ROAD TRIP: A BBM Game

[nova20194]

Fort MacKay, AB

Fort MacKay is a hamlet in northern Alberta, Canada. It is located in the Wood Buffalo Municipal District, at the northern end of Highway 63, 64 km (40 mi) north of Fort McMurray. The Athabasca River flows east of the settlement.

It is served by the Fort MacKay/Horizon Airport (IATA: N/A, ICAO: CYNR).

Fort MacKay has a permanent population of 536, mostly first nation.

It was named in 1912 after Dr. Williams Morrison McKay, the first President of the Northern Alberta Medical Association.

The economy is centered around the development of the Athabasca oil sands.


(XYZ rule)

[MaineWriter]

Pancake, TX

 Mail delivery seemed to be a problem in Pancake - in fact most of what is written about the town in the Handbook of Texas involves postal infrastructure.

The name comes not from a flat-topped mountain or the terrain, but the first postmaster who had the unusual name of John R. Pancake. It opened in 1884 and closed in 1886.

Main was routed through Jonesboro until the community tried again (1894) to have their own post office. The new post office was designated Bush, Texas.

The town had a population of 200 Pancakers or Bushes in the mid-1890s. The name reverted to Pancake in 1901 and by 1908 the post office had closed again - mail going back to Jonesboro.

The population of Pancake dwindled and the town had only twenty-five residents from the 1930s through the 1960s when statistics stopped.

Pancake is shown on detailed county maps, but the town never had a cemetery of its own. Nearby Jonesboro or Turnersville provided ground for Pancake burials.

[MaineWriter]

It has been 11 days since anyone played a town! I know lots of our road-trippers are in Alberta but in an attempt to get the game going again, I am going to play a double play and also pick a letter at random (because I am sick of E towns.) Don't you think this might be considered...


Fair Play, TX

 John Allison was an ambitious man who is credited with being Fair Play's first citizen. Allison was a storekeeper / blacksmith who also operated a boardinghouse. When Panola County was organized in 1846, John Allison became the first Panola County Judge.

A post office opened in 1851 and a traveler is said to have been the source of the town's name. He expressed his feelings about the fair dealings he had received and evidently John Allison submitted this praise on the post office application. By 1885, Fair Play had a population of 100 with two schools, two churches, and basic businesses. By 1890 it had declined by half and the post office closed in 1904. Mail was thereafter sent through Beckville.

The population was reported at 90 during the Great Depression and the school merged with those in Carthage. Although many residents left after WWII, it still reported a population of 80 for the 2000 census.

(for the next player, XYZ rule applies)

[nova20194]

Gayford, AB


Gayford is a village in southern Alberta, approximately 70 kilometers east of Calgary, and about 15 kilometers west of Rockyford.  The village was established in 1911 and named Swastika, but the name was changed to Gayford during World War II.

[Meryl]

Dapp, AB

The community was named for David A. Pennicuick, railway accountant.



Hoary Redpoll
Photographed by Brenda Hudec, Dapp, Alberta

[MaineWriter]

Point Blank, TX

The village of Point Blank has a name that sounds like something out of an Old West novel. Actually, Point Blank was was originally named Blanc Point by a Frenchwoman who moved here from Alabama. The town was also known as Point White and White Point. There is a small cemetery on the banks of Lake Livingston, where Texas' second governor, George T. Wood, is buried.

Leslie

[nova20194]

Kane, WY


Kane is in Big Horn County.

The community was named after Riley Kane, cowboy

The latitude of Kane is 44.843N. The longitude is -108.202W.
It is in the Mountain Standard time zone. Elevation is 3,691 feet.

[Meryl]

Exum, TX

[MaineWriter]

McQueeney, TX

The town dates from 1870 and the Galveston, Harrisburg and San Antonio Railway arrived in 1876. Although the stop was named Hilda (there was also a Hilda in Gillespie County) it was renamed McQueeney, "in honor" of the superintendent of the Southern Pacific line. Actually it was a transparent ploy by storekeeper C. F. Blumberg to persuade the railroad to move the stop from Hilda to his store a mile away. The railroad didn't move - but when the post office opened (1900) it retained the name. By 1914 McQueeney had forty citizens.

Lake McQueeney, AKA Lake Abbott, was formed by damming the Guadalupe River in 1925. It soon became a popular recreation area.

Throughout the 1940s McQueeney had a population of 300 residents which has since increased to the present 2,500.

(XYZ rule applies!)

Leslie

[Fran]

Bosler, WY