  Sherman Democrat Bicentennial Edition (photo courtesy of Jean Hughes) Robert Morrison appears on a street in the old town of Hagerman. The town was covered by water when Lake Texoma was built.  BLACKOUT FOR HAGERMAN As Texas towns go, Hagerman is only a crossroads place with little to attract the notice of passing travelers. But to the 150 people who live there and to others who were reared there, no other community can quite take its place. Soon Hagerman will exist only in snapshots and memories. When water carried by the Red River backs up behind the new Denison dam, the site of Hagerman will be at the bottom of the lake. The all-day reunion at Hagerman Sunday will be for many the last visit to the home of their youth. Soon buildings will be razed or moved, trees cut down, and even graves opened and their contents taken to other locations. Many who have spent their whole lives in Hagerman will be uprooted, and some families will be broken up. Schools will close, churches will be disbanded and their members scattered. Such steps are necessary sometimes as a price for progress, but it is doubtful if the engineers who blithely draw plans that call for the wiping out of whole towns are fully aware of the community, family and personal problems that such moves involve. Hagerman will disappear as completely as some of the small communities that have found themselves in the path of a Nazi Blitzkrieg. In this case, the inhabitants will at least escape with their lives and most of their property or compensation for that which cannot be move, but they will be able to sympathize better than most of us with the refugees of Europe and China.  Hagerman History Susan Hawkins © 2024 If you find any of Grayson CountyTXGenWeb links inoperable, please send me a message. |