http://texags.com/main/forum.reply.asp?topic_id=1875166&forum_id=27&page=&opt=post,%20post,%20post

too bad this thread is not here in this location to enhance it's discussion but nevertheless...

AAAAAAAAAAg - Air Force Aggie Architect & Administrator from Amarillo, Altus, Austin, Arabia, Arkansas, Africa, Seoul, & now Amman, Jordan '65, '69, '73
Behavior is a mirror in which everyone shows his image - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Must be on a premium board. Care to give us the Reader's Digest version.

Let's see how this transfers:

Generally, an Ag is moving from CA to Guymon, OK and wants to know what to expect.
Several responses talk about pigs and illegals, and going into Amarillo to shop and go to a decent restaurant…

Other discussions are about Helium and PanTex with references from me…
1. Helium is scheduled to play out around 2020. Not much left.
http://amarillo.com/news/local-news/2011-07-18/helium-reserve-could-be-exhausted-2020
2. Today's information background on PanTex from Fort Worth Star Telegram...
http://www.star-telegram.com/2011/07/30/3258291/pantex-plant-intends-to-continue.html
3. Apparently the Star-Telegram is unaware of this ongoing contracting strategy and negotiations that proposes consolidating the management and operations contracts for the PanTex Plant and a Tennessee weapons facility as a cost-savings move re PanTex and TVA in TN:
http://amarillo.com/news/latest-news/2011-07-21/plan-calls-placing-pantex-y-12-under-single-contract

And general information such as: The History Channel's discussion about how Oklahoma ended up with that sliver of a panhandle is very interesting...
Look at the line across the tops of NM, AZ, TN, and NC (don't know why Arkansas didn't follow same line)... Had to do with alignment and North-South controversy...

There are a lot of illegals streaming into the area. Many of the towns around and nearby schools lose up to half their students when the INS makes their periodic raids.

So long as PanTex is in Amarillo, it will thrive. If PanTex ever closes (and there is some discussion now about possibly combining TVA either at PanTex OR in TN) Amarillo will struggle much like it did when Amarillo AFB Closed in 1968.

Interestingly, Texas Tech Medical School, Pharmacy School, etc., has very large complexes in the Amarillo Medical Center...

I-40 is still Amarillo's life line - along with Union Pacific/Santa Fe/Rock Island, etc.
Beef industry is HUGE - as it has been since the days of McKenzie and Charles Goodnight who survived the Comanche and Kiowa in the buffalo country all about...

The guy moving in is apparently single and others are advising bringing a bride with him as the pickins’ are slim in the OK panhandle…


OBTW: my email is texag904@yahoo.com

AAAAAAAAAAg - Air Force Aggie Architect & Administrator from Amarillo, Altus, Austin, Arabia, Arkansas, Africa, Seoul, & now Amman, Jordan '65, '69, '73
Behavior is a mirror in which everyone shows his image - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

[This message has been edited by Aggie1 (edited 7/31/2011 9:50p).]

Helium operations under U.S. Government ended years ago. The current private sources running out of He are a problem, but not a huge one for the economy of the Panhandle.

Putting Pantex (never spelled PanTex) under one management might cost a few of the Big Dogs their jobs, not so much the worker bees. Pantex is a unique facility with a unique mission. As long as there is a nuclear United States, there will be a Pantex.

Now, with the current drawdown in the nuclear stockpile, could the workload at Pantex taper off? Sure, but I'm betting that's a long way off. There was a recent story about a nuke weapons class from 1962 still being dismantled. That same story states

quote:

---

Top administration officials revealed this week that the U.S. stockpile includes more than 5,100 nuclear weapons - 5,113 as of Sept. 30 - and about 4,500 warheads waiting to be dismantled.

---

Yep, lots of illegals in the livestock industry. And strangely, lots of Japanese, as they own some of the packing plants in Perryton.

The Medical Industry will be a big force in Amarillo for years. Besides Tech, there are a ton of doctors and hospitals (including a large VA) in Amarillo, and it serves a very large radius.

The pessimists may be right on the female situation. The small towns of the Texas and Oklahoma Panhandle are great places to raise a family, not so much for dating.

Don't think I agree so much with I-40 being Amarillo's "life line". No doubt a lot of traveler dollars are spent there from I-40, but there's a heck of a lot else going on in the Amarillo economy.

CanyonAg,
I presume you know why the western state line between TX-NM is west of the western state line between OK-NM.

Spider, can't recall right now. I do know there is a history of bad surveying in the area, does that have anything to do with it?

quote:

---

Don't think I agree so much with I-40 being Amarillo's "life line".

