The White Deer Land Museum has been in the business of preserving Gray County history for more than 50 years since its official opening in 1970. The museum was authentically restored from the 1916 office of the White Deer Land Company. Today, the museum boasts several interactive exhibits, summer camps for kids and has even financed research documentaries on historical happenings in the Texas Panhandle.
This year will feature a host of new exhibits.
“Right now we have O.M. Franklin, who created the black log serum, exhibit upstairs. We’re also bringing in Celanese and Cabot (exhibits). 2026 will make 100 years that Atlas Cabot has been here in Pampa,” said Anita Gullet, curator of the White Deer Land Museum.
“And then we, along with the people of Lefors, are actually building an exhibit on Lefors being the first county seat and it is a community project.”
In addition to the O.M. Franklin, Celanese, Cabot, railroad and Lefors exhibits, the museum will also see the grand opening of the Red River War wing and a B&G Electric exhibit.
“August 24, we’re having Dr. Michael Jordan from Texas Tech here doing a lecture on ledger art. He focuses on Kiowa, Comanche and Cheyenne ledger art,” Gullet shared.
“On August 27th and 28th, we’re going to be doing tours of the Red River War battle sites. November 8 will be the grand opening of the Red River War Wing- there will be a banquet and a big opening that will also bring in lectures, food and a lot of fun to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Red River war.”
“We also have our summer camps coming up, and our summer camps are three days long. It’s where we do art and history, and it’s a lot of fun. We usually have 25 to 30 kids, and we do two different series so that we don’t miss anybody in Pampa if they want to go. So we do one set in June (10-12) and one set in July (8-10).”
Museum Archivist Della Moyer has been on the board of White Deer Land museum on and off for decades. She explained some of the ins and outs of collecting, organizing, preserving and displaying the information collected over the years.
“We research as much as we can,” Moyer began.
“It’s not just scanning it and putting it out there. Our goal is to have something for people to come look at on the computer instead of the more fragile archives.”
Documents, photographs, newspaper clippings and more are scanned and organized into a spreadsheet. For the more fragile documents, Moyer utilizes her camera. To identify people and events in photographs, Moyer utilizes social media groups and spends a lot of time “chasing rabbits” online.
These digitized documents and organization help to shine light on family histories and contribute to information displayed on storyboards within the museum, most of which Moyer put together herself.
“I worked for an attorney for 14 years. Research and organization was what I spent most of my time doing. That was back before social media- you had to be very original in your search parameters to find out what you need to know about people or events,” Moyer said.
This skill has helped Moyer to refine the archives while digitizing- especially on days that boxes of documents are brought in for her to organize. These documents can range from family photos to receipts to building plans to estate sale items and more.
“A few weeks ago, (a Pampa local) brought in 30 years worth of files on his recovery efforts for the swamp ghost in Papua New Guinea. It had photographs, had articles, magazines and the contracts they had drawn up. His wife had, thank goodness, organized it all so well, and we went in and digitized it,” Moyer shared.
“We have people that have found things in estate sales that they may bring in. We scan those in and put as much information as we can with them.”
“Anything that pertains to Gray County, we like to at least see. Sometimes we just scan items in and give them back to (the people that brought them in) because our archive storage is limited.”
In addition to the wide range of topics of information the museum may take in, Moyer also navigates around poor storage and preserving practices.
“We try to make what we scan as legible as possible. Staples, glue and tape are not your friends in archiving. Paper clips- anything metals rusts. Tape loses its ‘sticky’ and leaves a residue. It can be difficult to scan items with backing on them,” Moyer explained.
While she explains that it can be difficult to archive documents such as this, she emphasized the need to continue to print physical copies of photos and other documents.
“All of us are bad about not writing on the back of photographs. Cell phone cameras and digital photography are probably the biggest enemies of historical preservation, because people don’t do anything with them. They just store it on their phone, then they get a new phone and their baby pictures are gone, school programs are gone. People need to print,” she stresses.
“When a loved one passes away, one of the biggest healing things we do and don’t think about, is we go through the old photographs. It gives us a chance to relive the good times and gives us an opportunity to teach our kids the family history and walk through our grief.”
While Moyer’s passion for history is displayed on many of the walls of White Deer Land Museum, she hopes to see a passion for history spark within the younger generations.
“I grew up here, I love the history. What I do is try to document it for people 400 years from now, which I’m afraid people won’t care. The interest in history is lacking in the younger generations. That’s why we like to do the WOW kids. All three museums in town are in the WOW program. You get the kids in the museum and you teach them about history, and you make it fun and they want to learn and just maybe out of all of those kids, you may have one that history will become a passion.”
“It’s fun to see the family history, the connections- and you’d be surprised who’s related to who. I’ve gone on a lot of rabbit hunts and I’ve helped a lot of people put their family history together- It’s important to me, and I hope it benefits somebody else.”
To contact the White Deer Land Museum about its upcoming events, exhibits and summer camps, you can e-mail anita.gullett@graycch.com or call 806-669-8041.
