Name: Idalou, Texas
Address: Idalou, TX

Idalou, TX RoadyGoat

Idalou, Texas, it's a place where the land stretches out forever, almost a painting in browns and blues under that big Texas sky. You can feel the peace out here, see it in the friendly waves you get driving down the road. Cotton's still king, same as it ever was, though folks remember the Dust Bowl, how it nearly choked the life out of everything. But Idalou’s got grit, always has.

Idalou, TX RoadyGoat

Idalou's always been a place where you could set your watch by the seasons—planting in the spring, harvest in the fall. Cotton's king here, always has been, stretching out across the plains as far as you can see. It’s not the Dust Bowl, nothing like that, but the conversations at the Dairy Queen are different now. It’s about water, or rather, the lack of it. The Ogallala Aquifer, that giant underground reservoir we all depend on, has been shrinking for years. You can see it in the fields—farmers having to make tough choices about what to plant, how much to irrigate. The old ways of doing things just aren't sustainable anymore. It's forced folks to innovate, to try new techniques, to have some hard discussions about the future of farming, and the future of Idalou itself. It's a challenge, no doubt, but there's a real sense of community here, a willingness to work together to find solutions. And maybe, just maybe, that spirit will see us through. We’ve weathered tough times before, after all.

Idalou, TX RoadyGoat

Idalou wasn't always here, but when the Crosby County Railroad laid its tracks across the high plains, it might as well have sprung up overnight. Before that, it was just windswept prairie, good for grazing maybe, but not much else. Then suddenly, it was a shipping point, a place to load cotton grown in the rich red dirt of the surrounding fields. The altitude, a little over 3,300 feet, gives you these incredible, wide-open views, and I reckon folks just saw opportunity out on that horizon. Naming it for the railroad man's daughters, Ida and Lou, well, that was just good business. Of course, it hasn't always been easy. The Dust Bowl hit hard, just like everywhere else on the South Plains. You can still hear stories about families packing up everything they owned and heading west, hoping for a better life. But Idalou held on, and cotton's still king. But the ones who stay, the ones who raise their families here, they'll tell you it's the quiet, the community, the kind of place where everyone knows your name. And maybe, just maybe, the spirit of those '58 Wildcats still hangs in the air, a reminder that even a small town can achieve something great.

Idalou Cemetery

1920

John William Turner, Jr. and his wife, Mary Alice, deeded two acres of their farm as a burial ground in 1920. At this time, the Idalou Cemetery Association was formed. The first interment was for the Turners' infant nephew, Weldon Fred Turner, whose grave is indicated by a homemade marker. In May 1921, C.J. and Mary Hallmark buried their infant son C.J., and 13-year-old Mable Gladis Andrews was interred in July. In 1928, the Turners and Selma Graves donate more land to the burial ground. Over the next decades, the association accepted additional land donations, which increased the cemetery to its present size of eight acres. In the early twenty-first century, a non-denominational memorial chapel named after Madison Sowder (1927-2007), longtime trustee, was added.
 Early leaders who served on the cemetery association include E.T. Daniell, W.M. Weaver and H.W. Lasater. Throughout its history, the cemetery has always been a public entity, owned and operated by the community, with volunteers and families attending workdays to help maintain the site.
 Today, the cemetery's features include curbed plots and numerous upright shoulder stones typical of 20th century grave marker designs, and the open prairie landscape highlights native plantings. Idalou is the final resting place of veterans of all branches of the U.S. military who served in peacetime and in all conflicts since World War I. Descendants from all over the United States are buried in the numerous traditional family plots located here. The cemetery is a link to the many generations who have contributed to the history of Idalou. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2002

