Thomas Lewis Latane Temple

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'm gonna do my best to honor every word. Thomas Lewis Latane Temple. Born 1859, died 1935.

Virginia native. Son of Henry W. L. and Susan Temple, née Jones.

Now, a lot of men have moved to Texas and left no mark at all. Temple was not one of those men. He came to Texarkana in 1877, and right away you get the sense that this was a man who saw things other people hadn't looked at yet.

In 1880 he married Georgie D. Fowlkes, and then he got to work in earnest. By 1893 he had organized the Southern Pine Lumber Company, right there in Texarkana, and he had his eyes fixed on the timberlands of Angelina County.

He purchased land here, started timber operations, and then, in 1894, he did something that doesn't happen every day. He founded a town. Named it Diboll, placed it right at the site of the company's main sawmill.

A town, called up out of the East Texas pines. Now here's where the story gets a little deeper than your average timber baron tale. Temple didn't just cut and move on.

He practiced conservation. He practiced reforestation. He looked after the land and he looked after the people of Diboll and his employees with a kind of philanthropy that people noticed, and people remembered.

When Thomas Lewis Latane Temple died in 1935, the Texas State Senate recognized his legacy. Not just what he built, but how he built it. That's the kind of thing that follows a man even after he's gone.

What the marker says

(1859 - 1935) Virginia native Thomas Lewis Latane Temple, son of Henry W. L. and Susan (Jones) Temple, moved to Texarkana, Texas, in 1877. He married Georgie D. Fowlkes in 1880. In 1893 Temple organized the Southern Pine Lumber Company in Texarkana and began timber operations on lands he purchased here in Angelina County. Temple founded the town of Diboll in 1894 at the site of the company's main sawmill. His legacy of conservation and reforestation practices, and philanthropy towards the Diboll community and his employees was recognized by the Texas State Senate upon his death in 1935. (1994)