YOWELL, TEXAS. Yowell is at the junction of Farm roads 904 and 2068, between Barnett Creek and the West Fork of Jernigan Creek five miles west of Klondike on the Hunt county line in extreme western Delta County. It was named for J. W. Yowell, who operated a general store there early in the 1880s, and it became a stop on the stage line from Pecan Gap to Commerce during that time period. The Yowell Methodist Episcopal Church South had been organized by 1900, when the trustees obtained a deed. By 1915 Yowell had a population of thirty, a store, two churches, a cotton gin, a school, and a pharmacy. Ida V. Spears, the first postal officer, opened the post office early in the 1920s. In 1925 Yowell had a population of 150, and in 1931 it had two businesses. Maps for 1936 identified the settlement as two churches and a cluster of dwellings on gravel and dirt roads. In 1940 the community had three businesses, a school, and two churches; the population had decreased to seventy. In 1964 the school and businesses had closed, but the two churches and a scattered collection of dwellings remained. Local children attended Cooper Independent School District in 1970. Yowell still appeared on maps as a church community in 1984 and had fifteen residents in 1990. The population remained the same in 2000.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: John J. Germann and Myron Janzen, Texas Post Offices by County (1986). Wilma Ross and Billie Phillips, Photos and Tales of Delta County (1976).

Vista K. McCroskey