W. G. McMillan Construction Company

The museum McMillan helped build had a long start. The Plains Museum Society was formed in Lubbock on March 27, 1929, with sixty-nine charter members and became the West Texas Museum Association in 1935. Sixty-seven counties pooled their Texas Centennial interests, and a $25,000 Centennial allocation paid for the basement, dedicated on March 5, 1937. Only in 1948 did the Tech regents add $184,381 from the veterans' program surplus to finish the building, which opened in 1950 for the college's silver anniversary. Peter Hurd completed his South Plains mural in its rotunda in 1954.

What the plaque says

W. G. McMillan Construction Company W.G. McMillan came to Lubbock in 1924 to assist in the construction of the Hotel Lubbock. McMillan stayed, and over the next thirty years oversaw over 850 construction projects. Some of McMillan's first projects included the 1926 Conoco service station, followed by completion of the Meadowbrook Golf Course. In 1930, McMillan completed the Lubbock Municipal Airport that still exists today. During World War II, McMillan played a significant role in the local war effort and the wartime history of Texas. In 1942, McMillan built 220 structures at South Plains Army Air Field, where glider pilots prepared for D-day and other invasions. Under McMillan and his son, numerous additional buildings were constructed on military bases and air fields in the area. The McMillan Construction Company (later known as McMillan and Son Construction Company) completed a multitude of projects, including airports, schools, public buildings, hospitals, grocery stores, churches, sporting venues, and numerous buildings on the Texas Tech campus. In addition to construction projects, W.G. McMillan also served the community through social, educational, and political organizations. McMillan was a member of the Kiwanis Club and Methodist Church, helped form the Plains Museum Society (later called the West Texas Museum Association) and constructed the original museum building in 1936. He participated in archeological digs, hunting expeditions, and community service projects. The W.G. McMillan construction company performed a significant and contributing role in the economic, physical, and commercial development of Lubbock. 175 Years of Texas Independence * 1836-2011

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Silent Wings Museum — steps away
  The museum of the American combat glider pilots of World War II, in Lubbock's old airport terminal on the field where most of them earned their wings.
• Lubbock Lake Landmark — 4.1 mi
  A bend of Yellow House Draw on Lubbock's north edge where digging has found nearly 12,000 years of people on the Southern High Plains, layer on layer, from Clovis to the 1880s.
• American Windmill Museum — 5.3 mi
  Lubbock's park of restored water-pumping windmills and early wind chargers, more than 70 of them turning outdoors and the rare ones under roof, with a megawatt-era turbine overhead.
• Buddy Holly Center — 5.5 mi
  The city's museum of Buddy Holly and West Texas music in a 1928 railway depot, with the house where the Crickets worked on That'll Be the Day moved next door.

More markers nearby

• South Plains Army Air Field — steps away
• Site of Old Lubbock — 1.8 mi
• Migrant Labor Camps of Lubbock County — 4.2 mi
• Yellowhouse Canyon — 4.5 mi