Texline

   Near the northwest corner of the Texas Panhandle lies the tiny town of Texline, population slightly more than 500. It lies just 8 1/2 miles from Clayton, New Mexico and Clayton is where residents of Texline do most of their shopping and where they have most of their social activities, since there is also a movie theater and several restaurants, in Clayton.
  Most of the streets in Texline are dirt and many of them are rather rough. Texline is the oldest town in Dallam County. It was founded in 1888 when the Fort Worth and Denver Railroad set up  divisional offices and shops slightly more than half a mile inside the Texas Panhandle. This was less than one year after the rail line first entered Texas. The town that soon developed around the railroad shops took the name "Texline" due to its location close to the New Mexico border. At the time, New Mexico was still a territory. Three years later, in 1891, Dallam County was created by the Texas Legislature and, since Texline was the only town in the county, it was named county seat, a position it held for twelve years, until 1903, when the county government moved to the new, and bustling, town of Dalhart on the county's southern border. Due to the fact that Texline is the oldest town in the county, it can claim several "firsts." The first county courthouse, first school, first marriage license issued in Dallam County and the first public road, which led from Texline to the Northern Division Headquarters of the famous, but now defunct, XIT Ranch. I will have more about the XIT Ranch in another edition of this blog. Its history is integral to the history of Dallam County and this part of Texas in general.
  Texline today is basically a railroad town and a farming town, though the Fort Worth and Denver Railway liquidated in 1982 and the line is now owned by Burlington Northern. Texline sits at a lofty elevation of 4,673 feet above sea level, which, I believe, makes it the second highest town in Texas, behind Fort Davis, which is 5,050 feet above sea level. The grain elevator is one of the biggest employers in town, along with the school district and the town government.
  There is a claim that the Texline area is the only part of Texas where you can actually see the Rocky Mountains from Texas soil, but that is not all together true because the "official" end of the Rocky Mountains is just north of downtown El Paso, in far west Texas, at the foot of the Franklin  Mountains. There is a commemorative plaque in El Paso saying so. I guess it depends on what your definition of the Rocky Mountains is. At any rate, the mountains of northern
New Mexico can be seen from the Texline area, though they are more than 100 miles away, and that is something many people do not realize.
  Texline is located at the junction of U.S. Highway 87 and Farm Road 296 (a secondary state highway that is unique to Texas), and these are the only paved streets in town. Highway 87 parallels the railroad and it is a very busy highway and it follows one of the busiest rail lines in the country. Highway 87 runs at an angle, northwest to southeast, through part of New Mexico, across Dallam County and part of neighboring Hartley County. It is a four-lane, divided highway for most of that distance, but it is not a freeway. It does not have exits, instead it has
"grade crossings," or direct crossings, with connecting roads. In Texline, however, it is not divided, it is a four lane street that widens into a divided highway on each end of town.
  Texline was recently the subject a news story that made its way around Texas, and parts of New Mexico and Oklahoma, recently. It was the "feel good" story of the year. I will discuss that in the next edition of this blog.