White Deer Land Museum


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  • Eloise Lane Articles 1-100
    • Articles 1 - 20 >
      • About Eloise Lane
      • The "White Deer" Name
      • The Log House
      • Obtaining The Land
      • The Lands Organized
      • Cattle Brands Tell Story
      • Ghosts And All . . .
      • Southern Kansas Railroad
      • Fire Guard Dam
      • When The Railroad Came
      • The Sutton RR Station
      • Post Office At Pampa
      • The Bell Family
      • J. C. Short
      • Pampa 1892-1902
      • Pampa Laid Out in 1902
      • Crystal Palace Founded
      • Gray County Organization
      • Organization - Continued
    • Articles 21 - 40 >
      • The "White Deer" Name
      • Gray County - Lefors
      • McLean - The Largest Town
      • Gouge Eye
      • The "Mother Road"
      • German Family Reunion
      • Desks From Hopkins
      • Grandview School Begins
      • The Oil Money
      • History Wall Painted
      • Boydston Or Boydstun?
      • Ontario???
      • Laketon - Early Farming
      • Laketon - Continued
      • First Couple To Marry
      • Hoover
      • Water Well Drilling
      • Kingsmills Visit Pampa
      • George Tyng Left
    • Articles 41 - 60 >
      • Tragedy In Utah
      • T.D. Hobart - Manager
      • M.K. Brown Arrives
      • Rider Livery Stable
      • The Pioneer Cottage
      • Pampa's First Doctor
      • Doctor Makes House Calls
      • A Red Cross Nurse
      • Pampa's First School
      • Hobart Went To London
      • Cemetery Began In 1904
      • First Business District
      • C.P. Buckler Arrives
      • Five Barrett Brothers
      • Influence Of The Santa Fe
      • Trains Still Roll
      • John V. Thomas - Teacher
      • Cattle-loading Center
      • Rolla J. Sailor & Arrowheads
      • A.H. Doucette Arrives
    • Articles 61 - 80 >
      • Lands Are Advertised
      • The Holland Hotel
      • Wheat Left Pampa
      • First National Bank Begins
      • Pampa News Begins
      • First Denominational Church
      • 2nd Office Of WD Lands
      • J.N. Duncan Arrives
      • Nels Walberg Sells. . .
      • Dormer Simms
      • Fourth Of July Celebrations
      • Pampa's First Cars
      • Pampa In 1907-08
      • J. S. Wynne Family Arrives
      • Gray County State Bank
      • Baptist Church Organized
      • Joe And Lizzie Bowers
      • Threatened By Prairie Fire
      • Library Began In 1907
      • J.R. Henry
    • Articles 81 - 100 >
      • Sir Gordan & Lady Cunard
      • Three Vicars Brothers
      • Dodd Grain And Produce
      • December 29, 1991
      • D.C. Davis Family
      • Long Christmas Celebration
      • First Christian Church
      • Facts About Pampa
      • Buster Brown
      • The Last Hanging
      • Bones Hooks
      • The "Red Brick" Is No More
      • The Purviances Family
      • The Dr. E. von Brunow Park
      • Boards Of 1st Headquarters
      • Mary Jane Purvis
      • Cook - Adams Addition
      • Nativity Scenes
      • Clyde Carruth
  • Eloise Lane Articles 101-200
    • Articles 101 - 120 >
      • The Mine Tragedies
      • Additions To Pampa
      • Third Family In Pampa
      • Frank Dittmeyer
      • Bricklayer Indian Jim
      • A.A. Tiemann
      • First Movies And Lights
      • Pampa Incorporated
      • Mark And Sara Fletcher
      • Annie Baker Daniels
      • Pampa's Business District
      • Birthday Tea Of 1919
      • Former Pampa Minister
      • John Mack Patton
      • The First Brass Band
      • Early Graduating Class
      • "How We Met"
      • F.P. Greever Is Assassinated
      • George Tyng's Father
    • Articles 121 - 140 >
      • L. H. and Lula Greene
      • John and Lena McKamy
      • Robert and Mary Yeager
      • "Dear Old PHS"
      • Supt. Believed in People
      • William A. and Ruth Greene
      • Jason A and Alice Poole
      • Wayside School
      • Pampa Football Begins
      • The Pampa School Building
      • Rev. C. E. Lancaster
      • Panhandle Lumber Co.
      • Will Wilks & Mora Hughey
      • An Unusual Valentine
      • Charles A. Tignor
      • O. A. Barrett
      • Poppies In Flanders Fields
      • Barnard & Williams Families
    • Articles 141 - 160 >
      • 4th of July Celebrations
      • Cuyler Street Underpass
      • The King Family
      • Kretmeier and Baer Families
      • Stephen B. Oates
      • Phebe Worley
      • Organization of Gray County
      • First Courthouse
      • Pampa Laid Out in 1902
      • Pampa in 1902
      • W. R. Kaufman
      • The Pampa Country Club
      • Living In Pampa in 1902
      • Pampa Buildings of 1902
      • May Foreman Carr
      • Scaffers - Early Residents
      • Nita Luna
      • Former Sub Debs Reminisce
      • PHS In 1932
    • Articles 161 - 180 >
      • PHS Appreciated
      • The Forth Worth and Denver
      • From Pampa to Childress
      • The Origination Of "Taps"
      • The Warners
      • J. C. Studer
      • Floyd, John and Otto
      • Our American Flag
      • Stories and Memories
      • Museum in Pampa?
      • The Franklin Farm
      • The Franklin Family
      • Beryl Wayne Vicars
      • Historian Made Cookies
      • The Pioneer Cottage
      • The Orginial Swastika
      • Library Clerk
      • Women's Clothing Store
    • Articles 181 - 200 >
      • Jon and Pat McConal
      • Whitey Walker Gang
      • How Rudolph Began
      • Gwendolen Avenue
      • Jerry Kerbow
      • Two Paintings
      • Second Part - Paintings
      • Bones Hooks
      • Original Nativity Figures
      • Why "V" Instead of "U"
      • Pampa Incorporated
      • Prairie Fires
      • Abert's "Day of Anxiety"
      • George Autry's "A Fable"
      • Girls Basketball
      • Thomas and Lard
      • Henry and Jenny Ledrick
      • C. J. Walstad
      • Ledrick and Walstads
      • Bert and Annie Lard
      • Peter Gray
      • H. H. and Kate Heiskell
      • The Story of Elsie (Lard) Hall


