Roscoe Sophomore to Attend Texas Academy of Math and Science

Arwen Elmore.

Congratulations to RCISD sophomore Arwen Elmore, who will be heading off to the University of North Texas in the fall. Arwen has been accepted into the Texas Academy of Math and Science (TAMS), a residential early college program for gifted high school students.

TAMS students are full-time college students, taking UNT courses, but they live in a dorm and participate in many activities with other early college students. TAMS offers five tracks of study: Traditional Science, Computer Science and Computer Engineering, Music, Visual Arts and Design, and Media Arts. Arwen will be in the Traditional Science track.

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PLOWBOYS WIN ONE, LOSE THREE

Antonio Aguayo shoots a layup in last night's game with Stamford.

The Plowboys won their district opener with Albany, leading all the way and defeating the Lions 47-42 in a home game on Friday, January 17. Ryan Highsmith led the Plowboys with a season-high 21 points. Unfortunately, that was the Plowboys only victory in four district games. They lost a close one to Haskell 36-32 in Haskell, another close one to Cross Plains at home 51-48, and a loss to Stamford at home yesterday evening 83-34.

The coming week they play Hawley here on Friday evening and Albany in Albany next Tuesday.

Here are the stats for each of the last four games:

Plowboys 49 – Albany 42

Scores by quarters:
Plowboys          15        25        31        49
Albany                2        13        22        42

Individual Plowboy scoring: Ryan Highsmith 21, Tristan Baker 10, Hunter Anglin 9, Brayan Medina 5, Zachary Parrott 2.

Haskell 36 – Plowboys 32

Scores by quarters:
Haskell             8          13        24        36
Plowboys          7          17        23        32

Individual Plowboy scoring: Baker 13, Anglin 8, Highsmith 4, Antonio Aguayo 3, Parrott 2, Medina 2.

Cross Plains 51 – Plowboys 48

Scores by quarters:
Cross Plains        5        22        33        51
Plowboys           12        16        36        48

Individual Plowboy scoring: Anglin 14, Medina 13, Highsmith 8, Martinez 7, Baker 6.

Stamford 83 – Plowboys 34
Scores by quarters:
Stamford          20        47        69        83
Plowboys            8        19        28        34

Individual Plowboy scoring: Martinez 8, Highsmith 8, Baker 6, Medina 6, Anglin 5, Aguayo 1.

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PLOWGIRLS LOSE FOUR DISTRICT GAMES

Carson Greenwood shoots a free throw against Stamford.

The Plowgirls played four district games in the last two weeks, losing all four, to Albany at home 51-28, to Haskell in Haskell 72-29, to Cross Plains at home 51-41, and last night to Stamford at home 67-25.

Their next games are with Hawley at home Friday evening and with Albany in Albany next Tuesday.

Here are the stats for each of the last four games:

Albany 51 – Plowgirls 28

The Plowgirls lost to Albany at home Friday, January 18, 51-28

Scores by quarters:
Albany             12        30        41        51
Plowgirls         11        14         21        28

Individual Plowgirl scoring: Carson Greenwood 11, Shauna McCambridge 7, Mia Lavalais 6, Cameron Greenwood 2, Riley Sheridan 2.

Haskell 72 – Plowgirls 29
Scores by quarters:
Haskell              19        37        51         79
Plowgirls            0          6        20        29

Cr. Greenwood 16, McCambridge 5, Cm. Greenwood 4, Lavalais 3, Kaylea Perez 1.

Cross Plains 51 – Plowgirls 41

Scores by quarters:
Cross Plains      14        28        39        51
Plowgirls           10        16        28        41

Individual Plowgirl scoring: McCambridge 19, Cm. Greenwood 8, Cr. Greenwood 6, Perez 6, Anahi Ortega-Solis 2.

Stamford 67 – Plowgirls 25

Scores by quarters:
Stamford          15        35        56        67
Plowgirls            5        11         19        25

Individual Plowgirl scoring: Cr. Greenwood 11, McCambridge 6, Perez 4, Cm. Greenwood 4.

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ROSCOE IN YEARS GONE BY: ROSCOE'S HEYDAY 1904-1916

Editor’s note: If there was ever a time that might be called Roscoe’s heyday, it would be the years from around 1904 to 1916. In those twelve years, the town went from a hamlet with a railroad depot, a few businesses, and about 300 inhabitants to an incorporated town with a burgeoning population, a good school, several churches, a new railroad, and a bustling business district. Its citizens were confident that the good times were at hand and would continue into the future. This optimism was a part of the community’s character that went unchecked until the severe drouth of 1917 and 1918.  

