John Gerham Hardin

Hardin's money helped start the boom. Walter Cline drilled the 1918 Fowler discovery well just north of Burkburnett with a group of investors that included Hardin. His later gifts put his name on campuses. Simmons University in Abilene became Hardin-Simmons in 1934 in honor of Mary and John G. Hardin. That same year Baylor College for Women, pushed to the edge of bankruptcy by the Depression and a 1929 fire, was saved by the couple's gift and renamed Mary Hardin-Baylor College. In Wichita Falls a Hardin Foundation formed in 1934 led to the 1937 campus of Hardin Junior College.

What the plaque says

Pioneer settler, financier and philanthropist. Came to Texas in 1876 and to this area in 1879, living at first in a dugout. Operating a store and owning extensive lands, he amassed a fortune that he left as a rich legacy for Texas children. He gave six million dollars to Buckner Orphans Home, Baylor Hospital, Baylor University, Mary Hardin-Baylor College, Abilene Christian College, Howard Payne College, Hardin Junior College, Hardin-Simmons University and local churches and schools. This park was one of his gifts to children. (1970)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• World's Littlest Skyscraper — 13 mi
  A four-story brick tower in downtown Wichita Falls, 40 feet tall and 10 feet wide, the leftover of a 1919 oil-boom office deal in which, the story goes, investors misread inches as feet.
• Kell House Museum — 13 mi
  The 1909 Classic Revival house of Frank Kell, the miller and railroad builder who helped make Wichita Falls a city, shown by guided tour with its family furniture still in place.
• Lake Arrowhead State Park — 25 mi
  A prairie park on the north shore of the Wichita Falls water-supply lake, which drowned the town of Halsell in 1965-66, with mesquite campsites, a lighted pier and more than 200 bird species.
• Clay County 1890 Jail Museum — 28 mi
  Henrietta's 1890 stone jail a block from the domed courthouse, now the county museum, with its original cells, a gallows that was never used and the sheriff's family quarters.

More markers nearby

• Samuel Burk Burnett — steps away
• First National Bank of Burkburnett — 0.7 mi
• Simon Peter Hawkins — 0.9 mi
• Fowler Discovery Well — 1.1 mi