Historical Marker →

Lubbock County

-12000

Lubbock County is located in Northwest Texas on the Southern High Plains, within the larger Great Plains of the western United States. The center of the county lies at 33°35' north latitude and 101°52' west longitude. Lubbock, its largest city, is 327 miles northwest of Dallas and 122 miles south of Amarillo. The county measures 893 square miles of flat tableland sloping gently from northwest to southeast, with elevations ranging from 2,900 to 3,400 feet. Its soils are mainly brown to reddish-brown loams and sandy loams, with smaller areas of grayish-brown, silty clay loams. These overlie a clay subsoil and, beneath that, at from two to three feet from the surface, a hardpan of caliche made of calcium carbonate. This caliche forms the Caprock , which has generally prevented streams from cutting their way through the area. Beneath the caliche zone lie beds of water-filled sand of varying thickness but averaging about 300 feet; these make up a part of the great Ogallala Aquifer, formed some ten million years ago as great rivers deposited sand from the Rocky Mountains over an area extending several hundred miles east of the mountains, from what is now Canada to the South Plains of Texas. In 1968 there were 922 small, wind-scoured lakes called playas dotting the county and providing refuge for wildfowl. These are formed by runoff from rainwater and range in size from less than an acre to more than fifty acres. Grasses are predominantly buffalo and blue grama, and in summer there is a profusion of wildflowers, including daisies, buttercups, verbena, and Indian paintbrush, together with scattered yucca and catclaw. Before its settlement the county was treeless, except for cottonwoods and hackberries in the canyons. In later times Chinese elms, oaks, pines, cedars, and a few other trees were introduced, along with mesquite in the nineteenth century. The county is classed as semiarid; its average annual rainfall is 18.41 inches, most of which occurs during the growing season of 208 days. The average minimum temperature in January is 25° F, and the maximum in July averages 92°. Lubbock County is one of the oldest inhabited places in the state, if not the oldest. In the northern part of the city of Lubbock is the archeological site known as the Lubbock Lake Site, the first archeological site in Texas to be entered on the National Register of Historic Places ( see LUBBOCK LAKE NATIONAL HISTORIC AND STATE ARCHEOLOGICAL LANDMARK ). There, in Yellow House Canyon , preserved in the twenty-foot wall of a dry lakebed, lies one of the very few known records of human habitation in Texas reaching back uninterrupted for at least 12,000 years. There Paleo-Indians camped and hunted the elephant, camel, bison, giant bear, and prehistoric horse, all long since extinct. Although the evidence is not conclusive, some authorities believe Francisco Vásquez de Coronado was the first Spaniard to visit the lake, during his famous expedition of 1540. In 1629 Father Juan de Salas led an expedition that went down Black Water Draw to Yellow House Canyon on its way from Santa Fe to the South Concho River. In 1650 another expedition commanded by captains Hernán Martín and Diego del Castillo used the same route, as did Capt. Diego de Guadalajara four years later. Other Spanish expeditions traveled this same route and on their maps gave the name La Punta de Agua to the Lubbock Lake Site, which is now in Mackenzie Park . From 10,000 B.C. to about A.D. 1000 the plains were inhabited by bands of Indians who lived off the land. When the Spaniards reached the plains they found tribes they called Quecheros or Teyas, probably ancestors of the Apaches. About 1700 the Comanches (from a Ute word meaning "enemy") came onto the South Plains with their newly acquired horses. They quickly came to dominate an area stretching from north of the Red River south to the Edwards Plateau , westward to New Mexico, and as far east as the Brazos River. The area of West Texas

