Electra

This past weekend I was relaxing after my holiday party. I had fun, but I only one day off. So I watched movies and kept up with my events planner on Face Book.  I see a post from my sister, Anita.  Anita lives in Oklahoma and because we are family, her posts are important.  She posted about how she was going to ELECTRA.  I was caught by surprise.  Electra is the town I grew up in. It is 30 miles NW of Wichita Falls along HWY 287.  The population is probably about 3000 people.  My first question was, why would you go there?  She has not been there in 8 years and for me even longer.  I have such a strong resentment for that town. I have lost all ties to the town.   It is reminder of how poor we were. It is a reminder of our parents who are now dead. They were both cremated and do not rest there.  The house we lived in is now torn down, and only a vacant lot and a few trees remain.  I see it as a sad place. 

Electra was once a much bigger city. At one point it was twice the size. Now it is small and fading.  Electra is a city in Wichita County. Electra claims the title of Pump Jack Capital of Texas, a title made official by the state in 2004 and has celebrated an annual Pump Jack Festival since 2002. A pumpjack is the above ground drive for a reciprocating piston pump in an oil well. It is used to mechanically lift oil liquid out of the well if there is not enough bottom hole pressure for the liquid to flow all the way to the surface. The arrangement is commonly used for onshore wells producing little oil. Pumpjacks are common in oil-rich areas.  I remember thinking that they looked like bucking horses.  Moving up and down, pumping oil from the ground.  My dad worked in the oil field. In 1936, Electra had well over 6,000 residents, by the 1960s the population had decreased to a bit over 5,000. The Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area was growing and many people moved away. By 2000, Electra's population dropped to just over 3,000.

Daniel Waggoner started a ranch in present-day Electra in 1852. Then the railwroad was built. Waggoner's son, W.T. Waggoner, successfully lobbied railroad executives to build a railroad station at the site. By this time, the Waggoner ranch covered a half-million acres. Up until this time, the town was called Waggoner, but following the building of the station and a post office in 1889, it was dubbed Beaver Switch, after the nearby Beaver Creek. The opening of 56,000 acres (230 km²) of land north of the railroad station brought more farmers to the area. The town was renamed again in 1907, this time after Waggoner's daughter Electra. In 1911, the Electra ISD was created.

Water can be scarce in this region of Texas, so Waggoner started drilling for water for the towns new residents. Most of these drilling sites were befouled by crude oil, which made the water unfit for drinking. Three years later, a developer from Fort Worth named Solomon Williams bought the land from Waggoner. Sooner thereafter, he annexed nearby land, subdivided the land, and placed advertisements in national media trying to increase the population. His efforts were successful, and the town grew from a population of 500 to 1,000 between 1907 and 1910. It was not uncommon to see Pumpjack operating in town.  The neighborhoods grew up around them.  A fateful day in Electra's history was April 1, 1911, when the Clayco gusher successfully drilled for oil. Word spread quickly and the population increased fourfold over a period of months. Fortunately there was already some infrastructure built in the town to handle the new residents. Oil was this town’s glory and its demise. 

I remember when the Electra Tiger won the state Championship in 1985.  That was a big deal. Football in Texas has always held important status.  If you did not play football, you were not important.   No one cared that other state level students have since come and gone. Students like me.   I was a member of the all state band and competed at the state level Solo contest my junior and senior years.  But there is no sign in front of the school showing my accomplishments.   The only one is the one honoring the 1985 football team.  But a music scholarship was my ticket out of that town.

So why did Anita want to go back there?  I had a ton of questions. She said she wanted to show her kids.  They have always lived in a big city.  Interesting, I thought.  But was it worth it?  She said yes, it was a last minute day trip. She said some things are different and some were still the same.  That sounds about right.  I saw some pictures she took.  Yes, it looked the same.  It was odd to see the school where we graduated. It looked so small.  Also she drove by the company our dad used to work for.  She also told me that she did not see anyone she knew.  I honestly figured, she might see several people. We used to know everyone in town.  I grew up there and left when I was 20. After my Mom and Dad passed there was nothing to go back for.  The house was sold, I assume my oldest sister took what ever was left in the house.  She had a way of getting what ever she wanted.  All I have are some old photographs and memories.

 I worked hard to break free from that town.  To me, small towns are a trap.  If you don’t have a way out, you could be stuck there for life.  The best you could hope for is a job at the local plant or work for the school system.   I know some old classmates, are still there.  Or still in the close area.  They are living the same small existence that their parents lived.  For them it is enough.  I don’t think I could have ever stayed there and been happy.  I had thought about maybe one year going to the Homecoming football game. But I changed my mind. Also I did not attend out 10 year reunion. And next year in a couple will be our 20^th class reunion.  I don’t think I will go to that one either.  My destiny was out there in the world.  And I left to go find it. Electra is a distant memory that returns to haunt me every so often.