As the 70s flew past in a blur of growth and development, the missing link in Spring Valley Road was built connecting it from Coit Road to west of Hillcrest (where for years it dead-ended at White Rock Creek for lack of a bridge). The Northwood Hills Addition spread north all the way to Belt Line. Across Hillcrest, Northwood Hills Estates was sprouting new 3,000 to 3,500 square-foot homes on half-acre lots. In order to fund these new sections, developers Mixon and Troth sold 30 acres to the City of Dallas for Fretz Park, named for an early Dallas architect responsible for several landmark city government buildings. By the arrival of the fateful 80s, Northwood Hills had achieved distinction as a mature, highly desirable neighborhood.
Frankford, TX, was nine miles Northwest of Richardson in extreme Southwestern Collin County. Settlement of the area began around a campsite on the Shawnee Trail near a small spring on Halls Branch, used in the 1850s and 1860s as a stopping point and watering hole for traildrivers and other travelers. A small town developed after the Civil War at the nearby crossing of the Addison and Weber roads (later known respectively as the Dallas North Tollroad and Hilton Head Road), and a post office opened on May 11, 1880, under the name Frankford. By 1890 the town had a population of 83, a steam gristmill, a corn mill, a cotton gin, a blacksmith shop, two general stores, and three churches. The St. Louis Southwestern Railway bypassed the town in the late 1880s, however, and many Frankford residents moved to Addison, Plano, and other nearby communities. In 1904, the Frankford post office was closed, and in 1907 its lodge hall, which had served as a non-denominational church, was moved to Addison. A second church, built in the 1890s, continued to serve a predominantly Methodist congregation until 1924. By the mid-1930s the town was no longer shown on county highway maps. Its church building was restored in 1963 by the Frankford Cemetery Association, which arranged for the Episcopal Church of the Holy Communion to worship there. The city of Dallas annexed the area in 1975, and in 1990 local children attended the Plano schools. All that remained of the community in 1990 was the Frankford Church and Cemetery, adjoined by residences on three sides and by the Bent Tree Country Club to the south.
Frankford community, including a still existing church and cemetery, developed in the mid-1800s in the Southwestern corner of Collin County on Halls Branch, a tributary of White Rock Creek. In the 1850s and 1860s, travelers detoured from Preston Road, oldest North-South route in North Texas, to camp in their covered wagons by a spring on Halls Branch on the Shawnee Trail. Residences and the Bent Tree Country Club near the present Dallas North Tollway and Weber Road now cover the area. A post office that served the community from 1890 to 1904 was built at the crossing of Addison and Weber Roads. Records state that "by 1890 the town had a population of 83, a steam gristmill, a corn mill, a cotton gin, a blacksmith shop, two general stores, and three churches." The post office gave the community the official name of "Frankford" when it opened on May 11, 1880. Stories collected by Collin County historian Frances Wells speculate that the name Frankford described a "ford" or shallow crossing over the creek that was "frank" or free with respect to conditions or restrictions for crossing. Thus "Frankford" might mean a ford available for public use. Another story attributes the name Frank to the name of a settler's son, Frank Cotton.
The history of the community's cemetery and church is closely associated with Masonic Lodge 234, chartered June 15, 1858. Members of the lodge built a two-story lodge hall in 1872 on land owned by Captain William C. McKamy, a Tennessee immigrant who arrived in present Dallas County, Texas, in 1852. McKamy bought land, a home, and a mill on the White Rock Creek from Peters Colonists. McKamy was a member of the Masonic Lodge 234 and sold the lodge five acres for church and school uses in 1873 for ten dollars an acre.
The Hall, as the old-timers called the building, served as a religious, fraternal, and educational community center. The second floor of the Hall was reserved for lodge meetings while the first floor was used for school and non-denominational church services. One former student, William Furneaux of Carrollton, remembered going to school at the Hall in 1875 when W. H. Alexander and his wife taught about 75 pupils there. Since some of the students lived in Dallas County, Mrs. Alexander took the primary grades across the creek into Dallas County and taught them in a farm tenant house in order to collect Dallas County school money. Another teacher, J. S. Allen, is listed in a record of Collin County free public schools as receiving $84.95 from the county in 1880 to operate the Frankford School.
