MCADOO, TEXAS. McAdoo is at the junction of Farm roads 193 and 264, fifty miles northwest of Lubbock in northwestern Dickens County. Settlement began in the area when some local school lands, of which the McAdoo site was a part, began to be sold in 1907. In March 1915 a post office was established under the name McAdoo, with Benjamin Hines as postmaster. The town was named for William G. McAdoo, then secretary of the treasury under his father-in-law, President Woodrow Wilson. During 1915 a one-teacher school, known as Prairie View School, was moved to the town. The school also served as a meetinghouse for three area churches. As a supply center for area ranchers and farmers, McAdoo had a large business section, portions of which burned in 1925 and again in 1929. In 1925 the town had an estimated population of twenty, and in 1933 it reported nineteen residents and thirteen businesses. By 1939 the number of businesses was twelve, but the population had grown to 250, its level throughout the 1950s. In 1964 McAdoo had six businesses and an estimated population of 150, and in 1974 the town reported five businesses and 169 residents. By 1988 the number of businesses was reduced to one, though the population remained at 169 through 1990.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Fred Arrington, A History of Dickens County: Ranches and Rolling Plains (Quanah, Texas: Nortex, 1971).

Edloe A. Jenkins