Part 1 - 1904-1909

The coming of the twentieth century was a time of great optimism in America. Scientific discoveries and innovations such as electric lights, telephones, trains, and horseless carriages pointed to a better and more prosperous way of life. And the nation was rapidly becoming an established power in the modern world, no longer just a post-colonial outpost far away across the sea.

In west Texas, the wild west had been tamed, the buffaloes and Comanches were gone, and, more recently, so were the open range, cattle drives, and frontier lawlessness. In their place were incoming settlers hoping to live new and better lives in and around the new towns springing up along the railroads with their churches, schools, virgin farmland, and business opportunities—and Roscoe was one of these.

The slow and sporadic growth that marked west Texas in the 1890s continued into the first couple of years of the new century. The 1900 US Census population of 296 recorded for Nolan County Precinct 5, which included Roscoe, was about the same as it had been in 1892 and 1895, as the population increased in good years and fell during drouths. Newspapers of the time reported little about Roscoe, but that soon began to change. As the open prairie was sold to settlers breaking it up into farms, Roscoe began to grow and develop as its population boomed. By the 1910 US Census, Nolan County Precinct 5 would have a population of 2,896, almost ten times the 296 it had in 1900, and the newly incorporated city of Roscoe would have 941.* 

* Sweetwater experienced a similar upsurge with a recorded population of 670 in 1900 and 4,176 in 1910.

Roscoe High School on a colorized postcard in 1904.

Significant town development must have begun in 1903 or 1904, and the area’s attraction was the quality of the blackland soil and the abundance of good underground water. People were moving in primarily from the east and southeast, mostly from east and central Texas, along with some from southern states like Alabama, Mississippi, and Georgia. West of Roscoe, a German community was growing, made up of more first and second-generation German-Americans than of fresh immigrants just off the boat.

A new two-story school building was built in 1904, and a high school established around this time. A Roscoe Times editorial of May 18, 1906, states, “As we now have 11 grades and the divisions of Primary, Grammar, and High School thoroughly established, we can with accuracy compare our school with others and are certain our standing is second to none.”*

* In those days, children didn’t typically start to school until they were seven years old, and 11 grades for public schools was standard.

More businesses with brick buildings also went up downtown starting around 1905. The author of the article “Roscoe, the Magic City of West Texas,” published in the Sweetwater Telegram in 1908, describes it this way: “Three years ago Roscoe was a small station on the Texas & Pacific, just like any other of the little hamlets that lie between cities along the line of the great trans-state railway. Early in the year 1905 the town began to build up and take on signs of a determination to become a city. Several prominent property-holders erected substantial residences and business houses, and the building fever spread rapidly.”

In early 1906, the town got a weekly newspaper, The Roscoe Times, edited by Joe Pickle, which he and his successors would publish regularly for the rest of the century. In February, it reported a downtown boom: “There are now three stone business houses under construction. With exception of one, they are all nearing completion and will be ready for occupancy in a short time. These improvements mark a beginning of a permanent and substantial growth, the like of which this town has never seen before.”

In June of that year, the Times declared, “A long pull, a strong pull all together, and Roscoe will have 1000 inhabitants by January 1.” If this estimate is anywhere close to accurate, it means that the town’s population had tripled since the 1900 census. And even if it was an exaggeration, it was clear that the boom was on in Roscoe.

Also in June 1906, the town’s prospects for prosperity received a big boost when a group of businessmen from Abilene led by General F. W. James came to Roscoe with a plan to build a railroad to Snyder and, once that was completed, to extend it all the way through Post and Lubbock to the New Mexico line. In those days before good roads, railroads were key to development, and northwest Texas without a rail line south of Amarillo was a huge area in great need of one. James presented his proposal to city leaders in Roscoe and Snyder, and a deal was struck. The two cities promised free land and a $50,000 bonus if James’s group could complete a line from Roscoe to Snyder in two years. Surveying began in September, and on October 1 a charter was signed establishing the Roscoe, Snyder & Pacific Railway with its business office and roundhouse to be located in Roscoe.

Inaugural run of the RS&P on June 6, 1908.

Over the next several months, surveying was undertaken, groundwork laid, materials obtained, men hired, and grading done. Then on June 6, 1907, the laying of the track began, sometimes with as many as 300 workers for ten hours a day at 15ȼ an hour. A used locomotive was purchased from the Texas & Pacific Railway in November and was immediately put to use hauling materials as the track was laid. By May 1908 the track was completed all the way to Snyder by way of the new communities of Wastella and Hermleigh, and a regular schedule was established for both passengers and freight. After an inaugural run and a great celebration in Snyder, the train made daily runs to and from Snyder, while track laying resumed and continued on to the new town of Fluvanna, twenty miles northwest of Snyder and fifty from Roscoe. That’s as far as it ever got, however, because the Santa Fe railroad had meanwhile begun building a line from Lubbock to Coleman. Even so, the RS&P would go on to become one of the most prosperous short lines in the country and bolster the economies of Roscoe and Snyder for the next seventy-five years.