The St. Louis Southwestern Railway bypassed the town in the late 1880s, and many Frankford residents moved to Addison, Plano, and other nearby communities. In 1904, the Frankford post office was closed, and in 1907, its lodge hall, which had served as a church and school, was moved to Addison. A second church, built in the late 1890s, continued to serve a predominantly Methodist congregation until 1924. By the mid-1930s the town was no longer shown on the county highway maps. Frankford Church lay vacant and deteriorating until 1962 when Episcopal services of the Church of the Holy Communion began to be held in the building. Today the restored church and carefully tended cemetery are nestled in a picturesque setting which includes a wooden bridge across the creek at the entrance to the 13-acre grounds and a windmill. A parish hall that was originally the old Addison Railroad station sits next to the white church. New buildings constructed by the Episcopal Church are also on the original grounds. Both the church and cemetery have Texas State Historical Markers.
Renner, TX, a half mile west of State Highway 289 in Southwestern Collin County, was established in 1888 as a stop on the Cotton Belt line (officially known as the St. Louis Southwestern Railway of Texas). The community was named for John A. Renner, a railroad engineer in charge of developing townsites along the Cotton Belt line. A post office was established in 1888 to serve the fifty residents of Renner, and within twenty years the town became a commercial and community center for area farmers. In 1915 its population reached 300, a figure that was not surpassed until 1965. The Great Depression and the development of mechanized farming contributed to a sharp decline in population, and by 1947 Renner had 100 residents and two businesses. After World War II, the Texas Research Foundation, a nonprofit agricultural research organization, selected Renner as the site of its agricultural laboratories. From 1950 to the late 1960s the population of Renner grew steadily, reaching 394 in 1969. After 1977 the Texas Almanac no longer listed it as an independent community, and by 1983 Renner had been incorporated into the city of Dallas.
One source recalled that Bill Blakely owned about 1,000 acres, was quite wealthy but later came on hard times after developing Exchange Park near Parkland hospital. McCallum's aunt owned about 1,000 acres where Preston Trails Golf Club is now located. Blakely used to ride his horses on the ranch where Meandering Way resides (there is some uncertainty as to whether Blakely's land went east of Hillcrest or all the way to Coit) on Sundays, dressed in his church suit, tie, boots and hat. The McCallum's shared the profits of running horses on the land. The land was sold to Pollard-Simon, a national developer who then sold tracts to a partnership of Metropolitan Savings and Talmadge Tinsley to build houses. His recollection of Renner was that it was bounded by McCallum, Frankford, a little west of Coit, and Meandering Way on the west. There was an old grocery store in the downtown area where the old-timers would play dominoes.
Another source said Bill Blakely owned the land where the trail resides; he was an Arapaho Indian, thus the name for Arapaho Road. Bill was an oil and gas man, had no heirs and was believed to have left the land to SMU. The McCallum's ran cattle on the land. Their farmhouse was east of Preston in the vicinity of where Brentfield is now. "It was just open country; you could piss off the front steps and shoot out the back."
The developer of Northwood Hills mentioned that the land on Meandering Way north of Belt Line was owned by Bill Blakely, an investor in Braniff Airlines and involved in Exchange Park Bank and Trust. When L.B. Johnson resigned the Senate seat to become VP, William Blakely was appointed Senator for Texas, until beaten by John Tower in 1961. It was thought that the Meandering Way land was donated to SMU by Blakely as he had no heirs. Whoever eventually developed the land was believed to have done it in the late 1960s with Dallas Federal Savings and Loan. DFSL would take a piece of the equity for lending to the developer and then get the title insurance and mortgages on the new houses. Bill Troth developed the duplexes along Belt Line east of Meandering Way. There was no school district until it was annexed into RISD. Meandering Way was built to Belt Line in late 1960s. In the late 1950s there was a drive-in movie on Arapaho between Meandering Way and Hillcrest. It was gone by the early 1970s. There was a grocery store at Alpha and Hillcrest. Metropolitan Savings and Loan and Warren Clarke were involved in development of the residential area near Bowie School.
From the Internet: Baylor Law Library Rare Book Room (Sheridan and John Eddie Williams Legal research and Technology Center)— Most of this collection was made possible through the generosity of two distinguished members of the legal community: Judge Frank M. Wilson and U.S. Senator William A. Blakely. Judge Wilson donated his private collection of over 2,100 volumes of first editions, rare printings of pre-eminent legal writing, novels and research titles. Senator Blakely presented the library with an early printing of the Magna Carta and several other first editions. These gifts, along with the law school's original collection of rare books, which includes Las SietePartidas and a nearly complete collection of the session laws of Texas, are housed in this room, located on the second floor of the Law Library in Room 207.
Much early funding for the University of Dallas, Irving, Texas came from Tom Braniff of BraniffAirlines, who underwrote the graduate school, and from William (Bill) Blakely who underwrote the William A. Blakely Library, in the Braniff and Blakely buildings.
