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Grandfield
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Early Grandfield...
Below - Kell City denizens only a short few months later. This image was captured after there was time enough to build the
business-looking structure seen in the background. Reverend Tant watched, helped possibly in these developments. Neighbors they were...less than a half a mile away. Each could clearly see and hear the other. Are Kemp or Kell in the image below, or Rev. Tant? Who then?
To the left - the Tant household sitting out on the open prairie, unquestionably the very first image of Grandfield, this image dated just after the Reverend's arrival in early 1907, nearly two years before Grandfield was incorporated. Below is a photograph of the Reverend himself.
Above: The honorable Reverend A.J. Tant! Without his generosity and understanding there simply would not have ever been a Grandfield! (Wyatt, Hub, ibid)
The following very rare images speak for themselves, volumes!
A Train Wreck on the "Katy" rail, c. 1910
1910-1911 Grandfield's GHS boys basketball team, men certainly. Possibly the first?
The first or second GHS graduating class of 1910-1911 (McNees)
Mules dragging a house (or is it a Post Office?) c.1908 (OHS)
The Bridgetown, Grandfield to Burkburnett bridge just after completion c.1914...what was could easliy be again!
Grandfield icon and long-time teacher at GHS, Arthur Tatum's father helped build this structure while, at first since there were no local rooms, abiding in a cliff-side dwelling of his own construction! WE KNOW, bulletproof hearts and hands!
All photos this page are from "Grandfield: Hub of the Big Pasture. Wyatt, Robert Lee III, ibid)
Early "Bearcats", left and below, class of 1914
It is believed the house in the photo to the left still sits in this exact location, just south of the the current Grade School parking lot! WE KNOW!
A corum for GHS Basketball
c.1910
(left) It is surmised this photo was taken from atop the First National Bank (below), c.1914. the First Presbyterian Church (left center) looks pretty much like it is shown here still today. The first Hubbard (foreground center left) home still stands as well.
(left, upper left, and above) the First National Bank (below), c.1910. One of the first Grandfield brick constructions. Sadly, the bank building no longer stands, BUT the house seen in the background to the left still stands just as it did in 1910! Wow....
Earliest image of the still standing Tillman County Bank building (right) as well as bustling downtown just after much of it was constructed, c.1914. The Tillman County Bank building can also be seen in the photo below (far right), along with the front side of the enigmatic and mysterious Parker McConnell Grocery Company building seen in many images of early Kell City. Please note the location of the bank relative to the location of the Parker McConnell bldg. Simpson Avenue now passes less than 25 feet
west of the Tillman Co. Bank bldg. If Simpson Avenue existed at the time the photo below was taken Simpson would have run right into the middle of the Parker McConnell building.
Imagine, if such buildings as was the Parker McConnell Grocery, or Doctor Walker's Building can be simply swept from history, what of the rest?
Is every parcel of our great society volatile, poised for extinction? Perhaps we have no problem with such "cleansing?" That is, perhaps until we can't get a tire repaired, or go to school?
The then Tillman County Bank can clearly be seen in these images! Knowing the relative location of the Parker building and the situation relative to Simpson Avenue, that in fact the Parker building did exist when Kell was in its prime, and both the Tillman County Bank AND the Mid-Continent Supply (or Grandfield Hardware) building still exist in tact, means that that Parker McConnell Grocery and Tant Land Company building was torn from the Mid-Continent building, and from the prairie, and from our hearts.
The Cherry Hotel...1914
If you work at the Grandfield Frazer Bank you may find this factoid interesting. The image to the left shows the "Fox Theater" sitting in what is now the parking lot of the bank. Also, the "highway" then 1st street, is mud. What in fact are the distant buildings shown? If you know, or even have a good guess, let us know!
Later called the "Chadwick House", notice that the office and "VACANCY" sign in on the Kell City side of the building!
(Image above an to the right from History of Tillman County Vol. II, ibid)
The "City Garage! Possibly the first automobile repair shop in Grandfield. The vehicle model years shown almost predate Grandfield's Birth. From left to right: Bud West, Ed Burke, L.M. Zumwalt, Mr. Shipely, G.B. Burke, and George Shipley (Murray Zumwalt Photo)
Early Grandfield "barnstorming" air show, c. 1914 (right). The website developer's grandmother flew with these guys for a quarter! I bet that was a RUSH? Many who attended such displays of aerobatic bravado had never even ridden in a car, much less flown! Imagine the exhilaration of seeing these roaring contraptions actually fly for your first time...in 1914! The people lined up to fly are seen in the background..one of them is probably your relative! Just sayin'....
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