Gaines County Museum - Seminole, Texas

06/19/2026

This 1955 photo is from the Gaines County Golden Jubilee celebration honoring the early settlers and pioneers with a dinner. Notice the women in pioneer dresses and sunbonnets in contrast to the automobiles shown in the background. Several of the attendees are recognizable …so let us see who can spot former Gaines County Judge Charles Lawrence among the crowd. The museum staff believes that each of these people had a personal as well as significant story that was a building block to the development of our county. Our thanks and appreciation to this stalwart group who chose to settle in West Texas and Gaines County!

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06/15/2026

06/12/2026

The Museum’s summer paleontology program is in full swing. The featured photos are from the first day of the Stegosaurus class and as you will notice these young paleontologists are immersed in the discovery of this dino. We still have a few openings for the T-Rex and the Triceratops classes should your child be interested. Students should be entering the 2nd thru the 5th grades, and the classes are free as the Friends of the Gaines County Museum fund the program. For more information, please call the Museum at 432-955-1016 or visit us at 700 Hobbs Highway, Seminole, Texas.

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06/05/2026

The featured photo is of six mules pulling a 2-row planter in early Gaines County (date unknown.) It is estimated that the team of mules could cover 25 – 28 acres per day. Mules were the unsung heroes when considering the development of America as this animal power provided the strength to build innumerable projects from coast to coast. We are familiar with the quote “stubborn as a mule”…perhaps we should rethink and reassess the quote as maybe that stubbornness translates to an excess of common sense and a very strong desire for self-preservation. Those two attributes were also core values of the early settlers of Gaines County.

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05/29/2026

The featured photo from 1924 is of the Scott C. and Maggie Doss family. The family is in front of their home at 806 S. E. Third Street in Seminole. Scott stands on the left, holding his youngest son, Hyle. Next are from left to right, Cleo, Beth, Bobbie, Maggie Doss, Bernice, Scott Jr (aka “Son”) and “Mother Cox (Maggie’s mother). Scott farmed, ranched, and served as a carpenter, clerk, mail carrier and tax assessor. From 1939 to 1955, he also served as a state cattle inspector.

Source: Gaines County Museum and The Gaines County Story

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05/22/2026

The Gaines County Museum hosted the Seminole F J. Young Elementary 1st graders last week, and they were the first official visitors to the Loveland schoolhouse that is located on the Museum property. The students were able to receive an imagined experience of this early Gaines County school as well a new appreciation for the current facilities…specifically air condition for the afternoon visitors. The ranching community donated parcels of land for the original 29 school sites and often provided room and board for the teachers. We are especially grateful and thankful that the progressive minded ranchers and citizens who stepped forward to establish the first educational system in Gaines County. We believe this group would be among the loudest voices yelling “GO TRIBE!”

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05/15/2026

Ed and Etta Aryain met in 1925 and were married the same year, and they moved to Seminole in 1939 with their two small sons Eddie and Jameil. Ed Aryain came to the America at age 15 having traveled by steam ship from his native home of Damascus, Syria. The Aryains opened a clothing store at 110 S Main Street in Seminole where it remained in business for several decades. The featured photo was taken in 1927 in Lamesa, from left to right are Ed’s friend Fays Fandy, Etta Stone (Ed’s future wife), Ed, and Etta’s aunt and uncle Luma and Sam Hameed. The group is sitting on the running board of a Buick Brougham 51 Master Six automobile. We can imagine this group of friends embarking on a Sunday afternoon drive to view the countryside in this wonderful automobile…we really like the detail of the photo, the apparel that reflects the 1920s, and of course the car.

Source: The Gaines County Story, Images of America/Seminole, and the Aryain family

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05/08/2026

“High fashion from the Roaring Twenties did not bypass the lovely young ladies of Seminole. Pictured in this photograph from the late 1920s are, from left to right, Lena Upton, Nancy Sawyer, and Lillie Kirk. Apparent are the latest hairstyles and dress lengths that actually show a young lady’s ankles.” The fashion statements that stands out to us are the fur-like accessories as well as the showcased wavy hairstyles…all of which are runway worthy.

Source: The Jones family, Images of American, Seminole

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