers have developed the possibilities of fruit, vegetables and melon crops. The value of taxable property in the county in
Wichita County Hos Fine Farms
1919 BUMPER WHEAT CROP
GUERNSEY DAIRY HERD
IRRIGATED FRUIT FARM
PROLIFIC COTTON CROP
MODERN DAIRY
WICHITA COUNTY HAS FINE FARMS
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1882 was $412,031; in 1903, $3,899,660; in 1913, $18,507,195; in 1920, $72,043,810. During the past ten-year period the increase of wealth was nearly 500 per cent, and few counties of the state have developed so rapidly in the same length of time.
In the development of the county and particularly of the chief city railroads have played an important part. The Missouri, Kansas & Texas extended its line across the northern tier of counties as far as Henrietta by 1887, and soon afterwards to Wichita Falls. In 1890 the Wichita Valley Railroad was built from Wichita Falls southwest to Seymour. During 1903-04 the Wichita Falls & Oklahoma Railway was constructed from Wichita Falls northeasterly to Byers on the Red River, passing through what later became the Petrolia gas district. During the past decade the Wichita Falls & Northwestern has been constructed from Wichita Falls into Oklahoma, while the Wichita Falls & Southern leads south through Archer County. These lines have placed the chief city in direct communication with all the rich and developing territory of Northwest Texas, Southwest Oklahoma, and the chief market points in the entire southwest and western part of the United States.
While the development of Wichita County has been along the lines of stock raising and general farming, it has also become famous for its melons, particularly cantaloupes, and the growing of many special crops is the chief industry of a numerous colony of small farmers. A large amount of northern capital and northern settlers as well have come into the county during the past fifteen years, and the town of Iowa Park, a few miles west of Wichita Falls, developed as the seat of an enterprising colony from the state of Iowa.
Statistics on live stock and agriculture as supplied by the last enumeration report as follows: Total area, 386,560 acres; 326,628 acres in farms; about 175,000 acres in "improved land," as compared with 106,000 acres in 1900. The number of farms at the last census was 1,039, and 423 in 1900. There were 11,607 cattle; horses and mules, about 4,866 ; hogs, 4.933. In 1909, 46,215 acres were planted in corn, which is the leading crop ; 23,794 acres in cotton, 33,000 acres in wheat, 7,214 acres in oats, 6,584 acres in hay and forage crops. About 13,000 trees were enumerated in orchard fruit.
Outside of Wichita Falls the chief towns are Iowa Park, Electra and Burkburnett. At the last census Electra had a population of 640 and Iowa Park of 603.
The city of Wichita Falls has always been the chief center ot population, and in 1910 more than half the inhabitants of the county were located there. The population in 1890 was 1,987; in 1900, 2,480 ; in 1910, 8,200; and in 1920, 40,079. It is easily one of the most pro- gressive and prosperous small cities of the state. Railroads gave it a start, and since then the presence of enterprising citizens and the abundance of such resources as oil and gas have brought about a city whose prosperity comes from its railway division points and shops, its extensive retail and wholesale trade, and its varied manufactures. The supply of natural gas, which is piped from the Petrolia field and sold to manufacturers at from four to eight cents a thousand feet, has
A BUSINESS STREET IN WICHITA FALLS, SHOWING THE NEW LIGHTING SYSTEM
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brought several important industries from other cities and states to Wichita Falls. The city also is benefited by the daily production of more than 33,000 barrels of oil. At the beginning of 1914 the Cham- ber of Commerce enumerated more than forty manufacturing plants, most of which had been established within the last five years. These include a factory for the manufacture of auto trucks, a window glass factory, a bottle factory, a pottery, a fruit jar factory, flour mill, rail- road shop, iron foundry, machine shops, ice factories, planing mills. brick and tile plants, broom factory, cotton compress, oil mills and many minor enterprises. About ten or twelve years ago some enter- prising capitalists built a dam across Holliday Creek, five miles south- west of Wichita Falls, and thus created Lake Wichita, a body of water two miles by seven miles, furnishing water for the irrigation of several thousand acres of truck and fruit and other crops, water for the city and manufacturing purposes, while the lake itself has become a most attractive resort for the people of the city and of several counties. Owing to the rapid progress of the last ten years Wichita Falls now has 40,079 people. It has fully a third of the taxable values found in the entire county. It is a city of many hand- some churches, well equipped and thoroughly organized with public schools, has a Federal building, hospital, street cars, the business sec- tion is paved, and its business buildings and the character and atmos- phere of the city in general are in advance of older and more populous centers in the Southwest.
