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History in a Pecan
Shell
In
1902 J. F. Blankenship, Sam P. Ford, and a Mr. Pool started the town, the first
settlement in Terry County. Blankenship surveyed the townsite. The men were informed-incorrectly,
it was later discovered-that the land they had bought was at the center of the
county. A post office opened in 1903 with Mrs. Tom Bess as postmistress. The name
of the town was suggested by Washington postal authorities in honor of Máximo
Gómez, a Cuban general and patriot who had figured prominently in the recent Spanish-American
War.
The first building in Gomez was a general merchandise store,
Wolf and Ware. In 1903 J. T. Gainer gave up ranching to build a large general
store in Gomez, W. Craig established the first saloon, and Vernon Seitz built
the first public dance hall. That year T. J. Price, who owned the blacksmith shop,
circulated the first petition for the organization of the county, feeling sure
that Gomez would be the county seat. The founders boasted that Gomez was "the
metropolis of the plains." A school was established in 1903 in a one-room building
with a curtain between the two teachers' classes. The first teachers were W. P.
Florence and Miss Lula Spinks. H. H. Longbrake drilled a public well in the town
square that year, and by 1904 the square was surrounded by businesses, including
the Terry County Voice, the first newspaper in the county. The first cotton gin
in Gomez was built in 1904, marking the beginning of significant cotton production
in the county. When the election was held in 1904 to choose the county seat, the
newly established Brownfield won by a margin
of three votes. But Gomez continued to grow for a while. In 1907 the Gomez bank
was established with J. T. Gainer as its first president, but in 1909 it was moved
to Plains. Around 1910 Gomez residents and businesses
began to move to Brownfield. A. P. Moore strongly
believed that Gomez could be successful and built a general merchandise store
in 1910 that did well until 1920, when it burned.
Moore might have rebuilt
the store, except for the fact that in 1917 the South Plains and Santa Fe Railway
was built to the east of Gomez through Brownfield.
The old townsite of Gomez was abandoned in 1918 and reverted to farmland, and
a new townsite was established less than a mile north of the old site, along the
Brownfield-Roswell highway. All that is left of old Gomez is the cemetery, which
dates back to 1900 and was used until 1918.
The new Gomez has a gin and
a school. In 1927 it had a population of seventy-five, and in 1984 the population
was thirty. It was still listed as a community in 1990. In 2000 the population
was twelve. |
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Terry
County 1907 Postal Map showng Gomez
(Above "E" in TERRY. West of
Brownfield)
Courtesy Texas General Land Office |
Where
to Stay - Gomez Area Hotels
Brownfield
Hotels | Lubbock
Hotels
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