Foard County, Texas Towns

Foard City was established after the Kansas City, Mexico and Orient Railway was built through the county in 1908. In 1910 F. R. Lefevre donated land for a school and a cemetery, and a one-room schoolhouse was moved a short distance from what had been known as Harrisonville. Eventually Foard City had both elementary and secondary schools, but in 1939 its schools closed. The community's post office, dating from 1907, closed in 1955, as did its only store, leaving a grain elevator, a church, and a few residents. In 1968 the church disbanded, and most of the remaining residents moved their houses to Crowell. The population of Foard City was reported as ten from 1980 through 2000. Margaret is  seven miles northwest of Crowell in north central Foard County. It was originally known as Pease. In 1884 it became the first county seat of Hardeman County and was renamed for Margaret Wesley, reportedly the first white child born in the county. In 1860 Cynthia Ann Parker was rescued by Texas Ranger captain Lawrence Sullivan  Ross near the site. When Foard County was established in 1891, Margaret was in the new county. In 1908, when the Kansas City, Mexico and Orient Railway bypassed the community, the prospects of the town looked dim, but the residents responded by moving the business center three miles southwest to the tracks. Margaret flourished for a time, with a railroad station, a hotel, and a number of other businesses, but declined in the 1930s and 1940s, as the number of area farmers dwindled and the major highways bypassed it. In 1940 Margaret had a post office, a store, a gin, and 100 residents. The school, built in 1909, closed in 1943 and was remodeled as a community center. The population of Margaret was reported as fifty-one through 2000. Rayland, on Highway 98 in the northeastern corner of Foard County, was founded in 1885 by P. S. and James S. Ray and granted a post office in 1887. In 1908 the post office was moved to Antelope Springs, a trading post on the Hardeman-Wilbarger county line 3½ miles east, but it retained the name Rayland. A Rayland school was built in 1899 and, after several relocations, closed in 1949. The post office closed in 1920. In 1940 the town had eighty residents, three businesses, and two churches. The population was thirty in 1980 through 2000.    The Battle of Pease River occurred on December 18, 1860, near the town of Margaret in Foard County, Texas. A monument on that spot marks the site of the famous "battle" between the Comanche Indians under Peta Nocona and a detachment of Texas Rangers and militia under Ranger Captain "Sul" Ross. The "battle" was really a wholesale massacre and slaughter of the Indians, men, women, and children as the Rangers managed to catch the camp totally by surprise. This “battle” is primarily remembered as the place where Cynthia Ann Parker was recaptured from the Comanche she had lived with for 24 years.