Tsha Handbook → · 8.8 mi away

South Plains Army Air Field

1942

During World War II, nine preliminary and advanced military glider pilot training fields operated in Texas; one of the most prominent sites was located here. The U.S. Army Air Forces (USAAF) leased Lubbock Municipal Airport, and with help from the City of Lubbock expanded it for glider training. Opened in October 1942, the site was initially named South Plains Army Flying School, and later renamed South Plains Army Air Field (SPAAF). The mission of SPAAF was ground and advanced flight training for glider pilots who flew the “Waco CG-4A” glider––the USAAF's primary glider during the war. During its tenure, SPAAF trained nearly 80% of America’s combat glider pilots who served in major operations, such as Market Garden (Invasion of the Netherlands), Varsity (Invasion of Germany) and overlord (the “D-day” Allied Invasion of Normandy, France). SPAAF closed on April 1, 1945, more than a month before victory in Europe was declared. Designated surplus, the site was transferred to the War Assets Administration in December 1947. In 1949 the airfield returned to the City of Lubbock for municipal use, and in 1950 the city built a modern air terminal. Regional combat glider training facilities –– located in the Texas panhandle and South Plains –– were vital components of U.S. Military force projection capability during the war. In addition, the creation and maintenance of these bases contributed significantly to local economies during the war. In 1971, former glider pilots formed the National World War II Glider Pilots Association, Inc., providing the framework for the preservation of the history of the U.S. Combat Glider Program. Today, a key element in telling this story is the Silent Wings Museum, moved to this site and opened in October 2002.

Historical Marker → · 8.6 mi away

Moore, Patsy L. Smith

1946

Pat Moore, attorney and judge, was born on January 27, 1924, near Lorenzo, Texas, the daughter of W. L. and Gladys Smith. At the age of four she contracted polio and thereafter wore leg braces and used a crutch and cane for walking. She attended public schools in Ralls and graduated from Texas Tech University. She applied for admission to Southern Methodist University law school in 1946 and was refused admittance to the day school because she was a woman. Undaunted, she enrolled in the evening school and, on the basis of her academic record, was permitted to transfer to the day school after one semester. She received her degree in 1949 and passed the bar examination shortly afterward. She joined a Lubbock law firm and was the city's first woman attorney. She then opened her own law office and married James F. Moore, a former law school classmate and practicing attorney in September 1950. From 1952 to 1956 she was cochairman of the Texas Bar Association State Legal Aid Commission and helped establish the Lubbock County Legal Aid Commission. In 1953 she became the first woman president of the Lubbock County Bar Association, and four years later she was elected judge of Lubbock County Court at Law, Number Two. In 1968 she was elected the first woman judge of the Seventy-Second District Court (Crosby and Lubbock counties). Judge Moore was committed to civic work for the underprivileged and helped establish a clinic for the intellectually disabled in Lubbock. She was named Woman of the Year by the Lubbock Altrusa Club in 1965, and in 1972 she received the Southern Methodist University Woman of Achievement Award. She died on January 11, 1975, survived by her husband, son, and daughter.

Tsha Handbook → · 8.4 mi away

W. G. McMillan Construction Company

1924

W.G. McMillan came to Lubbock in 1924 to assist in the construction of the Hotel Lubbock. McMillan stayed, and over the next thirty years oversaw over 850 construction projects. Some of McMillan’s first projects included the 1926 Conoco service station, followed by completion of the Meadowbrook Golf Course. In 1930, McMillan completed the Lubbock Municipal Airport that still exists today. During World War II, McMillan played a significant role in the local war effort and the wartime history of Texas. In 1942, McMillan built 220 structures at South Plains Army Air Field, where glider pilots prepared for D-day and other invasions. Under McMillan and his son, numerous additional buildings were constructed on military bases and air fields in the area. The McMillan Construction Company (later known as McMillan and Son Construction Company) completed a multitude of projects, including airports, schools, public buildings, hospitals, grocery stores, churches, sporting venues, and numerous buildings on the Texas Tech campus. In addition to construction projects, W.G. McMillan also served the community through social, educational, and political organizations. McMillan was a member of the Kiwanis Club and Methodist Church, helped form the Plains Museum Society (later called the West Texas Museum Association) and constructed the original museum building in 1936. He participated in archeological digs, hunting expeditions, and community service projects. The W.G. McMillan construction company performed a significant and contributing role in the economic, physical, and commercial development of Lubbock. 175 Years of Texas Independence * 1836-2011

Historical Marker → · 8.6 mi away

Idalou, Texas

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