WICHITA FALLS, THE CITY THAT FAITH BUILT
While Wichita Falls is known throughout the world as the chief city adjacent to the great new oil fields of North Texas, the far-seeing city builders who have built Wichita Falls from a village to the metropolis of the Northwest Texas Plains wish it to be known for its advantages as a home city, its new and magnificent buildings and its jobbing and agricultural resources as well as for its oil supremacy. As this book is being prepared for the press Wichita Falls is just coming into its own as a metropolitan city, having passed through the trying "growing pains" incident to the oil boom, which began here in July, 1918, and has lasted with more or less intensity until late in 1920, and the community has been busily engaged in transforming itself with the facilities necessary to take care of a population three times that which it had two years ago.
In June, 1918, Wichita Falls was a live, prosperous little West Texas city with a population of about 18,000. By June, 1919, this city was the center of oil operations and activities the like of which the world has rarely, if ever, witnessed. The population by that date, including transient oil operators, workmen and curious sight-seers, probably ran as high as 50,000, though all of these were never con- sidered as citizens. The United States census of 1920 gives Wichita Falls 40,079, and this is believed to have been a very accurate count. The population of the city in 1910 was 8,200. The increase in popu - lation from 1910 to 1920 was 388 per cent, possibly the largest percen- tage of increase shown by any city which was listed in the 1910 census.
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Wichita Falls enjoys the rare distinction of being the distributing center and the home city for the operators of a vast oil region without the unpleasant features of having oil wells right in the city. If the oil wells of the Wichita Falls district had been arranged by a blue print plan in advance they could not have been much more desirably located. There is one field at Burkburnett, sixteen miles north; the Northwest Extension, twenty-five miles northwest; the Petrolia field, twenty-five miles northeast; Iowa Park shallow field, twenty- five miles west; Electra field, twenty-six miles west; the Kemp- Munger-Allen field, sixteen miles southwest; the Texhoma field, twelve miles north ; the new Parker field, eight miles west ; the Holliday wells, seven miles south; South Bend, forty miles south ; Breckenridge, seventy-five miles south; all of which fields recognize Wichita Falls as the center of finances and supplies.
The people of Wichita Falls realize that the accidental discovery of oil is a bit of good fortune which is to be utilized to the utmost, but they do not depend upon oil exclusively as the reason for the future growth of Wichita Falls.
The actual pipe line runs for this district at this time (Decem- ber, 1920) are approximately 85,000 barrels per day. This remark- able "crop" turns into the coffers of this city and its various com- panies and operators about $9,000,000 per month.
Cities, like men, come face to face with circumstances in the course of their lives which test the utmost there is in them. And it is at such epochal times that the final degree of success can be truly pre- dicted-for man or city. When a man gets "his chance" and makes good, we say he has arrived. When a city has met the problems that such a critical time has brought to it, the world bows in homage and commercial ratings are revised in favor of the new metropolis.
Did you ever see an overgrown boy who needed to discard short trousers and don the larger garments of a man? He was uncomfortable. He was passing through a trying stage in his development. But his "growing pains" were a sure sign that he was about to be a man-a full- grown man.
Wichita Falls has had a spell of "growing pains." Here we have more than 40,000 live and hustling citizens where only about 18,000 lived a few short months ago. This is destined to be a man-size city -a new metropolis of the Southwest.
And Wichita Falls is meeting the new civic problems rapidly. Her changing skyline looms large against the western horizon. A multitude of oil derricks are overshadowed by great sky-scrapers in this new citadel of fortune.
BANKING
Wichita Falls has the largest bank in West Texas, the City National Bank of Commerce, with resources of more than $20,000,000. The six banks of Wichita Falls had deposits at the last call of approximately $30,000,000. Wichita Falls is fifth among the cities of Texas in bank deposits and eighth in population. Wichita Falls paid more income tax to the United States Government than any other city in Texas.
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NEW BUILDINGS
Wichita Falls has more newly completed buildings than any other city of twice its size in the Southwest. The list includes the twelve- story City National Bank of Commerce Building, twelve-story American National Bank Building, eight-story Bob Waggoner Building and eight- . story Kemp Hotel, newly opened and representing an investment of $1,500.000. There is not a more elegantly appointed hotel in the South- west than the Kemp, of this city.
AN OIL SCENE
OIL MONEY STAYS IN WICHITA FALLS
It is a source of gratification to the leaders of Wichita Falls that a very large proportion of the money made by operators in this field has stayed in Wichita Falls in the form of permanent investments in magnificent residences, tall office buildings and in fertile farms in this county. The custom of investing in country homes adjacent to the new $5,000,000 irrigation project is growing in favor. The fertile lands of the valley of the Wichita River are to be irrigated by a project now being started. The bonds have already been voted and work on constructing the dam will be begun early in 1921. This project will make Wichita
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Falls the center of a thickly populated agricultural section in which the twenty-acre, intensively cultivated, one-family farm will be typical.
