History
The town originates from May 23, 1923, when oil was discovered. The town was named for the Texon Oil and Land Company, which drilled the first successful oil well in the Permian Basin. On December 4, 1928, under the supervision of Carl G. Cromwell, Texon Oil discovered the Santa Rita University 1-B, at that time the world's deepest well at 8,525 feet. Texon Oil and Land Company developed the Santa Rita oil field. Texon’s leases were subsequently purchased by M. L. "Mike" Benedum and Joe Trees of Pittsburgh, who formed the Big Lake Oil Company.
Texon was considered a model oil community. A grade school, a church, a hospital, a theater, a swimming pool, a golf course, and tennis courts were built by the Big Lake Oil Company. The Texon Oilers, a semiprofessional baseball team, were started. Privately owned businesses began including a drug store, a cafe, a boarding house, a tailor-shop, dry-goods and grocery stores, barber and beauty shops, a service station, a dairy, an ice house, and a bowling alley.
Ownership passed on to successive oil companies including Plymouth Oil Company (in 1956) and Ohio Oil (now Marathon Oil) in 1962, which chose not to maintain the town that had at that time 100 residents. In 1986, the post office was closed.
Read more about this topic: Texon, Texas
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