Callaghan Memorial Library

The library opened after Panhandle had cleared a debt from its first boom. During the oil years of the 1920s, when the town grew to 2,035 people by 1930, voters approved bonds for a modern water and sewer system, paved streets and utilities. The Depression of 1932 and 1933 left the city unable to pay the interest and close to bankruptcy, and emergency measures followed, but Panhandle did not entirely rid itself of its "Boom Bond" debt until 1965. By 1980 the town had 2,226 people, aluminum-window and athletic-equipment plants, and six churches.

What the plaque says

Callaghan Memorial Library Named in honor of renowned pioneer family of Asbery A. Callaghan. Erected 1970 through bequest of local businessman H.J. "Friday" Hughes (1901-1968), son-in-law of Asbery Callaghan. In 1890 A.A. Callaghan came to Texas with his parents, the J.R. Callaghans. After his father's death, he took over the family general store and was elected to almost every public office in city. Served as deputy sheriff, county treasurer, county judge, school board member, director of First National Bank, and steward in Methodist Church. Won respect throughout region. (1969)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Carson County Square House Museum — steps away
  The 1880s ranch cottage that is the oldest house in the town of Panhandle, at the heart of a twenty-one-building museum of the plains from mammoth hunters to the oil boom.
• Gem Theatre — 16 mi
  Claude's small-town movie house of 1915, restored by the Armstrong County Museum and remembered for the scene in Hud where Homer and Lonnie Bannon sing along to Clementine.
• Hutchinson County Museum — 23 mi
  Borger's museum on the three-mile Main Street of a 1926 oil boom town that drew 45,000 people in ninety days and was put under martial law in 1929.
• Lake Meredith National Recreation Area — 24 mi
  A Canadian River reservoir in 200-foot breaks, built to water the Panhandle's cities, that fell to a record 26 feet deep in 2013 and still rises and falls with the drought.

More markers nearby

• Carson County — steps away
• Panhandle Herald — steps away
• Carson County — steps away
• Conway Community Church — steps away