Thrift, TX
N 34° 05.779 W 098° 37.849
14S E 534054 N 3772897
A Texas Historical Marker at TX 240 and Fairview Road in rural Wichita County, TX, notes that the town of Thrift, now gone, was about 1.25 miles north of here.
Waymark Code: WMVFXM
Location: Texas, United States
Date Posted: 04/13/2017
Views: 4
The 1977 historical marker, so badly vandalized that it had to be reissued in 2002, provides some history:
"Newtown", or "Thrift", originated about 1919 in the Northwestern Extension of the Burkburnett Oil Field. Early in its existence it gained prestige by the founding of a bank -- the only one in the area at that time. Mostly a tent city, Thrift suffered many fires. One of these, started by lightning striking an oil tank in 1920, caused two deaths and wiped out much of the town. Thrift's post office opened in 1925. After the population shrank to 30 in 1929, the bank, a church, school, and store served people living at oil field pump stations; but all of Thrift's buildings are now gone.
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According to the entry for Newtown in T. Lindsay Baker's "More Ghost Towns of Texas", there were actually three boomtowns in the area, and all three of them are ghosts now. He is careful to indicate that their identities sometimes merged and blurred, and he notes that the three towns were Waggoner City, Newtown, and Thrift, going from east to west. Notably, some maps still refer to Thrift, although nothing but "Thrift Road" remains at the townsite. Baker's book, published in 2003, mentions bits and pieces to be found here and there, but one would really need to hop out and scrutinize the landscape to find anything these days.