Wentz

Wentz was one mile south of Farm Road 1106 ten miles southeast of Tilden in eastern McMullen County. Two Rivers Ranch Company, a group of Kansas investors, formed in 1910 and hired C. C. Wentz to promote the townsite. Prospective buyers were brought to the property in a limousine from Three Rivers, and many found the tall grass and abundance of game attractive. Those who bought at least 100 acres were entitled to run cattle on unsold property, and the terms for purchase were one-third down and a balance to be paid in ten installments. By 1914 Wentz had a post office and by 1916 a hotel, two schools, two grocery stores, a meat market, a cotton gin, a lumberyard, 200 people, and a weekly newspaper. Wentz was crippled by a drought that lasted from November 1916 to March 1918. Repeated attempts to drill water wells met with failure. By the early 1920s most of the residents had left; in 1921 the post office was closed. The schools closed in 1948, and by 1952 only a few families lived in the general vicinity. A 1967 map shows nothing standing on the original townsite.