ROADS
$3,000,000 is being spent for the construction of a system of forty- six miles of concrete roads throughout the county. Five miles of this road has just been completed, from Wichita Falls south to the Archer County line.
$8,000,000 will be spent by the city and county on public works, including roads, streets and large sewer and water systems and municipal improvements during the next two years.
RAILROADS
Wichita Falls has six railroads and Wichita Falls capital is now extending the Wichita Southern from Newcastle south through Graham and Eliasville to Breckenridge to connect with these important points in the Southern oil fields.
MANUFACTURING AND JOBBING
Wichita Falls has a manufacturing and jobbing business totaling approximately $40,000,000 annually. Two of its factories, the Wichita Motors Company, making Wichita Trucks, and the Wichita Mill and Elevator Company, making Belle of Wichita Flour, distribute their products to many foreign countries.
MAGNIFICENT STORES
Wichita Falls prides itself on the quality of its retail mercantile establishments. Its stores, in appointments and in range of stock and selection, rank with the best among the cities of the Southwest. Its annual volume of retail sales approximate $30,000,000.
The Wichita Falls Chamber of Commerce is one of the largest and best financed organizations of any city of twice the size in the South. Without disparaging its great material resources, Wichita Falls counts the spirit of its people its greatest asset. It is proud to be known as "The City That Faith Built," and the chief idea of its Chamber of Commerce is "To Make Wichita Falls a Better Place in Which to Live."
WINKLER COUNTY
Winkler County touches the southeastern corner of New Mexico. and was created from Tom Green County in 1887, but remained without a county government until 1910. Its soil is sandy for the most part. and while an underground water supply may be obtained in many places it is a country which will have very little agricultural development at least for many years. Its ranges have been occupied by stockmen for thirty years or more, and there is no important development to be re- corded except a very gradual breaking up of the larger ranges and the cultivation of limited areas by dry farming methods. The Texas & Pacific Railway touches the southeast corner of the county and made it accessible many years before settlers came in any numbers.
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In 1890 the county was accorded a population of eighteen; in 1900, sixty ; in 1910, 442; and in 1920, 481. Since the organization of the county the Village of Kermit, near the center of the county, has been made the county seat, and is the only town in the county. The total assessment in 1909 was $818,363; in 1913, $1,085,473; and in 1920, $7,997,670. Of the total area of 540,160 acres, more than half was classified as farms or ranches according to the last census report, but only 638 acres were "improved land." There were 128 farms enumer- ated, as compared with twelve at the preceding census. The last census afforded no statistics on agriculture, except about 200 acres planted in hay and forage crops. The number of cattle were - 8,445; horses and mules, 273; sheep, 7,441.
WISE COUNTY
Wise County, northwest of Tarrant County and Fort Worth, was created by the Legislature from the original Cooke County in 1856, and its county government was organized on May 5th of the same year. The first settlers penetrated into the county under the protection of the military post at Fort Worth, and its population by the end of the '50s was over fifteen hundred. In 1858 it was estimated that about six thousand acres of land were in cultivation, but throughout that decade the county was on the frontier. In 1856 the only postoffices in the county were Odessa and Taylorville. The county seat was established at Decatur, and that was a point on the route of the Overland Southern Pacific Mail, the government stage line put in operation about 1858. During the Civil war decade population decreased in Wise County. The Texas Almanac for 1867 said: "There is not a mill in Wise County, the nearest being at Weatherford, forty miles away. A large quantity of wheat is raised in the county, and large numbers of cattle are raised and driven away to market." In January. 1870, a Decatur citizen wrote that there had been no Indians for three months, and "most of our citizens who moved away last spring are moving back again. This county, although on the borders, is establishing three good schools, at Prairie Point, on Deep Creek and at Decatur." A traveler in Wise County in the next year speaks of Boyd's Mill in the south part of the county, the town having been located soon after the war, where at the time of writing there were a postoffice, steam mill, two dry goods stores. "While there," continues this observer, "I was informed of a new town that had sprung up two miles away, and rode by. On the roadside is handsome new storehouse. This place we proposed to christen 'Aurora.'" The Almanac for 1867 gives the voting population of Wise County at about four hundred, and goes on to state that there are "few freedmen in the county ; we have no bureau, and they are quite happy and contented. There are as yet no postoffices established (meaning that postal service had not been resumed since the close of the war). Decatur and Prairie Point were two flourishing villages before the war, and are beginning to look up again. Owing to the defenseless state of the frontier Indian raids are frequent."
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