That description is a memory of my childhood in Newport.
Also a memory is the fact that we never locked our doors at night, could sleep outside in the summertime without fear (except of what monsters lurked in our imaginations), and the stories my Dad could tell of his life growing up in and around Newport. My memories are so rich of Newport that my inadequate web skills will never be able to fully convey to you the love I have for my hometown.
But I will try if only to honor the best friends I grew up with and who have now passed on to another home as wonderful as my Newport.
Now, for an excerpt from The History of Newport:
"Newport is a small village about 33 miles southeast of Henrietta, the county seat of Clay county. The town stands right on the line of Clay and Jack counties, part of it being on the Clay side and part of in Jack County.
Newport nestles in a long and beautiful valley and the surrounding country is thickly settled with farm and ranch homes. A number of small ranches that are well-stocked with white faced cattle are around Newport and grain crops, row feed crops, and cotton are grown extensively and the gin at Newport usually turns out about 2.000 bales a year. All kinds of truck crops thrive well in the sandy soil of the Newport country. These crops find a ready market at Bowie, Wichita Falls, and other places. Grapes and berries do well and are grown extensively as well as are all other kinds of fruit.
There are four mercantile establishments in the town which carry large stocks all the time, one blacksmith shop, an up-to-date barber shop, two garages, a hotel and cafe which are always ready to supply the needs of tourists and visitors. One ample and commodious church building, equally owned by three denominations, Methodist, Baptist and Cumberland Presbyterian, and a union Sunday school that was first organized in 1879 and has never suspended or had to be reorganized since that day. This school still uses the same literature it has used all the years. The postoffice gets its mail from Bowie by Star carrier every day and there is a Rural Route that supplies the country both north and south of Newport. The community is still pioneering in that is has a grist mill that grinds corn and wheat upon the old-fashioned burr, or rock grinders, like they did back in the old days. This old burr mill is an attraction and draws customers for many miles around the town every Saturday. A lively, well-equipped consolidated rural high school that is growing gradually, from year to year is proudly boosted by Newport people who are satisfied and happy and always ready and willing to give new-comers the "glad hand" when they come to live in this splendid country. The "latch string" always hangs on the outside at Newport."