---

I-40 is a major east/west thoroughfare for the interstate shipment of illegal drugs, that's for sure (and which can also be said for just about every other major interstate highway) ... it keeps the APD and DPS busy with drug busts

http://m.knoxnews.com/news/2011/jul/21/government-begins-process-of-merging-y-12-and/

AAAAAAAAAAg - Air Force Aggie Architect & Administrator from Amarillo, Altus, Austin, Arabia, Arkansas, Africa, Seoul, & now Amman, Jordan '65, '69, '73
Behavior is a mirror in which everyone shows his image - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

I'm not going to pretend I understand it all, but BWXT currently has the contracts to manage Pantex and Y-12. So it appears to me that the only thing going on is that they will now make one bid, for the combined Pantex/Y-12 contract, as opposed to two separate bids.

I'm going to back down on my earlier comment, and say that NOBODY is going to lose jobs in that scenario.

CanyonAg,
That's what I heard. It was a surveying error in Texas' favor.

[This message has been edited by Spider69 (edited 8/3/2011 10:08p).]

Gotta agree with CanyonAg on Pantex. My father worked at Pantex for many years and he has told me that the dismantling of nukes there is just as important as the assembly was in years past. That is what he worked on before retirement and I don't think that it is going away anytime soon. CanyonAgs wife currently works there, so I would consider him a better source today. So listen up to the man from Hale Center.

Helium... Well, growing up there, I cannot recall anyone who's parent worked in the helium industry. Lots of Pantexans, but no helium families.

I40 as a lifeline...? not so much. Not that much tourism in beautiful Amarillo as you might think. Stanley Marsh tried his best, but outside of the Cadillac Ranch, no cigar. Railroads? nsm either.

Medical opportunities are ongoing, but I haven't heard too much about major expansions.

I don't think there is that great a problem with illegal aliens. Not so much more than the rest of the state. The beef packing industry has some issues I am sure.

FYI - Guymon is about 120 miles from Amarillo, so I don't think you would be going there for dinner. Or a date with the few and far between panhandle chicks. Although, I gotta say, when I was growing up in Amarillo, there were plenty of attractive females around the panhandle. Mebbe it has changed in the last decades...

Overall, it aint CA, but it is a pretty good place to live.

Did either of you guys read the newspaper links I posted?? You may very well be right but crazy things happen with politics and government contracts in cities that vote Repub during a Dem administration... Amarillo AFB is testament to LBJ... Along with Webb and James Connolly AFB's.

I reckon I've been around Amarillo and Pantex a while too. Arrived in 1943 whilst my dad was in WW2 and mother found work building bombs whilst we lived in barracks on Pantex for several years until my dad returned after armistice. And I worked at Pantex again in the 50's in HS.

Went through public schools and graduated HS in Amarillo BEFORE either I-40 or I-27 existed. In fact before NE 8th was diverted Rt 66 - which was on 6th Street at one time and when I was a boy, in fact St Anthonys was on Polk and NW Tx was on "the highway". - I.e. 6th Street...
Spent summers and a year earning $$ to return to A&M via AC and WT. and had Amarillo A&M Hometown Opportunity Award Scholly to A&M, So have just a tad of background I'd put up against any of you younger guys.

And Rt 66, the railroads, and the ranching industry was and is Amarillo's legacy and without it Amarillo would not exist and neither Pantex nor AAFB would likely have been here without them. Thus, I think what was posted in my original post above was - and is - accurate...

Granted I have lived mostly elsewhere for the last 50 years but my folks still live in Olsen and I just attended my 50th HS Reunion. Things haven't changed much except AHS pulled a fast one and moved from South Polk Street and moved to the affluent part of town and redistricted everyone else (to each other HS detriment I might add...). If AHS had stood fast, the current high schools near failing grades would likely be more evenly distributed and Canyon ISD would likely not have felt so threatened as to move their school boundary into Amarillo City Limits and be stretched so??
From afar this whole thing appears fishy and I would welcome some enlightenment in that regard,..

Twings, DoubleDip, Phariss, Dino's Blackburn Bros, Hub, Colbert's and Brents are all gone and Corbin's (?) is as close as it gets to B-CS old Varsity Shop or Harolds in Norman... Ted Lokey is gone (?) as is Myer's Fried Chicken and Batson's Dining Room. Circle-N is still around as is Buck's Spoting goods... Vance Hall is gone...

My first "job" (besides mowing grass) was selling pop at Gold Sox Stadium when the New York Yankees were the host to a AA farm club here and at Furr's at 6th at Georgia and on North Fillmore for 35cents an hour in the 7th grade. Competition was McCart's and Ideal and all of them gave away bags of sugar and real automobiles at each store location frequently and each gave away a different type of stamps to redeem gifts... None of the big chains were here until Safeway arrived with union scale at 75cents/hr.

