Historic Architecture on the High Plains
Back in December, I made a trip up to Lubbock for a week to do some lab work related to my dissertation. Never one to pass up the chance to explore and photograph a new place, I brought along my camera to make some photos in my down time. For much of the week it was very cold and rainy, which was probably in my best interest since it forced me to focus on the lab work I was there to do and not get distracted meandering around taking pictures. But on the last day we were in Lubbock, the sun came out, and the mild temperatures returned. So Sadaf and I drove around downtown Lubbock and Texas Tech’s campus to take in the sights, make some pictures, and enjoy the weather before heading home to Bryan.
Our first stop that morning was across the highway from downtown at the prairie dog town located in Mackenzie Park. The city has graciously provided a few acres of land for the prairie dogs to live on (or under), enclosed by a short cinder block wall and complete with interpretive signage for visiting humans. I am sure the prairie dogs are appreciative of their land appropriation, but nevertheless, they have taken the liberty of spreading far beyond the boundaries of their designated area. In fact, we probably saw more prairie dogs scattered throughout the rest of the park than we saw within the town itself. The prairie dogs have turned just about every open grassy area into a portal to their underground labyrinth. This includes the roadsides and picnic areas but also, regrettably, the baseball and softball fields and disc golf course. I am not sure how the locals feel about the prairie dogs, but I am sure they are the bane of the existence of the ground crew tasked with tending to the baseball and softball fields. For me, the novelty of seeing prairie dogs, with their cute, corpulent bodies and playful demeanor made it impossible to be mad at them. After all, they were there long before we were.
Maybe the locals harbor some disdain for the prairie dogs. Maybe they love them or at a minimum tolerate them. But one thing is for sure, the prairie dogs are well fed. Indeed, the prairie dog town seems to be the dumping ground for everything starting to go bad in Lubbock’s crisper drawer: whole heads of romaine lettuce, oranges, baby carrots, all of it offered up to the prairie dogs for their perusal. Sadaf was determined to demonstrate the magnitude of her newly-discovered love for the prairie dogs and manifested this by throwing carrots towards every prairie dog within reach. She befriended one particular prairie dog that was hanging out on a gravelly patch in the middle of the parking area. It did not seem to mind us being so close and minded even less when Sadaf threw a carrot toward it. Having fed and expressed our love to all the prairie dogs, we bid them farewell and promised to return again. Next time, we’ll know to bring carrots.
After departing the prairie dog park we headed to downtown, where my first order of business was to photograph the Lubbock County Courthouse. The current courthouse was built in 1950 and was designed by the architectural firm of Haynes & Kirby in the Modern style. I normally like my courthouses a little older and much more ornate, but I think it’s important to document and appreciate them all. It’s also interesting to see how architectural styles vary across the state and to ponder how a county’s history influences the design and age of the courthouse. For example, Lubbock County had a courthouse built in 1891, right at the beginning of the heyday of Texas county courthouses, but the county grew drastically throughout the 20th century, so much so that they needed to replace the 1891 courthouse with a larger building in 1915, and then had to replace that one with the even larger courthouse that occupies the courthouse square today. The courthouse square is nicely manicured, at least as far as I could tell with all the plants already dormant for the winter, and the gazebo on the west lawn is a nice addition.
In most county seats, the courthouse serves as an anchor for the heart of the commercial district, with the busiest and most vibrant shops occupying the perimeter of the courthouse block. This is not the case in Lubbock. In fact, the most lively part of downtown is about seven blocks south of the courthouse in a neighborhood that’s come to be known as the Depot District. Here, the smell of barbecue on the smokers drifts past bars and live music venues, the most charismatic of which is the Cactus Theater. The Cactus originally opened in 1938 and screened films in its 720 seat auditorium for twenty years before closing in 1958. For several decades it sat neglected, serving only as a storage facility for a neighboring business. But the Cactus acquired a new owner in 1993 who was determined to return the theater to its former glory and transform it into a premier venue for showcasing the region’s best musical acts. The renovation of the Cactus Theater spurred additional reinvestment and rejuvenation of the neighborhood, culminating in the Depot District that is the cultural lifeblood of Lubbock’s downtown. As is the case for the district as a whole, the Cactus is still a work in progress. The marquee was updated sometime in the last two years, adding an exuberantly colorful display befitting a theater credited with catalyzing the rebirth of Lubbock’s Depot District.
