Historic Temple

eagerness” coupled with sheer progressive
optimism after Texas emerged from a devastating
war and reconstruction of the 1860s and ’70s.
The Dallas Morning News in 1895 was more
specific about the town’s persona: “A godsend to
the town was that it did not immediately attract
capital. Those who came here were poor men
and in order to ‘go’ at all they had to rustle. The
farmer when he came to Temple found a plain
man to sell him goods, and too many anxious
for his trade that they hunted him up, offered
him inducements and in every way paid him the
homage due the tiller of the soil—nature’s king.
The bleaching bones of many business wrecks
mark the path of Temple’s climb, and the fierce
competition swamped the unfit. But ‘it was the
makin’ of the city.’”
Temple also gained a reputation for “cheap
goods, for high prices for cotton, for hospitable
treatment and for natural advantages as
shipping and distributing point all united in
building up a trade,” added the Dallas
newspaper. Thus, the railway city was “lifted …
from the harum-scarum new town ways into a
city that had gained strength in adversity and
that had never ceased to build and grow.”
Helping to build the community and
commerce were frequent fairs and parades,
especially the annual “birthday celebration” in
June, marking the town lot sales in 1881. “Among
“The City With a Future” ✦ 15