Watchorn: A 1920s boom town years ago
By ROWENA PLETT
Staff writer
From late 1919 to the early 1930s or so, an oil boom town existed five miles east of the southeast corner of Peabody. In modern-day street terms, it was located at 60th and Timber.
The oil boom hit Butler County in 1915 and a few years later spread to southern Marion County.
Many oil men became involved, and one of the biggest players was a man by the name of Robert Watchorn.
He sent his nephew, John, to negotiate a lease of the 3,300-acre Townsend Ranch east of Peabody.
Owner Orville Townsend was reluctant to lease the land to anyone. But when Watchorn offered him a million dollars and showed him an adjacent gushing oil well, he accepted the deal.
In 1918, headlines in the Peabody Gazette-Herald competed with news of World War I and local events.
"Townsend Gets First Oil at 2,100 Feet" and "Flock of Geologists Here" are two examples.
Within a few months, Watchorn had erected many oil derricks on the Townsend Ranch and drilled wells which produced millions of dollars worth of oil.
Watchorn erected a small town for the workers in his oil fields.
In August 1919, Oscar S. Stauffer, editor of the Peabody Gazette-Herald, reported: "Watchorn has begun erecting 24 houses, an eating house, and a bunk house."
A blacksmith's shop and a grocery store with a gas pump also were established.
The buildings sat out on the open prairie with no lawns or other landscaping except for a cottonwood tree planted by one resident. That tree outlived the town.
Many years after the town's demise, former residents of Watchorn recorded their memories of the town.
Fern (Shepler) Petre described the oil wells as "smelly and noisy, like an old cow bawling."
The poorest of the houses were described as crude "shacks." Families moved from one house to another in an attempt to better their conditions.
Joe and Tena Gaines moved three times. Tena recalled huge cracks between the wall boards of their first home and, with the stove burning "blazing hot" in winter, they "went to bed to keep warm."
The houses had electricity but no drinking water. Watchorn had a water tower, but the water got warm in the summer months and was not useful for drinking.
Some people recalled taking cream cans to the camp's warehouse to be filled with water brought out from Peabody. The water was shipped to Peabody by train from Newton.
Tena Gaines recalled many trips to a nearby farm well and pasture spring to fill a 10-gallon can with water.
For $3 a month in rent, residents received free coal and electricity. There was one outhouse and one coal shed for every two houses.
A grocer occasionally came out to the camp from Florence and took orders for goods to be delivered.
The boarding house, sometimes called a hotel, had a dining room where meals were served. Saturday evening dances were regular events.
Residents furnished their own music. Accordions were especially popular along with piano, horn, drums, and other instruments. Refreshments also were served.
According to one woman's recollection, there was "little drinking and no problems." However, another resident recalled a drunken brawl one night which resulted in damage to the dining room and kitchen.
The oil field workers labored in all kinds of weather. In 1922 or 1923, a tornado reportedly blew down most of the derricks, and they had to be rebuilt. Occasionally, a worker was electrocuted.
One man recalled, "We worked night and day, but still had lots of fun in the three years I worked there."
"People got along well together, made much of their own entertainment, and shared what they had," recalled another.
As in any community, the children got together and entertained themselves in various ways.
For those of school age, a special bus took them to Biscuit Hill School, a mile or two down the road toward Peabody. The school also was known as Knob School.
Some of the women of the town organized a competitive softball team.
The town of Peabody benefited greatly from the oil boom.
"Oil field workers flooded the town and lived in every available room," wrote Editor Stauffer.
Within a year, from 1918 to 1919, the population of Peabody jumped from 2,000 to approximately 5,000.
It was estimated that more than 1,000 people took up residence within a five-mile radius of Watchorn during those years.
By the early 1930s, equipment was wearing out and prices and production were down, so most of the wells were abandoned and Watchorn became a ghost town. The boarding house was destroyed by fire in 1931.
In August 1937, the Wichita Eagle published an article titled, "Town Has Vanished."
"The exhaustion of the oil below the surface also exhausted the town and so it dwindled and at last disappeared in a puff of prairie wind," wrote the author.
Today, nothing remains except a lone pump or two and several huge concrete boulders.
"There were those who said Watchorn was not a town at all, but merely another oil field camp," Stauffer once wrote. "However, . . . it's people who make a town."
(Source: Peabody Historical Museum)
While Watchorn is now just a story passed down through history, the oil business still shapes the landscape in this area to this day. As you survey the surrounding views, you will notice not only those huge concrete bases and foundations but the presence of modern day oil pumps and tanks still harvesting oil from the reserves deep inside the ground here. Another oil related shaping of the land occurred just 1 mile west of this location when the Keystone-Cushing Pipeline (Phase II) carved its path through the landscape back in 2010. Even several years later the scar from the installation of this massive pipe can be seen in the land.
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