Ector County

Ector was born in Putnam County, Georgia, in 1822, studied at Centre College in Kentucky, read law and served a term in the Georgia legislature before turning to farming. After his first wife's death he went briefly to California, then settled at Henderson, Texas, in 1850, where he edited the Henderson Democrat and was elected to the Sixth Legislature. After the war he was elected district judge in 1866, only to be removed in 1867 by Gen. Joseph J. Reynolds as a "Southern obstructionist." In 1876 he became presiding judge of the Court of Appeals.

What the plaque says

Ector County Created February 26, 1887 from Tom Green County organized January 15, 1891, named in honor of Matthew Duncan Ector 1822-1879. Member of the Texas legislature a confederate officer and outstanding jurist Odessa, The County Seat.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• White-Pool House — 4.7 mi
  Odessa's oldest standing building, an 1887 brick house of a family the Texas and Pacific drew west, later cut into apartments for the oil boom and now a free house museum.
• Midland Army Air Field Museum — 6.5 mi
  A hangar museum at Midland's airport, run by Commemorative Air Force volunteers, telling how a 1927 grass field became the bombardier college that graduated 6,627 officers in World War II.
• Odessa Meteor Crater — 14 mi
  A shallow bowl in the ranchland southwest of Odessa where a shower of iron meteorites struck in the late Ice Age, with a trail down into it and a small museum on the rim.
• Permian Basin Petroleum Museum — 14 mi
  Midland's museum of the oil basin it sits on, from a restored diorama of the Permian reef to a 40-acre yard of drilling rigs and Jim Hall's Chaparral race cars.

More markers nearby

• Comanche War Trail — steps away
• Homer Robert Henderson — steps away
• Emmet V. Headlee, M.D. — 1.5 mi
• Old Buffalo Wallow — 2.3 mi