Gray County Historical Markers Gray County Historical Markers
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Gray County Courthouse,
Pampa
Army engineers began mapping the area beginning with J. W. Abert
near Hoover and Lefors in 1845, followed by an expedition led by
Randolph B. Marcy with George B. McClellan in 1852. These
expeditions were followed by the arrival of buffalo hunters and
traders. Native Americans were removed to Indian Territory after
the Red River War of 1874. The federal government established
Fort Elliott in 1875 in adjacent Wheeler County, after the first
cantonment settled in eastern Gray County earlier that year.
Ranchers settled the area as early as 1877, and were soon
followed by land syndicates which established vast ranches. In
1882, the Francklyn Land and Cattle Co. purchased approximately
637,440 acres in Gray, Carson, Hutchinson and Roberts Counties.
In 1886, English bondholders foreclosed on the land, which became
part of the newly organized White Deer Lands Co., which operated
the Diamond F Ranch.
In 1888, the Southern Kansas Railroad extended its line through
the Panhandle toward Amarillo, through present-day Pampa. Thomas
Lane, a telegraph operator, manned a section station at the rail
switch, and became the first postmaster when White Deer Lands
manager George Tyng applied for a post office in 1892. The name
of the station changed from Glasgow to Sutton, and finally to
Pampa, so named because Tyng saw a similarity to the flat terrain
of the Argentine pampas (plains) he had once visited.
In 1902, White Deer Lands began to sell its holdings, leading to
a land rush in Gray County. Printed brochures and a display at
the station house boasted of the produce raised in the county, in
order to entice future land buyers traveling through by train. In
1916, White Deer Lands built its third and last office building,
from which land sales were conducted until 1957. In 1970 the
2-story brick building became a museum.
The county was organized in 1902, and the first courthouse
constructed in Lefors by S. B. Owens, architect, and Henry
Weckesser, contractor. Located in the center of the county,
Lefors was home to some of the first settlers. That same year,
Pampa was laid out north of the railroad, encompassing 38 blocks,
bordered on the north by Browning, east by Wynne, south by
Atchison, and west by West. As a farming and ranching center, the
population of Pampa remained under 1,000 until the discovery of
oil in 1926 transformed Pampa into a boom town. Godfrey Cabot,
head of Cabot Carbon in Boston, established a carbon black plant
in 1927. The city improved downtown streets with brick, churches
expanded, and many downtown business owners tore down their frame
buildings and erected permanent buildings, including some in the
popular Art Deco style. The Cabot Co. erected the
multiple-storied Hughes Building. The Schneider Hotel, built in
1927, served elegant dinners with silver and linens. Oil money
spawned the Worley Hospital, city parks, and later the Pampa
Youth and Community Center and Country Club, all of which
afforded residents numerous cultural opportunities that far
exceeded those of the average small community. The population of
Gray County grew from 3,405 in 1910 to 22,090 in 1930, and peaked
at 31,535 in 1960. In 1990, the population was 23,967.
County elections held in 1908, 1919, and again in 1926 failed to
move the county seat from Lefors to Pampa. As the result of the
oil boom, however, Pampa finally won the county seat by a vote of
3,672 to 1,386 in 1928. The First Baptist Church in Pampa offered
the county use of the church basement for records and offices at
$150 a month plus water and utilities until the courthouse could
be built. Citizens used fire trucks to haul the records from
Lefors, and many were reportedly lost. A bond election held
August 20, 1929, included provisions for a new courthouse, city
hall, fire station, paving improvements, and playground and parks
improvement.