In fall of 1906, a group of Roscoe citizens established the Roscoe State Bank, and in December it opened its doors for business. It was located on the north side of Broadway downtown, east of where the Wildflower Boutique is today, but in 1911 it moved to a new building where the Roscoe Historical Museum is now. Its first officers were W. F. Jones, president; G. F. Light, vice president; E. L. Hopkins, cashier; and T. M. Dobbins, assistant cashier.

By 1907, the town had developed to the point that its citizens moved to incorporate. A vote was held on June 8, 1907, which passed 65 to 18. The town’s first mayor was Joe Pickle, the aldermen were W. C. Cress, J. J. Parker, and J. V. White, the marshal was Jack Yarbrough, and the city secretary was R. R. Haley. The town established a volunteer fire department at around the same time, and the city limits, or boundaries, were set.

1st Methodist Church, built in 1905, on a colorized post card.

It was also in these years that the various protestant denominations went from services in the small wooden schoolhouse they had all shared to separate church buildings of their own as congregations grew. There were two groups of Baptists, and in 1902 the more fundamental one built a church at 3rd and Bois d’Arc Streets, while the “domino-playing” Baptists (as my brother called them) erected a new wooden building around 1906 on the northeast corner of 4th and Main, on the same block as the present church. In 1905, the Methodists built a new church at the southeast corner of Cypress and 3rd Streets, where the Methodist Church still is today. The Church of Christ built a church in 1908 at 4th and Oak Streets on land donated by P. A. Smith. Two country churches were also established west of town—the Champion Baptist Church, organized in 1907, which met at the Champion school, and the Salem Lutheran Church, organized in 1909, which met at the Brownlee school.

Roscoe High School after the extension was added, 1909.

By 1908, there were enough students going to school in Roscoe that an election was held for the issuance of $6000 in bonds to enlarge the school building built only four years earlier. The proposition passed by a vote of 93 to 28, and the building’s two floors were extended back, as can be seen in the photos.* 

* Some later histories say that the second floor was built in 1908, but the photographs show that the second floor was already there in the original building.

And in 1909, Roscoe hosted the largest teachers’ meeting that had ever been held in west Texas when the Texas and Pacific Teachers’ Association chose Roscoe as the site for its two-day conference. Over 250 teachers from Cisco to Odessa on the T&P Railway attended, coming from Baird, Abilene, Merkel, Trent, Sweetwater, Loraine, Colorado City, Big Springs, and Stanton, as well as area schools on other rail lines that connected to the T&P, such as Snyder, Hermleigh, Anson, Hamlin, Haskell, and Roby. The meeting was reported on in the local newspapers as well as the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and Dallas Morning News. Taylor County Superintendent of Schools E. V. White told the Abilene Reporter-News that “the institute was a success, both in attendance and results accomplished,” and the Dallas Morning News reported that “Roscoe furnished free entertainment to the association and in such a manner as seemed to delight all present.” Part of the entertainment was a track meet with athletes from some of the participating schools. Also, the area railroads, i.e., the Texas & Pacific, Orient, and Roscoe, Snyder & Pacific, all offered reduced fares for teachers attending the meeting.

Downtown, the business section showed steady growth and improvement with new buildings going up and older wooden and tin structures being replaced by brick ones. In fact, most of the downtown buildings still standing today—and many that are now gone—were erected during this time.

The author of “Roscoe, the Magic City of West Texas” provides a revealing description of the downtown life and activity as it was in July 1908. He begins a walking tour on the north side of Cypress and First Street (now Broadway) and walks east from one business to the next until he reaches the end at the St. George Hotel on Laurel, then crosses the street and walks back, describing each of the businesses on the south side.

Harris Bros. & Johnson was on the south side of 1st Street downtown in 1908.

In the downtown area he covers, he finds three general stores, two grocery stores, three real estate offices, one doctor’s office, two hardware stores, a tailor shop, two restaurants, two barber shops (one with baths in the back), a second-hand store, the telephone office, a drug store, a harness shop, and two banks.

He then mentions that outside the downtown area just described that there is also a newspaper office, two hotels, three lumber yards, blacksmith shops, three cotton gins, one livery stable, four churches, and one of the best school buildings in west Texas. He doesn’t mention them, but also along Main Street there were the calaboose (a small jail primarily for overnight use), a wagon yard, and a public windmill and water trough.

In short, to all appearances and in all aspects, Roscoe was a thriving young city whose star was on the rise. As the author says as he closes his article, “Keep your eye on Roscoe.”

