ROAD TRIP: A BBM Game

[Lynne]

Daniel, WY

http://www.sublette.com/daniel/

[jpwagoneer1964]

Lamont, Wy

Lamont was named after homesteader James "Jimmie" Lamont. Lamont had a small store in his home and is credited with installing one of the first windmills in the area. With the discovery and drilling of oil in the area, the need for a post office was filled by establishing it in Lamont's store. The post office was named Lamont.

Mark

[memento]

Trueloves, Texas

History in a Pecan Shell

What little is known:

The Handbook of Texas states that the community had at least two schools - one built in 1907 replaced an earlier one called Lovejoy.

Trueloves was named after the grandsons of Jonathan Bird.

Lemuel and brother Jonathan Richard Trueloves settled in NE Johnson County sometime around 1870. Lemuel invested heavily in land and acquired several thousand acres. He also had other business interests including partnerships in several gins and banking.

[MaineWriter]

Streetman, TX

The Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway arrived in 1905 before the town was established. The following year the town came into being and was named to honor Sam Streetman of Houston, who had surveyed the town for the railroad. In 1907 the nearby community of Cade, Texas lost its post office to Streetman. A newspaper was published in 1912 and the town incorporated two years later with a population estimated at 600.

Streetman's first school classes were taught in a blacksmith shop in 1907. A designated building came in 1913 but during the school consolidation in the late 1940s, Streetman's school merged with those in Fairfield. Streetman's salad days ran from 1920 through the Great Depression. From a population of just over 500 in 1931, it declined after WWII as did most smaller towns in Texas. By the late 1970s the population was down to 239, and the town's school children were bussed to Fairfield. The figure given on the 2006 state map was 203 residents.

Leslie

[jpwagoneer1964]

Nolanville, Tx

NOLANVILLE, TEXAS. Nolanville is on South Nolan Creek, the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe line, and State Highway 190 just east of Killeen in western Bell County. It was originally named Nolan Valley, presumably for Nolan Creek, which was in turn named for explorer and filibuster Philip Nolan.qv It was one of the earliest white settlements in Bell County. The census of 1850 listed its population as forty-six. A post office named Noland Valley was opened there in 1878, and the railroad reached the community in the early 1880s. The town changed its name to Nolanville in 1883. Nolanville had been the old name for Belton before the latter became county seat in 1852. In 1884 Nolanville had 100 inhabitants, two mill-gins, three churches, and a school. A weekly newspaper, the Item, was started by 1896. Nolanville School, one of the larger rural schools in the county in the early twentieth century, had ninety pupils in 1903. The community had 150 to 200 residents through the mid-1940s but began to decline after World War II.qv After dropping to fifty inhabitants in the 1950s, the town began to revive in the 1960s and had 200 residents and six businesses when it incorporated in 1966. By the later 1960s Nolanville was caught up in the expansion of the Killeen-Fort Hood area, and, as a suburban community, its population shot up to 740 in 1968, 1,050 in 1974, 1,726 in 1988, and 1,834 in 1990.

[Fran]

Ezzell, TX

Ezzell is on Farm Road 531 ten miles south of Hallettsville and two miles north of the Lavaca River in southern Lavaca County.  It is the oldest settled area in the county.  Families from Stephen F. Austin'sqv colony settled at the site between 1830 and 1836 and traded at Petersburg, the old county seat, six miles to the north, until Sam and Ira Ezzell started a store during the Civil War.  A private school taught by literate slaves operated at Ezzell.  After the war, school was held in church buildings until 1883.  In 1980 Ezzell had a population of fifty-five, a church, a school, and no businesses.  The population was still reported as fifty-five in 2000.

[MaineWriter]

Lone Star, TX

 Once called "Skin Tight" after the business tactics of early trader and storekeeper Henry L. Reeves, the more acceptable name of Lone Star was submitted when a post office was applied for in 1883.---- The office was granted and Lone Star was off to a great start. With 160 people and a gristmill, cotton gin, a sawmill, store and school, the future looked bright. But "downtown" Lone Star burned in an 1893 fire. Rebuilding was immediate and the town doubled its population by the mid-1890s.

But with the new century, Lone Star started to dim. In 1903 the Texas and New Orleans Railroad bypassed the town and most residents moved to Ponta. The 1915 population was down to 200 and the post office closed in 1916.

Oil was discovered in 1939 and it seemed as though it might resurrect the town, but production was anemic and hopes were dashed.

Still, 73 people remained in Lone Star through WWII. The post-war population drifted away and except for a lone building, and a state historical marker, Lone Star joined a long list of former East Texas towns.

Leslie

[jpwagoneer1964]

Raymond, Wy

[Meryl]

Dolores Hidalgo, Mexico



Photo by Phil Douglis

Mask Toss, Dolores Hidalgo, Mexico, 2005

I found this young fellow incongruously flipping Halloween masks around in a market and strewing the floor with them. His mother summarily ended the proceedings just after I made the picture.

Halloween falls on October 31st. Mexico's Day of the Dead is celebrated on November 2nd. The two holidays are often confused with each other, and even celebrated jointly. Halloween is based on a European concept of death, and is populated by negative images of terror. The Day of The Dead is far different. It is a unique Indo-Hispanic custom demonstrating love and respect for one's ancestors, the continuance of life, and even finds humor in death -- all positive concepts.

I include this image in this gallery because it speaks of the innocence of youth. The horrific masks, some of them associated with death, are toys, nothing more. In a way, this image expresses the essence of The Day of The Dead. It is a holiday that can turn the concept of death into life, through play and pleasure.

[MaineWriter]

Oklaunion, TX

Originally named Mayflower, the town underwent a name change in 1883.

The town had hoped to be a major railroad crossroads, but the railroads involved chose Vernon instead. The hammered-together name Oklaunion was meant to signify a “union with Oklahoma”.

The high population of 400 in 1928 encouraged the town to incorporate – an act they dissolved in the 1970s. The population was 223 during WWII and the town has been in a slow decline ever since. A picturesque view of a typical Texas town can be viewed from the overpass of Hwy 287 – over Hwy 183.

Leslie