Birth of a Texas Ghost Town: Thurber, 1886–1933

Chapter 1 Introduction

Chapter 1 Introduction A s one travels eastward from Ranger, Texas, along Highway 80, the scenery is rather commonplace until one reaches the eastern edge of the mountain, overlooking a great valley which is divided among three counties—Eastland, Palo Pinto, and Erath. From this high point, one’s attention is immediately drawn to the conical and rectangular formations to the south and east. Against a background of mesquites, oaks, and cedars, the mottled appearance of the formations is without a doubt the dominating feature of the landscape. These red, black, and blue-gray mounds are coal dumps built from the refuse of the coal mines that once made Thurber the largest coal mining camp in the state of Texas. Thurber was located in the extreme northwestern corner of Erath County—32° 30' north latitude, 98° 25' west longitude. It was approximately 75 miles west of Fort Worth and about 90 miles east of Abilene. Thurber was in that portion of Erath County which may be described as “broken country.” It lay within the confines of an encircling chain of low hills, and as one looked down upon the town from any one of these higher levels, he was impressed by the air of protectiveness lent by these hills as they stood guard over all entries into the place. The town seemed secure within the lowest part of this cup-like formation for, with the exception of a few slight nicks and one narrow Chapter 1 2 break, the rim of the cup was unbroken. Those minor chips or nicks in the rim afforded the best means of entering or leaving the town; hence, all roads into Thurber, with the exception of one, came “over a hill.” This exception was the road to Mingus which passed northward through the only complete break in the encircling chain. Those hills which lay closest to the heart of Thurber seemed to have spurned all attempts to achieve individuality and had conformed to the conventional lines of flat-topped, elongated structures. Only the hills lying to the east and slightly beyond the inner rim impressed one as having striven to gain attention by casting aside the conventional forms accepted by their neighbors. These hills to the east dotted the landscape as isolated cones, squatty knob-like structures, and one hill of rectangular proportions stood out above all the rest. The hills which overlooked the town from the north, south, and west were not covered with excessive vegetation, but on all of these hills there were dwarfed mesquites, an occasional live oak, and a substantial amount of grass. Once again the hills to the east struck the discordant note by supporting an even smaller amount of vegetation, and in this state of near nakedness, they stood in further sharp contrast to their more modest neighbors. When one looked down upon the town, he could hardly fail to note the air of serene self-satisfaction which seemed to hang over it. It would be hard to say whether this complacent air was the result of the protectiveness of the ever-watchful circle of hills, or whether it was due to the instinctive knowledge that nowhere else in all the Southwest or perhaps in the world, was there another Thurber. Onesomehowfeltthatthetownitself,aswellasitspopulation,sensed the unusual forces which characterized the founding of it. For years the area had been looked upon as having practically no value. Suddenly the demand for coal brought prospectors, and the discovery of a workable vein of coal encouraged hundreds of miners to come in. The Europeans who came in numbers brought with them and firmly established their native customs in this West Texas setting. As if this were not enough Introduction 3 to make Thurber unique, Colonel Robert Dickey Hunter organized the camp “on a plan that closely resembled a socialistic state.”1 Every building and every inch of ground was Company owned. A four strand wire fence was put around the camp and this fence served to keep out those elements to which the authorities objected, such as peddlers, labor agitators , and union organizers. The natural resources were limited to coal and clay, both of which existed in quantity. The demand for coal was the economic factor which brought Thurber into existence, and the discovery of the nearby Ranger oilfield doomed it to extinction. For years, the owners and residents lived in the hope that some new stimulus would again...