Hobbs Independent School District

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the Hobbs Independent School District out in Fisher County. Now settle in, because this one starts small, real small, and grows into something worth knowing. It starts in 1887, out on Buffalo Creek, where the very first school serving what would become the Hobbs community was known simply as Buffalo.

And when I say humble beginnings, I mean it: that school was taught in a tent. A tent. Out on the creek.

That lasted through 1888, and then the Reverend Robert Martin stepped in, erecting a church and schoolhouse right there on the site, using funds he'd brought in from his home church in Louisiana. That's the kind of thing that keeps a community alive when nothing else will. By 1896 the school had moved around, changed locations several times, and picked up a new name.

It was now named for Vachel Hobbs Anderson, who served as postmaster at Roby. And so Buffalo became Hobbs, carrying that name forward. Then comes 1922, and a man named J.

W. Hale becomes county school superintendent. Now, Hale was the kind of man who looked at a scattered landscape of little one-room districts and saw something that could be more.

His efforts contributed to a decision the voters made in 1924: consolidate. They pulled together the Hobbs, Dallas, Grady, and Baird common school districts into one body, the Hobbs Consolidated Common School District No. 18. Four districts, united.

And in 1925, a brand new eleven-grade school facility opened its doors. That was just the beginning of the growing. In the years that followed, Hobbs swelled from 85 square miles to 240, absorbing school after school, community after community.

Guinn, Sardis, Lone Star, Buffalo, Claytonville, Camp Springs, County Line, Capitola, Sam Bone, Busby, Barronview, Plainview, Cottonwood, Bush, Lone Valley, Midway, Gannoway, Rico, Rough Creek, Chicken Foot, Linn, Pyron, and others. Go ahead and let that list sit with you a moment. Each one of those names was a community, a cluster of families, a place where children walked to learn.

All folded in. Then came the 1930s, and the Works Progress Administration added the primary building, the home economics building, and the vocational agricultural building to the campus. Grade twelve joined the course of studies.

High school enrollment hit 380 in the 1940s. That was the peak, though nobody knew it yet. After World War II the rural population began to decrease as people migrated to cities.

The numbers started their long, quiet slide. A new building went up in 1956. A cafeteria in 1969.

A new vocational agricultural building in 1976. But the high school was closed in 1980. And then, in the fall of 1989, elementary enrollment dropped to 13 students.

Thirteen. The Hobbs Independent School District was dissolved, its remaining students annexed to the Roby, Rotan, and Snyder districts. What started as a tent on a creek in 1887, grew into a district of 240 square miles, and quietly folded itself back into the West Texas landscape a hundred years later.

The names remain, if you know where to look.

What the marker says

The first school in what would become the Hobbs community was known as Buffalo and taught in a tent on Buffalo Creek from 1887 to 1888. The Rev. Robert Martin erected a church and schoolhouse on the site with funds from his home church in Louisiana. By 1896 the school was named for Vachel Hobbs Anderson, postmaster at Roby, and had changed locations several times. J. W. Hale became county school superintendent in 1922. His efforts contributed to the voters' decision to consolidate the Hobbs, Dallas, Grady and Baird common school districts in 1924. The new district, known as Hobbs Consolidated Common School District No. 18, united the four districts. The new eleven-grade Hobbs school facility opened in 1925. With additions and annexations in ensuing years, Hobbs grew from 85 square miles to 240, combining many schools: Guinn, Sardis, Lone Star, Buffalo, Claytonville, Camp Springs, County Line, Capitola, Sam Bone, Busby, Barronview, Plainview, Cottonwood, Bush, Lone Valley, Midway, Gannoway, Rico, Busby, Rough Creek, Chicken Foot, Linn, Pyron and others. In the 1930s the Works Progress Administration added the primary, home economics and vocational agricultural buildings to the campus, and grade twelve was added to the course of studies. After World War II the rural population decreased as people migrated to cities. High school enrollment was 380 in the 1940s. A new building was constructed in 1956, a cafeteria in 1969 and a new vocational agricultural building in 1976. The high school was closed in 1980 and, when elementary school enrollment dropped to 13 in the fall of 1989, Hobbs Independent School District was dissolved and annexed to the Roby, Rotan and Snyder districts. (2000)