DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Fairmont Cemetery up in Lipscomb County. Now, before we even get into the story, I want you to sit with this one geographic fact for just a moment. This burial ground sits so close to the northern tip of Texas that it is nearer to the capitals of six other states than it is to Austin.
Six. That's the kind of detail that makes you pull out a map and stare at it. Way up here at the ragged edge of the Panhandle, the ground has been holding stories since before the town beside it even had a name.
And what a town that turned out to be — though it took a few tries to get there. In 1901, settlers in the area established a place called Ivanhoe, Oklahoma, eight miles to the north. Eight miles north, mind you, meaning we're already talking about folks who straddled a state line like it was just another fence row.
Then in 1909, Ivanhoe picked itself up and moved two miles to catch a rail line — the Beaver Valley and Northwestern Railway — changed its name to South Ivanhoe in the bargain, and left behind nothing but the Methodist church building. One lone church, standing in the grass like it hadn't gotten the memo. Then, eight years after that, the whole community moved again.
This time they crossed back over the state line into Texas to plant themselves on the North Texas and Santa Fe Railway, a line that had been built connecting Shattuck, Oklahoma down to Spearman, Texas. And here's where it gets vivid: beginning in December of 1917, every single building in South Ivanhoe — the hotel, the bank, all of them — was loaded onto skids and dragged to the new townsite. Dragged.
On skids. Across the prairie. If that doesn't put a picture in your head, I don't know what will.
The new settlement was named for a railroad engineer by the name of Horace Follett, and it received its post office in 1918. Follett, Texas. Born from a town that moved twice to find itself.
But here's the thing about Fairmont Cemetery — and this is the quiet heart of this whole story. The cemetery was here before the town. Dr.
Charles and Ora White owned land both in South Ivanhoe and at this very site, and they deeded the land for Fairmont Cemetery in 1910. Before Follett existed. Before the buildings got dragged across the state line.
The ground was already being set aside for the permanent ones, the ones who wouldn't be moving again. The first burial was a reinterment. Her name was Myra Jones — a mother of six — who had been killed by lightning in 1904 and originally laid to rest out at the Gigger Ranch.
She was brought here and given a place in the new cemetery. Her widowed husband, Michael Jones, known to everyone around as Uncle Mac, became Fairmont's first caretaker. There's a weight to that.
A man tending the ground where his wife rested. In the 1920s, a man named Frederick Harhausen and his two sons drove to near Vici, Oklahoma — about forty miles southeast — and hauled back more than two hundred cedar trees. They planted those trees along the perimeter and in a circle at the center of the cemetery.
You can still see those outlining trees today, one of the more distinctive things about this place. And the people resting here tell the full story of this corner of the Panhandle. Among those buried at Fairmont are the children of Mexican railroad workers who died during the influenza epidemic of 1918.
More than a hundred military veterans are interred here as well, three of them killed in action in World War II. The Fairmont Cemetery Association, founded in 1909 — a year before the land was even officially deeded — has cared for this ground ever since. A town that moved across a state line on skids found itself, eventually, right here.
And the cemetery was already waiting.
What the marker says
This burial ground serves citizens near the northern tip of Texas at a site closer to capitals of six other states than it is to Austin. In 1901, area settlers established Ivanhoe, OK., eight miles to the north. That town moved two miles in 1909 to a site on the Beaver Valley and Northwestern Railway, changing its name to South Ivanhoe and leaving behind only the Methodist church building. Eight years later, citizens moved again, this time across the state line to a spot on the North Texas and Santa Fe Railway built from Shattuck, OK. to Spearman, TX. Beginning in December 1917, all the buildings of South Ivanhoe, including a hotel and bank, were put on skids and dragged to the new townsite. The settlement, named for railroad engineer Horace Follett, got its post office in 1918. Dr. Charles and Ora White owned land in South Ivanhoe and at this site, deeding land for Fairmont Cemetery in 1910, even before the establishment of Follett. The first burial was the reinterment of Myra Jones, a mother of six, who was killed by lightning in 1904 and originally buried at the Gigger Ranch. Her widowed husband, Michael "Uncle Mac" Jones, was the cemetery's first caretaker. In the 1920s, Frederick Harhausen and his two sons hauled more than 200 cedar trees from near Vici, OK. (40 mi. SE), planting them on the perimeter and in a circle in the center of the cemetery. The outlining trees remain among the cemetery's more distinctive landscape features. Those buried here include the children of Mexican railroad workers who died during the influenza epidemic of 1918. More than one hundred military veterans, three of whom were killed in action in World War II, are also interred here. The Fairmont Cemetery Association, founded in 1909, cares for the cemetery. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2006