September 13th, 2021 … Summer of Fun continues! Texas!

We departed our overnight site at the KOA Wichita Falls / Burkburnett Texas. It was a great overnight stop. We took I-44 back to US 82.

The next town we came to was Henrietta, Texas. It made me think of home, we used to go to Henrietta, New York to the mall. Henrietta Texas has some interesting history. When Cooke County was separated into two counties, the day before Christmas 1857, Clay County needed a seat of government. The centrally located town of Henrietta is the result. However, no one knows for sure the origin of the name. One rumor is that since the county was named after Henry Clay, a feminized version of his first name was in order, since ships, cities, and countries were once referred to as feminine. There wasn’t a fight for county seat, since it was the only real contender for the title. With just a store and about ten residences, and less than 110 people, tiny Henrietta had nowhere to go but up.

Nocona, which is known as the Classic Car Capital of Texas, is also home to the Horton Classic Car Museum. This classic car museum is an incredible compilation of cars, some of which are the most sought out antique automobiles in the world. Explore three massive building and find automobiles with far out stories. The Corvette collection is something worth seeing – every model from 1953 to 1973 all in one room, a very rare collection.

The Great Race Rally even came through Nocona on a promotional stop in June of 2021. What is the Great Race? It’s an antique, vintage, and collector car competitive controlled-speed endurance road rally on public highways. It is not a test of top speed. It is a test of a driver/navigator teams’ ability to follow precise course instructions and the cars ability to endure on a cross-country trip. The course instructions require the competing teams to drive at or below the posted speed limits at all times.  GPS or computers are not permitted, and odometers are taped over. This is a test of human mental agility and endurance as well as classic car endurance, rather than programming capability.

Nocona is also home to Nocona Boots. Nocona Boot Company was founded in 1925 by Miss Enid Justin, daughter of H.J. Justin the founder of Justin Boots. Her goal was simple – to carry on her father’s tradition of making quality western boots in the town he loved. H.J. “Daddy Joe” Justin was a perfectionist with every detail of his craft. He started the tradition of fine boot making and when the cowboys came through on cattle drives, he’d measure their feet and on the way back, they would pick up their boots. At the age of 12, in 1906, Miss Enid started working in her father’s shop learning the finer points of the trade, absorbing his knowledge and his love for the handcrafted boots. After “Daddy Joe” died in 1918, other members of the family wanted to move the business to Fort Worth. Miss Enid felt so strongly that her father wanted the company in Nocona, she stayed. She borrowed $5,000 to keep seven employees in her small shop and founded the Nocona Boot Company. Every pair of Nocona Boots was hand made here until the factory closed in 1999, taking the jobs of many of the townspeople with it. Sadly, Nocona boots are not made in Nocona, Texas anymore.

Also located in Nocona, Texas is Tails 'N' Trails Museum. For centuries, people have traveled through this portion of Texas. They traveled by foot, by horse and by wagon. Eventually they traveled by rail and road. Permanent settlements were slow in coming, but with the establishment of Head of Elm (now Saint Jo), the county soon began to grow.  Every individual who passed through left their footprints in time.  It has been a long time dream of the citizens of Montague County to have a place to showcase the mementos of their history.  The Tales 'N' Trails Museum provides the perfect repository for the relics and artifacts of the county's past. The Museum opened its doors in 2010 after fifteen years of planning and fundraising.  Funded primarily by local donations, the Museum was built on land donated by the heirs of Joe Benton, an early pillar of the community.  The Museum houses hundreds of Native American artifacts and European trade goods from the vast collection of Texana of the Joe Benton family. Mr Benton amassed the largest regional collection of Indian artifacts in the US, and only a fraction of that collection can be on display at any given time.  In addition to temporary exhibits which are continually rotated throughout the year, the Museum focuses on five separate topics which are instrumental to the history of this area: Native American Culture, Western Heritage, Agriculture, Leather Goods, the Oil and Gas Industry.

We went through the town of Saint Jo. As I said earlier, Saint Jo was first named Head of Elm. Because it was near the headwaters of the Elm Fork of the Trinity River. The town was considered briefly as the county seat, but lost out to Montague. By the early 1870s, Head of Elm was thriving – partially due to it’s location on the Chisholm Trail. However, there are two conflicting stories regarding how Head of Elm became Saint Jo, both of which involve Joe Howell, who originally laid out the town. One theory revolves around a Tennessean named Irby Holt Boggess giving leadership in partnership with Joe Howell, around 1872. The other theory involves Howell's personal beliefs. Howell was an avid opponent of alcoholic beverage sales, and was thereby given the nickname of "Saint Jo", which managed to stick to both Howell and the town he founded. Saint Jo remained a "dry" city until a vote in 2009 passed allowing for the legal sale of alcoholic beverages for off premises consumption.

We saw billboards advertising for Fischer's Meat Market. The billboards had a German boy on the billboard. As we entered Muenster, Texas - we quickly decided it was a very German town.

We learned that the town was established in 1899 as a German Catholic colony and named after the capital of Westphalia, Germany. The Flusche brothers (Emil and August) were land agents under contract to sell 22,000 acres to immigrant settlers. The brothers had had success in Iowa and Kansas so even before platting a new town, settlers were transmigrating from their Iowa and Kansas homes. By the end of 1889, thirty-some people had arrived and on December 8, they celebrated a Mass by the Reverend H. Brickley of Gainesville. That date is considered the founding date of the town. Muenster holds a "Germanfest" each spring.

Just before we got to Paris, we found this jack rabbit riding an oil derrick. Not sure what they were trying to advertise for? Or is there a subliminal message?

This carriage crossed the highway in front of us. Pretty scary to watch them cross 4 lanes of divided highway while traffic was coming in both directions!

We turned north in Paris to head toward Powderly Texas. We are spending the night at Sanders Cove COE campground on Pat Mayse Lake. We love our Corps of Engineer parks and what we get for such little money.

Pat Mayse Lake is located in the Red River Basin in Lamar County, Texas. The damsite is on Sanders Creek, a tributary of the Red River. Pat Mayse Lake provides excellent opportunities for fishing and hunting. Sport fish species in the lake include largemouth bass, white crappie, sunfish, striped bass, channel and flathead catfish, and other common species.

These lands are managed for upland game and white-tailed deer and are open to the public as a public hunting area. The lake also provides resting and feeding habitat for migratory waterfowl. A few miles north of the project area are the famed Red River Bottoms where waterfowl congregate in great numbers.

The game species present include deer, fox squirrel, gray squirrel, bobwhite quail, mourning dove, cottontail rabbit, raccoon, turkey, and fox. Furbearers such as opossum, beaver, mink, skunk, raccoon, and nutria are also present.

It was a great afternoon to relax while sitting outside and watching the wildlife!

#TwoLaneAdventures