D.C. Davis Family Closely Linked To Gray County History

Eloise Lane PhotoEloise Lane
David Crockett Davis, born in 1854 at Joplin , Missouri , was working as a carpenter in Whitt, Parker County , Texas , in 1884 when he married Fannie Abbott who was born in Bosque County in 1867. They moved to Dodge City , Kansas , where D.C. was in the cattle business. Their son, Clade, was born at Dodge City in 1886.

One year later they traveled by covered wagon to Mobeetie , Texas , where D.C. worked as a carpenter and cut wood to make caskets for government use at Fort Elliott . Clem was born at Mobeetie in 1890.

D.C. filed on land on the North Fork of Red River about 10 miles east of Lefors. He paid for the land by hunting and raising horses. He and his father, Almarien Davis, had a spread of 22 sections of ranch land. They had a two-room sod house and a dugout. Mel was born near North Fork in 1891 and Maye in 1893.

Taking family cow-hands, the D.C. Davis family went in covered wagons to buy cattle in Cheyenne , Oklahoma and stayed there for several months. Anglus Barton was born at Cheyenne in 1894.

David Crockett, Jr. was born at Miami in 1898. Since the only transportation was by wagon or horseback, D.C. stayed at North Fork to care for the family while Fannie was in Miami . Later, the seventh child, Fannie, was stillborn.

Maye Davis Skaggs wrote that church services at North Fork were camp meetings under grape arbors. About eight or ten families came in covered wagons with chuck boxes. Water was obtained from springs that flowed out of the rocks beside the river. Food was cooked over open fires and people used kerosene lanterns to light their way around the camp ground.

Additional Information

In the early 1900s, D.C. and his father sold their land to Tom Bates and bought four sections up on the plains and eight sections of farm land. They broke out sod land and planted wheat, corn and other crops.

