Site of Old Goodnight College

Goodnight wanted a coeducational industrial institute where students could work to pay part of their expenses, and he gave the school 340 acres of land for that use. A summer school and a summer normal held here were the first in the Panhandle, and in 1916 students printed a yearbook called the Buffalo. Competition from West Texas State Normal College in Canyon and Clarendon College helped close it. Buckner Orphans Home used the buildings until 1920, fire destroyed the administration building in 1918, and Goodnight gave the property to the town's school district.

What the plaque says

Site of Old Goodnight College (1898-1917) Founded by first permanent Texas Panhandle ranchers, Col. and Mrs. Charles Goodnight. With 20 students, classes began in the Methodist church while donors' funds were being used to erect 3-story administration building, two dormitories, and dining hall. Enrolment grew to 200; school had good athletic program. College in 1905 became a Baptist-supported academy; a junior college, 1913. Presidents were: Dr. Marshall McIlhaney, C. H. Webb, the Rev. J. P. Reynolds, Dr. D. T. Sutherland, the Rev. A. H. Thornton, E. B. Moore, and R. B. Morgan. In World War I era the useful pioneer school closed. (1971)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Charles and Mary Ann Goodnight Ranch State Historic Site — 0.5 mi
  The two-story house the Goodnights moved into on December 27, 1887, after leaving the JA, with a porch that looks over bison descended from the calves Mary Ann saved.
• Gem Theatre — 11 mi
  Claude's small-town movie house of 1915, restored by the Armstrong County Museum and remembered for the scene in Hud where Homer and Lonnie Bannon sing along to Clementine.
• Donley County Courthouse — 18 mi
  Bulger and Rapp's red brick and white stone courthouse of 1891, the oldest in use in the Panhandle, given back its third floor and towers in a 2003 restoration.
• Saints' Roost Museum — 18 mi
  Clarendon's county museum in the hospital Cornelia Adair built for JA cowboys in 1910, named for the nickname cowhands gave a Methodist town with no saloons.

More markers nearby

• Town of Goodnight — steps away
• Charles Goodnight — 0.4 mi
• Site of Old Goodnight Ranch — 0.6 mi
• Armstrong County — 11 mi