NICKELVILLE
(south of Wylie)
NICKELVILLE'S EARLIEST
SETTLER SURVIVES DECLINE OF ONCE PROMISING TOWN NEAR HERE
Weekly Democrat Gazette, September 8, 1927
It can't be found on
the map of Texas but old settlers in Collin county remember Nickelville - a
struggling town on the southwestern frontier that held fair promise of growing
larger.
But Nickelville
didn't grow. When the railroad set up its new depot on the spot now occupied by
Wylie, the little town to the south suffered a severe attack of desertion from
which it never recovered. Later, as Wylie grew, it was absorbed by its more
successful rival.
Today a
weatherbeaten cottage is all that remains of Nickelville's former glory.
Passing by on a
sunny afternoon, one is likely to see a white-haired patriarch sitting in a
rocking chair on the front porch.
Earliest Settler
Still Living.
Question him, and if
he's in a reminiscent mood, he'll tell you all about Nickelville - how it
started and what happened to it. He is Dr. J. F. Butler, the only survivor of
the former town and the earliest settler in those parts.
Dr. Butler is now 85
years old, but he was quite a youngster when he came to Texas by train, boat and
wagon from Georgia in the early seventies. He is still living in the house he
built when he settled in Nickelville - then a store and two or three shacks.
Dr. Butler has some
interesting stories to tell about his early struggles. Collin county was an
untracked wilderness when he moved to Nickelville and practicing medicine was
not all that an ambitious young medico might desire. There were no roads - the
scant population was widely scattered. Making calls upon the sick meant long
rides on horseback over trackless prairies.
Doctoring on
Horseback.
"I guess I've
traveled thousands of miles in the saddle to administer pills," he told a
visitor the other day. "There were no telephones or railroads or automobiles.
Sometimes I wouldn't get any sleep for a week. I remember once of falling asleep
while I was trying to mix up some medicine for a sick man. I told his little
daughter to stick a pin in my leg if she saw me nodding. A moment later she
jabbed me so hard I forgot all about being sleepy."
Nickelville was
christened by the village wit, "Uncle" Tom Winn, according to Dr. Butler. Uncle
Tom jokingly dubbed it Nickelville "because it was no bigger than a nickel," and
the name stuck to the end of the town's days.
Dr. Butler grew
tired of batching it alone after a few years so in 1882 he went back to Georgia
and married, bringing his bride to Texas.
Prior to coming to
Texas Dr. Butler saw four years service in the civil war as a captain of Company
F., 26th Tennessee Infantry. He participated in virtually every battle in which
the Tennessee troops were engaged and retreated before Sherman's drive with a
tattered remnant of his company, barefooted and mounted on a donkey.
Dr. Butler is held
in high regard by his neighbors. They say he might have spent his declining
years in wealth had he been less generous in his youth. But playing good
Samaritan, failing to collect fees and going on other folk's notes has left him
in humble circumstances.
The foregoing story
is reprinted from the Dallas Times Herald. The picture was made by Frank Rogers,
staff photographer of the T. H. and the cut used by courtesy of that paper.
Communities Index
- Recommended
citation:
-
"Nickelville - Collin County Communities,"
Collin County, Texas History and Genealogy Webpage by Genealogy Friends of
Plano Libraries, Inc., <http://www.geocities/genfriendsghl>
[Accessed Fri February 13 13:37:28 US/Central 2004 ].
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