Pumphrey

Pumphrey, ten miles northwest of Winters, was first called New Hope, the Handbook of Texas says, and took the Pumphrey name with its post office in 1901, honoring either W. M. Pumphrey or Lewis Pumphrey. At the height of its prosperity Pumphrey had two general stores, a drugstore, a barbershop, a gin and two blacksmiths. Its last store closed in 1950. By 1970 only nine people lived there, the town showed no population at all in the 1980s, and fifteen people were counted in 2000.

What the plaque says

Founded about 1899. Named for Wm. M. Pumphrey (1849-1937), early settler. A deacon of the Baptist church, he would put his organ in a wagon on weekends and take it, his wife and 11 children to attend services in Wingate. In 1900, as the settlement grew, a one-room frame school was built and named New Hope, to embody the aspirations of the citizens. The community came to have a post office (1901-1912), several stores and 2 churches. It withstood tragedy in 1906 when 4 men were killed by lightning -- leaving more than 20 children orphans. (1969)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Z. I. Hale Museum and Rock Hotel — 7.2 mi
  A free museum in a Winters optometrist's office, a 1909 railroad hotel and a 1927 implement dealership, with Rogers Hornsby's hometown memorabilia and a 1912 horse-drawn cotton picker.
• Fort Chadbourne — 12 mi
  An 1852 infantry post and Butterfield stage station on a Coke County ranch, its fallen stone buildings rebuilt since 1999 by the descendant of the family that has ranched the land since 1877.
• Abilene State Park — 16 mi
  A pecan-shaded park on Elm Creek in the Callahan Divide south of Abilene, with red sandstone CCC buildings, a summer pool, a bird blind and yurts under the trees.
• Buffalo Gap Historic Village — 21 mi
  The 1880 stone courthouse and jail of the county seat Abilene took away, with about twenty old buildings from around West Texas gathered around it since 1956.

More markers nearby

• Site of Old Communities of Mazeland and Wilmeth — 6.4 mi
• Winters — 7.1 mi
• Valley Creek Station — 8.0 mi
• Norton — 13 mi