Dugout of W. M. Dye

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. William Miles Dye came into this world in Kentucky in 1864, and by 1870 he was already a Texan, his parents hauling the family down to the Lone Star State when he was still just a boy. Now, Texas has a way of holding onto people, and Dye was no exception.

He kept coming further into it. By 1891, he had settled right here in this stretch of Armstrong County, just one year after the county itself had been organized. The land was new, the county was new, and William Miles Dye was putting down roots.

But here's the thing about the Texas Panhandle. It is beautiful country, wide and dramatic, Palo Duro Canyon cutting through it like something the earth dreamed up on its most ambitious day. Beautiful, yes.

Generous with building materials, no. Timber was scarce. What you had was rock, grass, and sky.

So when Armstrong County needed its first jail up in Claude, thirteen miles to the north, the question wasn't just who would build it. It was what would they build it with. Dye answered both questions.

He hauled rock, right out of Palo Duro Canyon, and he helped get that first county jail built. A man who could haul canyon rock could figure out his own shelter too. And he did.

He built his family a dugout, right here, carved into the earth the way Panhandle folks did when the land itself was the only reliable building material around. That dugout is still here. The lower portion of it, ten yards to the north, still visible, still standing against time in the quiet way that honest work tends to do.

William Miles Dye, born in Kentucky, raised in Texas, settled here in 1891. He left his mark on this county's first jail, and he left his mark right here in the ground. Some legacies are built in stone.

Some are dug out of the earth itself.

What the marker says

William Miles Dye was born in Kentucky in 1864 and moved to Texas with his parents in 1870. He settled in this area in 1891, one year after the organization of Armstrong County. By hauling rock from Palo Duro Canyon, Dye helped in the construction of the first county jail in Claude (13 mi. N). Still visible (10 yds. N) is the lower portion of the dugout he built for his family. Dugouts often were constructed in areas, such as the Texas Panhandle, where building materials were in short supply. (1983)