Quanah, Acme & Pacific Railway

The Quanah, Acme and Pacific found a second purpose in the Depression. Court and regulatory wins let it carry transcontinental traffic with the Frisco on the east and the Santa Fe on the west, and from the late 1930s until the fall of 1973 through trains crossed its rails. Earlier, Lazarus's road reached Paducah in 1910 and Floydada in 1928 and promoted townsites, most impressively Roaring Springs. When the two big roads moved their overhead business elsewhere, the Floydada-to-Paducah line was abandoned in 1979.

What the plaque says

Quanah, Acme & Pacific Railway Originally chartered as the Acme, Red River and Northern Railway, the Quanah, Acme & Pacific Railway (QA&P) served the Quanah area in the early twentieth century. The railway was created in 1902, but the name was changed in 1909 when Quanah was chosen as its headquarters. In 1910, the company built a headquarters building at 105 Mercer Street that encompassed offices and a depot. The railway was the vision of Sam Lazarus of St. Louis, Missouri, president of the Acme Cement & Plaster Company in Acme, TX. He wished to connect larger existing rail lines spanning eastern destinations such as St. Louis, Kansas City and Memphis to Los Angeles for service via a long bridge line through west Texas, from the Red River to El Paso. Additionally, the railway would move his own products to these markets. However, the "Pacific" goal never materialized, and the railway's complete service ran from Quanah in the east to Floydada (Floyd Co.) In the west, about 117 total miles. Still, the railway successfully hauled passengers, goods, and mail for many decades. In 1911, the Frisco Railway purchased an ownership share in the QA&P, although Lazarus remained as president. The town of Quanah saw an immediate boost thanks to the presence of a new railway. Its population doubled, and property values increased fifty percent. However, the 1920s and 1930s brought hardship to the company. In 1926, Sam Lazarus died. The Depression and the Dust Bowl devastated the area served by the QA&P. The railway continued for several decades as a Frisco subsidiary until being merged with new owner Burlington Northern Railway in 1981. The lines west of Acme were ultimately abandoned soon thereafter. Nevertheless, the Quanah, Acme & Pacific Railway remains a major part of the story of the commerce and development of Quanah. (2022)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Quanah, Acme and Pacific Depot Museum — steps away
  The Spanish Colonial Revival depot of a little railroad that set out for El Paso and never got past Floydada, now Hardeman County's museum alongside the county's 1890 jail.
• Copper Breaks State Park — 12 mi
  Red badlands on the Pease River between Quanah and Crowell, streaked with the green copper that lured a Civil War general here to mine, with longhorns and a dark-sky designation.
• Fire Hall Museum — 22 mi
  Crowell's local museum in the 1922 firehouse on Main Street, in a county-seat town that was almost wiped away by the tornado of April 1942 and rebuilt.
• Red River Valley Museum — 26 mi
  Vernon's museum on College Drive, with rooms on the Waggoner ranch empire, Doan's Crossing and early Vernon, and the largest known collection of Electra Waggoner Biggs's art.

More markers nearby

• Shootout at the Quanah Depot — steps away
• William Jesse McDonald — 0.8 mi
• Hardeman County — 0.8 mi
• W. P. A. Sanitation Project — 11 mi