De Leon Peanut Company

Peanuts took over from cotton after the weevil. The Handbook says the boll weevil reached the area in 1906, and one carload of peanuts was grown in 1907. By 1914 a mill stood in De Leon, and 500 carloads brought sixty cents a bushel. In 1929 the price was $1.20. Irrigation arrived in 1949 and artificial drying in 1950, so the crop could be handled in bulk rather than in sacks. The annual Peach and Melon Festival, begun in 1914, is held in De Leon in early August.

What the plaque says

De Leon Peanut Company Cotton was the major cash crop for farmers in Comanche County until the early 20th Century. The combined effects of distastrous weather conditions in 1908-09, a national economic downturn, and a major infestation of the Mexican boll weevil in 1914 caused many Comanche County farmers to abandon their decades-long reliance on cotton and turn to the more lucrative prospect of peanut farming. Because shipping peanuts to Fort Worth for processing reduced local farmers' profits, N. T. Haskins organized the De Leon Peanut Company in 1912. Its first board of directors included R. W. Higginbotham, W. H. Williams, B. T. Higginbotham, Jr., J. B. Wilson, A. E. Hampton, and W. E. Lowe. By 1914, peanuts were the leading cash crop in the county, and the company enlarged its operations to meet growing demand. A six-story main building was completed in 1917; soon the plant was processing up to ten railroad carloads of peanuts per day. The business survived an economic crisis in the 1920s and remained a strong force in the local community, which has been called "The Peanut Capital of the World." Acquired by a national company in 1967, the De Leon Peanut Company has played a vital role in Comanche County history. (1994)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Dublin Bottling Works — 11 mi
  The Erath County plant that bottled Dr Pepper with cane sugar from 1891 until a 2012 settlement ended its Dr Pepper license, and that still makes its own sodas the same way.
• Old Rip at the Eastland County Courthouse — 26 mi
  A horned lizard in a glass-topped casket in the 1928 Eastland courthouse, the creature said to have come out alive from the old building's cornerstone after thirty-one years.
• Conrad Hilton Center and Mobley Hotel — 32 mi
  The 40-room oil-boom hotel in Cisco that Conrad Hilton bought in 1919 when a bank deal fell through, now a museum of the Hilton start and of Cisco's 1927 Santa Claus bank robbery.

More markers nearby

• Texas Central Railroad — steps away
• Laura Valenta — steps away
• Cyrus Campbell — 0.5 mi
• Community of Comyn-Theney — 4.5 mi