Bowers Cemetery

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'm passing it straight along to you. Out here on the high plains of Wheeler County, there's a piece of ground called Bowers Cemetery, and it carries a story worth slowing down for. This has been a burial ground for the African American community of Shamrock beginning in the nineteen twenties.

The oldest marked grave belongs to William Frank Holmon, dating from nineteen twenty-six. Now, you might hear it called West Shamrock Cemetery, and that name points you toward the Bowers Addition to the city, owned and developed by a man named David Laughlin Bowers. But locals, they had their own name for it.

They called it Boot Hill. According to family tradition, a man named Manse Lisles owned land on the west side of town, and he gave part of that land to the black community for a cemetery. That kind of generosity, quiet and unannounced, tends to outlast just about everything else.

The year nineteen twenty-six carries some weight in this story. That's when many African Americans arrived in Shamrock with a construction company, coming to pave roads. They stayed.

They worked at the cotton mill. They built something. A gas station.

A café. A school. A church.

A whole community on the west side of town. They put down roots in soil that didn't always welcome them, and they made it theirs all the same. Bowers Cemetery has been holding their memory ever since.

What the marker says

Beginning in the 1920s, this cemetery has been a burial ground for the African American community of Shamrock. The oldest marked grave, for William Frank Holmon, dates from 1926. Also known as West Shamrock Cemetery, the site takes its name from the Bowers Addition to the city, owned and developed by David Laughlin Bowers. According to family tradition, Manse Lisles owned land on the west side of town and gave part to the black community for a cemetery. It was known to locals as Boot Hill. Many African Americans arrived in Shamrock with a construction company in 1926 to pave roads. They continued to work at the cotton mill, and had their own community with a gas station, café, school and church. Historic Texas Cemetery – 2012