Deep in the Heart of Texas: On the Road

 On back roads back to Dallas...a giant gun.

 Fields of cotton, with an oil pump in the background.

 Hearne, Texas. We were on a "highway" along which were a Sonic Drive-In, CVS, all the same places every town seems to have. And out of the corner of my eye, as we drove by, I saw something that caused us to do a U-turn.

 Hearne's Main Street. Deserted and mostly boarded up. This picture doesn't do it justice: it was so eerie, like a stage set.

 City Cafe, since 1914. But no more...

 The drugstore seemed to be the only business still open.

 The last picture show...this was once the Queen Theater.

 Wow.

 The door reads "Hotel and Cafe."

And then, along the train tracks, this wall, obviously from some long-gone structure. The whole thing gave me goosebumps (and made me quite sad, too). A quote from Wikipedia about Hearne helps to explain the derelict downtown:

"On New Years' Eve 1990, the Wal-Mart in Hearne closed. Merchants in downtown Hearne by that time had already folded their businesses, being unable to compete with Wal-Mart. As a result, Hearne was the subject of media coverage because its residents had few places at which they could shop. Employee theft was also rampant at Wal-Mart. The Hearne outlet was at the time the only Wal-Mart in the nation to have operated at a loss. After closure, the store was converted into the current Hearne High School."

Tomorrow: the end of the Texas saga...