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FAIR PLAY,
TEXAS
Panola County,
East Texas
Highway 79, FM 124 and FM 1251
11 miles W of Carthage
Population: 80 (2000)
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The
closed Jerusalem Baptist Church in Fairplay
Photo courtesy Barclay Gibson, April 2006 |
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History in
a Pecan Shell
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. |
Carthage
: Music from two country masters
(Excerpted from "THE EAST TEXAS SUNDAY DRIVE BOOK" by
Bob Bowman)
"... At Beckville, take FM
124 and proceed in a southerly direction until you come to the community
of Fair Play at the intersection with U.S. 79. Travelers supposedly
gave the town its name in gratitude for the way they were treated
at John Allison's store, hotel and blacksmith shop in the l850s. One
legend tells the story of a young girl, member of a wagon train moving
west, who died here and was buried in a local cemetery. Over the years,
townspeople have tended to the grave as if it were one of their own.
Just down the road from Fair Play is another rural village known as
Rake Pocket, which supposedly got its name because merchants often
cheated visitors.
From Fair Play, take U.S. 79 back to Carthage,
completing your Sunday Drive." more
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