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WEATHER REPORT: MILD FOR JANUARY

Monday sunrise.

Since there was no Hard Times last week because I was busy in Dallas, this week’s weather report will cover the two weeks since January 15 rather than just the usual one. Those two weeks have been mild for January—not as mild as the first two weeks of the month when almost every day had highs in the 60s or 70s, but higher than normal nevertheless. The historical average daily maximum for January in Roscoe is 56°F and the average daily minimum is 29°.

Without averaging up the days for this month, it is clear that we are well over that. The lowest maximum so far this month was 48° on January 16, which was also the only daily maximum in the forties, although tomorrow is predicted to be the second. The lowest minimum so far this month has been 29° three times, including the morning with the snow, January 11. Twelve days had lows in the 30s (including this morning), 12 in the 40s, and one in the 50s, with two days left to go. The average rainfall for January is .98”, and on that this month was right on the button, with the official amount for January 17 at .96” plus however much moisture was in the light snow we got on January 11. In short, it’s been a warm January with the average amount of rainfall.

If you’ve been doing anything outside the past few days, you may have noticed the sounds coming from the sky as hundreds of sand cranes have been flying east in V’s, squawking as they go.

The forecast is for continued cool weather today and tomorrow with a high today of 54° and tomorrow only 44° with light north winds both days and lows of 34° and 33°. There is also a slight (20%) chance of rain tomorrow. Friday’s high will be 56°, and Saturday will be warm and sunny with a high of 66°, increasing on Sunday to 68° and Monday to 73°. Winds will shift from the north on Friday to the west on Saturday and the southwest on Sunday. Winds will be light to average until Monday when the southwest winds will be around 20mph.

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† TENNIE JEANETTE (WOOD) TALLY

Graveside services for Tennie Jeanette “Jean” (Wood) Tally, 93, were at 2:00pm yesterday, January 28, at Resthaven Cemetery in Brady with Tracy Pitcox officiating. She entered into eternal rest on Saturday, January 25, surrounded by her family in Sweetwater.

She was born July 19, 1926, in Brownwood to the late Tennie Kansas (Stanley) Wood and Louis Powers Wood. She married Melvin Lee Tally on January 13, 1946, in Brady and was a homemaker. In 1965 they moved and made their home in Maryneal, where they raised three children: Brenda Susan (Tally) Sissom, Kenneth Wayne Tally and Donna Jeanette (Tally) Porter. In 1983 they moved to Brady. They celebrated forty-three years together until Melvin passed on March 24, 1989.

Those left to celebrate her life and carry on her legacy are her children, Brenda Sissom of Snyder, Kenneth Tally of Eden, and Donna Porter and husband Pete of Roscoe; her sister, Sharron Ruth Morris and husband Charles of Post; seven grandchildren, Donald and Donna Pepp of Camden, Tennessee, Cheryl Tharp and Jason Sissom of Lubbock, Carolyn Ann and Joel Church of Fort Worth, Brandon Wayne Tally of Michigan, Jared Frank and wife Jessalyn Porter of Sweetwater, and Makayla Jeanette Porter of San Angelo; two bonus grandchildren, Kim and Daniel Aames of Amarillo, and Brett and Monica Brady of Fort Worth; eleven great-grandchildren, three bonus great-grandchildren; and seven great-great-grandchildren, as well as many nieces and nephews, and special friends Amanda Carson, James Yager, and Eduardo “Chino” Gallegos.

She is preceded in death by her parents, Tennie Kansas Wood and Louis Powers Wood; her husband, Melvin Lee Tally; her baby daughter, Cheryl Lynn Tally; brothers, Louis P Wood, Jr., and Jerry Lee Wood; and sister, Mary Helen Bird.

Our heartfelt thanks to everyone that helped take care of our mother/mawmaw including the Cogdell Home Health Hospice staff, Dr David Kerr, McWilliams Pharmacy, and our own Summer and Lee Walker for taking such loving care of her and making her final days at home as comfortable as possible before going into the Sweetwater Healthcare Center. The love and care of the staff of Hendrick Hospice and Sweetwater Healthcare for her as well as our family will always be remembered.

Tribute at Heritage Home Funeral, Brady.

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† MARAIHA ‘KAYLYN RUTH SHEARER

Funeral services for Maraiha `Kaylyn Ruth Shearer, 5, will be held on Saturday, February 1, at 10:00am at First United Methodist Church in Sweetwater. A graveside service will follow at the Roscoe Cemetery. Reverend Jackie Passmore will be officiating. She passed away on Sunday, January 26.

Family visitation will be held on Friday, January 31, from 6:00pm to 8:00pm at McCoy Funeral Home in Sweetwater.

The Big Country Homepage article may be accessed by clicking here.

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