The eponymous building of Lubbock’s Depot District is located two blocks east of the Cactus Theater. This train depot was constructed by the Forth Worth and Denver South Plains Railway when the railroad reached Lubbock in 1928. The Spanish Renaissance Revival design was the product of Fort Worth architect, Wyatt C. Hedrick, who also designed buildings on the campus of Texas Tech University in the same style. This depot served both passengers and freight until 1953. In 1979, it was the first building in Lubbock to receive a historical designation. The depot now houses the Buddy Holly Center.
Before we bid farewell to Lubbock, I wanted to get some photos of the lovely Spanish Renaissance Revival buildings on Texas Tech’s campus. Though I had visited Texas Tech three times previously, I had never admired the architecture of the campus until now. The campus was designed in 1923 by William Ward Watkin, the founder of Rice University’s School of Architecture. Watkin traveled extensively in Spain and was inspired by the Spanish Renaissance architecture ubiquitous in places like Leon, Alcalá de Henares, Salamanca, and Toledo. Further, Watkin thought the Spanish Renaissance architecture suited Texas Tech and the geography of the High Plains, with its extensive history of Spanish exploration and colonization.
The buildings on Texas Tech’s campus are really lovely, but what I am even more impressed by is the architectural cohesiveness of the campus as a whole. Perhaps more so than any other university campus in Texas that I’ve been to, Tech’s campus represents one singular architectural theme, which serves to unify the campus aesthetically and makes it much more than an amalgamation of academic buildings.
With the sun beginning to sink lower in the sky, we figured it was time to make the long drive back to Bryan. We’d spent much of the morning and early afternoon exploring downtown Lubbock and Tech’s campus, so we wouldn’t have much time or daylight for sightseeing along the way. We raced across the miles of high plains that Highway 84 slices through, past countless windmills sprouting from the once-verdant prairies, turned cotton fields, and came down off the Llano Estacado just northwest of Post.
Post is named for its founder, Charles Post, the famous cereal magnate. In 1906, Charles bought land on the cusp of the Llano Estacado to achieve his vision of a utopian town. The land was divided and sold to settlers well below cost with the goal of creating a self-sufficient community whose residents benefited from private land ownership without the burden of debts. The following year, Post was designated as the county seat of Garza County. The current county courthouse was built in 1922 and was designed by Amarillo architect, Guy Carlander in the Prairie School style. The courthouse is located at the west end of the main commercial street and faces east looking back on the town. The courthouse grounds lack any mature trees (though I think some existed at one point), offering unobstructed views of the courthouse. While such a setting is a stark contrast to many other Texas county courthouses that are enshrouded by mature shade trees, I think this open arrangement suits Garza County and the panhandle plains that have historically been depauperate of trees.
Back at the center of town, I found the marquee of the Tower Theater rising above the streets and surrounding buildings, the top shining brilliantly in the late afternoon sun. I couldn’t find really any information about the history of this theater online, but it looks to be well taken care of. The bold colors of the neon sign are nicely complimented by contrasting brick details in the facade.
One of my favorite activities when out photographing small towns is to search along the railroad right of way for any evidence of old train depots. My search in Post proved fruitful. About a hundred yards south of Main Street, at the east end of town, across a large gravel parking area that was partly flooded from the rain earlier in the week, was a small cream stucco building with dark blue trim. The architecture made it immediately recognizable as a Santa Fe depot, and it seemed as it has always been: a perpetual witness to the trains rumbling past. This depot was built by the Atchinson, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railway in 1911, a year after the railroad reached Post. The depot was designed by noted Kansas City architect, Louis Curtiss. Curtiss designed several depots for the Santa Fe in Texas, including depots in Lubbock, Snyder, and Sweetwater, but the Post depot is one of the few surviving Curtiss designs. Its location on the corner of a puddled muddy mess of a road may lead one to think that it is neglected, and while the vegetation was slightly overgrown when I photographed it, the building appears in good condition and is used by the local chamber of commerce, a perennial resident of abandoned train depots.
Post would be our last photograph stop on the drive back to Bryan. We stopped to use the restrooms in Sweetwater, and I felt the pull of the historic downtown imploring me to linger longer and take photos. But the sun was melting into the horizon, and we still had a lot further to go until we reached home. Sweetwater and the other towns will have to wait until next time.
