City Park – Hearne TX

Description

The Works Progress Administration (WPA) built park facilities in the Hearne City Park. The WPA contributed $44,000 for materials and labor, and the City of Hearne spent 22,000. First unit of the park completed was the swimming pool and bath house. (Bath house has the only WPA plaque). Also constructed was a rock entrance, a clubhouse, picnic tables and barbecue pits. There was a sunken garden (apparently now gone, as I didn’t find it). They also built a nine-hole golf course with water lines to keep the grass watered.

All the structures are built of native rock. The club house has a stage, committee room, kitchen, locker rooms and rest rooms.

Of the picnic tables I found only one that still had its original matching bench. The others have new benches or in one case, no benches at all. No barbecue pits were found.

Not mentioned in the article is a small lake with fountain. The walls are of the same rock as the other park facilities. There is a rock bridge the spans the lake. (This might be the sunken garden, repurposed.)