Amarillo architect William Raymond Kaufman designed the Gray
County Courthouse, the Pampa Fire Station (1930) and Pampa City
Hall (1930), all erected in a row just north of the grand
Schneider Hotel on Albert Square. Kaufman also designed the Art
Deco-style Combs-Worley office building (1931), located directly
to the east of the courthouse. The area soon became known as
"Million Dollar Row." The development of this area,
with three compatible civic buildings by the same architect,
reveals a sophisticated level of planning, reminiscent of the
City Beautiful movement of the early 20th Century. The civic
buildings, despite having different functions, share similar
glazed terra cotta ornamentation, and are finished with buff
brick. The courthouse is the most elegant of the three, due to
its tempered Beaux Arts style and relatively flat ornamentation
(paired columns, for example, common to Beaux Arts buildings, are
here reduced to paired brick pilasters), combined with an
abundance of large regular windows and a light skeletal
appearance, similar to many commercial and industrial buildings
of the early 20th century. Kaufman described the courthouse
design as "Georgian," noting that "stylists can
rave about Spanish, Italian Renaissance and sky-scraper types of
architecture all they want to, but Georgian is the only American
type." An article in the Pampa Daily News informed its
readers that the "big difference" between the
construction of the courthouse and "real Georgian" was
that the courthouse was fireproof and built with a steel frame.
The paper further described the courthouse as "rather
elaborately decorated with urns and bas-relief," but added
that the architectural style "demands some ornaments."
W.R. Kaufman (1881-1948) was the son of Amarillo architect Davis
Paul Kaufman (1852-1915). Working together in the firm of D.P.
Kaufman & Son, they designed many buildings in the Texas
Panhandle and nearby New Mexico, including the Elks Club, Old
Grand Theater, St. Mary’s Academy (1913-14), and
Lowrey’s Academy, all in Amarillo, the Union County
Courthouse (1909) in Clayton, NM, and the Cochran County
Courthouse (1926, remodeled 1968) in Morton, TX. Kaufman also
designed Elizabeth Nixon Jr. High School, in Amarillo, and the
Sam Houston Elementary School (1930) in Pampa. In 1939, Kaufman
moved San Antonio to work in the Army Engineer’s office at
Fort Sam Houston. After his death in San Antonio in 1948,
Kaufman’s son, W.R. Kaufman, Jr., an architect trained at
Texas Tech, took over the family firm.
Kaufman’s design was accepted in July, 1928. This courthouse
was completed in 1929, taking 16 months to finish at a cost of
$267,974. This cost included $213,354 for construction; $17,980
for the jail on 4th floor; $8,580 for the electrical system;
$15,300 for heating systems; and $12,760 architects’ fee (5%
of the total contract). The building was constructed by Harland
L. Case, General Contractors of Pampa. Case, the son of Samuel
and Emily Case, was the first baby born in Pampa. His family had
operated the boarding house constructed at 116 W. Atchison in
1892 by White Deer Lands Co. Of all the buildings Case built in
Pampa, he considered the Gray County Courthouse his most
important achievement. The building was formally dedicated April
19, 1930. The all-day celebration included local and regional
dignitaries, with the Attorney General of the State of Texas,
Robert Lee Bobbitt, giving the keynote address.
The Gray County Courthouse meets Criterion A, in the areas of
Politics/Government, for its role as the center of local
government, as part of an organized civic building program
spurred by the influx of oil and industry money, and the
community leaders’ desire to create a well-planned civic
center. Upon completion, the edifice served as a tribute to
Pampa’s meteoric rise from a railroad stop to the second
largest city in the Panhandle in 1930, and the commercial and
industrial hub of the eastern Panhandle. The magnificent
structure still reflects Pampa’s continued leadership and
status in county government. The building meets Criterion C in
the area of Architecture, as one of the finest and best-preserved
examples of Beaux Arts civic architecture in the region.
The building retains its integrity of location, setting,
workmanship, materials, design, feeling, and association. It is
significant that through foresight, the citizens and leaders of
Gray County have retained "Million Dollar Row," making
only a few minor changes to update the interior of the buildings.
When expansion became necessary, additional buildings were
erected or acquired elsewhere, retaining these buildings for
continued use, a tribute to the architectural grandeur and
booming economy of an earlier period.
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Page last updated on April 9, 2000