There, maybe that'll generate some discussion...

Aggie1,

Nothing is happening to Pantex. Just the logistics of moving however many thousand bombs and bomb components assures that.

Can you imagine the security nightmare of even moving a few hundred? Not to mention the hue and cry that will arise from the NIMBY folks wherever the bombs proposed move would be.

The "LBJ killed Amarillo AFB" is a persistent Urban Legend. Only 8 of the 26 counties in the Panhandle voted for Goldwater over LBJ in 1964. Potter County (home of Amarillo AFB) was not one of them.

quote:

---

Canyon ISD would likely not have felt so threatened as to move their school boundary into Amarillo City Limits and be stretched so??

---

What? Exactly when did Canyon ISD "move their boundary"? Canyon ISD has not moved ever as far as I know. A few minutes with a map would show you that the Amarillo City Limits are what has moved, not Canyon ISD.

And exactly how is Canyon ISD "stretched"?

By the Way, more Amarillo citizens are now citizens of Randall County than of Potter County. Guess which boundary lines moved, Amarillo or Randall county.



[This message has been edited by CanyonAg77 (edited 8/4/2011 2:03p).]

????
I'll admit that post has me confused.

you know when the high school burned down, they did this CRAZZZZZYYYY thing. Built a new high school on cheaper land in the direction the city was growing!!

I agree it would be crazy to move Pantex - but the TVA people would have it happen as it would enhance their economy... And the newspapers have picked it up. From where I am in the Middle East, I can only read what's printed. That's all. End of discussion.

Re: LBJ and AAFB - it is NOT an Urban Legend. It is fact. I was there and part of John Tower's staff at the time...

Re: The Canyon School District. Perhaps Canyon had more foresight than Amarillo. But, taking in that big an area for a school district has to be taxing for travel and expenses.

Re: AHS - I didn't figure anyone who is a Sandie would like those remarks. Nevertheless, their move changed the boundaries of Caprock, PD, and Tascosa to their detriment - and only enhanced dear old AHS - to it's immense better fortune. AHS pulled a fast one with old city politics. That's all. Otherwise they would still have the same area of responsibility they originally had - which would make them "sharers" of the minorities and less fortunate... Right now they are all affluent and can be the t-sips of Amarillo with all that goes along with that...

Re: Amarillo moving toward Canyon... Much better than NE and the "industrial parts of town" right?? My folks moved around and I have lived in every part of Amarillo - When I was in HS I lived near Cliffside and the Helium Plant... Rocks, bear grass and rattlesnakes... Obviously, it is much better in Tanglewood, and anyplace there is real "dirt" in and arond a break in the countryside...

Not trying to start an argument here. Just making some observations.

AAAAAAAAAAg - Air Force Aggie Architect & Administrator from Amarillo, Altus, Austin, Arabia, Arkansas, Africa, Seoul, & now Amman, Jordan '65, '69, '73
Behavior is a mirror in which everyone shows his image - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

quote:

---

Re: LBJ and AAFB - it is NOT an Urban Legend. It is fact. I was there and part of John Tower's staff at the time...

---

It seems highly unlikely for LBJ to punish part of his home state for such a small slight, but who knows. There is certainly little in writing to back it up. If you have inside info you can share, it would make interesting reading.

quote:

---

Re: The Canyon School District. Perhaps Canyon had more foresight than Amarillo. But, taking in that big an area for a school district has to be taxing for travel and expenses.

---

I'm going to guess that school district lines were drawn way back in the early 1900s, based on the population and communities of the time. It was certainly common for rural school districts to cover huge areas, since the population was so thin.

Amarillo ISD reaches pretty far, well into Randall County. I'm betting they took in downtown and the close-in communities of the time. I would bet they wanted the big downtown business and wanted nothing of the rural students. Sort of bit them in the butt later when the airport, Pantex, ASARCO, Excel plant, IBP beef packers, etc. all built in the Highland Park district. HP is pretty rich in tax dollars now.

From the old AHS location to the south end of AISD, it's about 7 miles. From the old CHS location to that point, about 11 miles. Not that different.

[This message has been edited by CanyonAg77 (edited 8/4/2011 11:25p).]

Good points. Perhaps when I come back into town we can have coffee or a brew and discuss some of this stuff... ?? Need a "fix" from "home" every once in a while... Roots and all that...

********************************************************
THE KID IS VERY FAST, I SAW HIM RUNNING VERY FAST. AND VERY HARD HE IS A GOOD RUNNER I SAW HIM RUNNING FAST AND HARD, THROUGH MANY HOLES.