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The post office
in Calliham, ZIP code 78007
TE
photo, 2001 |
History in
a Pecan Shell
Originally, this
seldom visited community was named after early storekeeper Hiram McGuffey
and the town called itself Guffeyola.
Guffeyola was a tent city arrangement with very shallow roots. But
when oil was discovered here (1922), a large influx of people showed
up overnight. Local rancher and landowner Joseph Thomas Calliham was
approached by a man named J. W. Stephenson who persuaded Calliham
to think in terms of permanence through planning.
Stephenson arranged for the platting of a proper townsite, with Calliham
getting a percentage of each lot sold.
A post office was granted in 1923 when it appears the town was thriving.
The newly renamed Calliham, Texas had several groceries, four
cafes, three two-story hotels, a druggist, newspaper and bakery. Amenities
even included a rarely seen "dance pavilion"
The community received a brick schoolhouse in 1928 and the oil may
have lessened the effects of The Great Depression. Calliham ended
the hard times of the 1930s with a population of 400 - a respectable
count for the region at that time.
Ten years later, and after WWII,
Calliham's population was down to 300 residents served by five businesses.
The high school closed in 1948 while the elementary school hung on
until closing in 1963.
In the early 1970s, Calliham was down to just 121 people served by
two businesses. In the late 1970s, twenty-two remaining families stuck
it out, but even they needed to relocate when the original site was
flooded by the construction of Choke Canyon Reservoir in the
late 1980s.
According to the Handbook of Texas, the "new" Calliham was three
miles south of the original plat. The population has increased to
where the 2000 census enumerated 200 residents. The estimate in 2010
is 25.
Attraction:
Choke Canyon State Park
P. O. Box 2 Calliham, TX 78007
http://tpwd.texas.gov/state-parks/choke-canyon |
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Escapes, in its purpose to preserve historic, endangered and vanishing
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