DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the Town of Latexo, out in Houston County. Now, before a place can become something, it's usually got to be something else first — and sometimes two or three things before it finds its name and settles in. Latexo is exactly that kind of town.
It started out as Oldham. A quiet early community, sitting near Bethel Church and its school. Nothing fancy, just folks putting down roots the way folks do.
Then came 1872, and with it the International and Great Northern Railroad. The railroad laid a sidetrack out here, and that sidetrack was put in to serve Starks' sawmill, sitting about two miles to the west. Just like that, Oldham got a new identity.
They started calling it Starks' Switch — named for that mill, named for that sidetrack, named for the iron rails that now ran through the middle of things. But Starks' Switch wasn't the end of the naming either. Fast forward to 1907, when a post office opened here under a brand new name: Latexo.
And the reason that name came to be is sitting right there in plain sight. The Louisiana Texas Orchard Company had come to town. They platted three thousand acres — three thousand — of fruit land, and laid out a town right along with it.
Latexo. Louisiana. Texas.
Orchard. You can hear it if you listen. Now, the lumber industry did what the lumber industry tends to do.
It stripped the timber from the area. The trees came down, the mills moved on. But the permanent settlers?
They stayed. They grew fruit. They grew cotton.
They worked the land with what they had and what they knew. And then, right around 1915, Latexo did something worth noting. It became the first school in all of Houston County to teach agriculture.
The first. In a county built on the land, that's no small thing. Time kept moving.
Ranches sprang up in the 1960s. The town, still unincorporated at the time the original marker was set down in 1972, had already built itself a fire squad and other civic services. Unincorporated, but not unorganized.
Not by a long shot. And then came 1979, when Latexo took the official step — the town incorporated, electing a mayor and aldermen. Street lights went up.
Street signs went up. A new school followed in 1980. A city hall and fire station came in 1984.
And in 1985, a new post office — the very kind of institution that gave this place its name back in 1907 — was added to the roster. From Oldham to Starks' Switch to Latexo. From a church and a school near a sawmill sidetrack to a incorporated town with a mayor, a fire station, and a post office of its own.
That's not just a name changing. That's a place becoming itself, one decade at a time.
What the marker says
Early community called Oldham, near Bethel Church and school, was renamed Starks' Switch when International & Great Northern Railroad in 1872 laid sidetrack to serve Starks' sawmill (2 mi. W). Latexo post office opened in 1907, after the Louisiana Texas Orchard Company platted 3,000 acres of fruit land and a town here. Lumbering later stripped timber from area, but permanent settlers grew fruit and cotton. About 1915 Latexo became first Houston County school to teach agriculture. Ranches sprang up, 1960s. Unincorporated, town has fire squad, other civic services. (1972) [SUPPLEMENTAL PLATE] Town incorporated 1979, electing mayor, aldermen. Street lights, signs added; new school (1980), city hall and fire station (1984), and post office (1985).