The D.C. Davis family was living on their farm about 12 miles east of Pampa in 1906 when the first two carloads of wheat left Pampa in boxcars. The wheat was raised on the Davis farm which was later the site of the Pampa Army Air Force Base and is now the location of Moody Farms.

In 1907 D.C. Davis and his brother, Alexander Ellison Davis, built a lumber yard near the 100 block of North Frost in Pampa . At that time lumber used for building purposes had to be shipped in from other places because there was no suitable lumber on the high plains. This was the reason that many of the early settlers of Gray County lived at first in dugouts.

The Davis men were talented carpenters and many of the early homes in Pampa were built by Walter E. Davis and Lester Davis, son and grandson of A.E. Davis. Lou Ollie Davis, sister of A.E. and D.C. Davis, married George Henry Saunders, the first county judge of Gray County .

Clade Davis, son of D.C. and Fannie Davis, was a pupil at the school in Lefors for its second year when there were only 14 pupils. The school was a small one-room building set on poles to keep it above water at all times. Cottonwood , chinaberry, hackberry and walnut trees furnished shade and limbs for swings. Drinking water was dipped from the river.

A.B. Davis attended Highwindy school when it was moved to its last location as a school and was known as the Davis school.  It was first on the northwest corner of Block M2, Section 145, but later moved one mile south to the northwest corner of Block M2, Section 146. This last location was across the road from the Davis house. The last year school was conducted there was 1928-1929.

When A.B. attended that school, J.A. Paris was the teacher. Pupils were permitted to study in an arbor outside the building until time for them to recite their lessons. School was held only during the summer months because there was no wood for heating in the wintertime.

A.B. said that some former slaves came to the Panhandle with D.C. and Fannie Davis. One of them was a woman who taught the Davis boys to smoke a "peace pipe." Tobacco was hauled in barrels and the Bull Durham was packed in gunny sacks. Before his death in 1991, A.B. Davis was a valuable source of information concerning the history of Gray County .

Mel Davis was a rancher and farmer on land bought by his father (Sections 8,9,12 and 13 of Block 1 of the Alexander, Crain, Harris and Brooks Survey). After the oil industry began to boom in 1929 and 1930, the Mel Davis lease was listed among those most productive. Mel Davis and J.M. Shaw are credited with having developed the townsite of Lefors and adjacent lands after the discovery of oil and gas. Mel helped to obtain the right-of-way for the Fort Worth and Denver Railroad built through Lefors in 1932. The first train on the new line gave free rides to Childress and back. Mel secured the land for the Mel B. Davis Girl Scout Camp. He died on August 18, 1946.

On August 7, 1918 Melvin B. Davis married Vera Anne Sloan, daughter of Charles P. and Tallulah Sloan. As a little girl, Vera could play the organ when her feet barely touched the pedals. On Sunday evenings she would stroll with Miss Clara Deen (the schoolteacher) to a home where people would gather to sing sacred songs and then play hoe-downs. Vera played the organ while Tallulah Sloan and Clara Deen played violins.

Vera was a tireless worker when the White Deer Land Museum was being developed and gave much of her time and talents in helping to prepare and display many of the exhibits. After her death on January 1, 1972, her family and friends paid tribute to her memory by establishing a memorial and tribute fund at the museum.

Mel and Vera Davis were the parents of Billy Boyd Davis of Pampa and Doris Anne Rinehart of Lamar , Colorado . Billy B. Davis, who followed his father and grandfather in ranching near Lefors, was a board member of the Top 0' Texas Rodeo Association in 1958.  He helped to organize the Calf Scramble which was made a featured attraction.

Billy B. and Nancy Davis are the parents of James Boyd Davis and Robert Alan Davis of Tucson, Arizona. James Boyd "Jim" and Pernie Fallon Davis live in a Santa Fe-style house on their ranch six miles north of Alanreed. They are engaged in agri-business and are raising Chiangus (key-angus) cattle in an area where four generations of Davises have ranched.

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116 S Cuyler St | Pampa, TX 79065 | Phone (806) 669-8041 | Fax (806) 250-2185

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