HAYRICK, TEXAS. Hayrick, in southeastern Coke County, was named for a nearby mountain shaped like a hay mound. In 1887 the town had twenty-five people and a post office. It was designated the county seat when the county was organized in 1889, but an election in 1891 made nearby Robert Lee the county seat, and Hayrick's population moved there. A majority of the settlers in the southern part of the county had always opposed Hayrick's selection as county seat, and two of its courthouses were destroyed by fire-possible arson-before Robert Lee won the election by a margin of forty-eight votes in a total vote of nearly 400.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ed Ellsworth Bartholomew, 800 Texas Ghost Towns (Fort Davis, Texas: Frontier, 1971). Jewell G. Pritchett, From the Top of Old Hayrick: A Narrative History of Coke County (Abilene, Texas: Pritchett, 1980).

William R. Hunt