Bunavista

Bunavista, west of Borger in southern Hutchinson County, was established in 1942 to house employees of a federal government synthetic rubber plant. It was allegedly named after the "Buna S" process for manufacturing synthetic rubber. When World War II cut off the supply of natural rubber, the Phillips Petroleum Company supervised the construction and operation of this plant, which produced butadiene, an essential ingredient of synthetic rubber. Almost overnight a settlement grew up around the enterprise. Local mail came through the post office in Borger. In 1955 Phillips bought the facility, which became its Copolymer Synthetic Rubber Plant. Several types of synthetic rubber for various uses were manufactured there in the 1980s. By 1966 much of the government housing around the premises had been sold and removed. The population in Bunavista was listed at 2,067 in 1960, at 1,402 in 1970, and at 1,410 in 1980. In 1979 part of Bunavista was incorporated into the city of Borger, and by 1990 Bunavista was a named locale in Borger.