Celebrating 80 Years of Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge

By Kathy Whaley, Refuge Manager

Aerial Map of The Town of Hagerman, Before Lake Texoma

As Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge celebrates its 80th anniversary, it’s worth reflecting on how far we’ve come. While paging through old refuge annual narrative reports to gather tidbits for this story, I was struck by just how much has changed—from onion-skin paper (including rodent-chewed corners on the 1945 report) to today’s technology that can generate entire stories in seconds. Some changes have been for the better, some perhaps not—but the importance of this place has only grown.

Long before the refuge existed, the lands and waters we now protect were shaped by ever-changing natural forces. Between 140 and 65 million years ago, the Western Interior Seaway—a shallow inland sea rich with marine life—covered this region, expanding and retreating many times. The organic material left behind by these ancient creatures formed fossil fuels still found beneath refuge lands today. Because of their existence, these resources play a role in modern refuge management, and staff work closely with producers to ensure that mineral extraction and transport are carefully balanced with the protection of refuge lands and waters.

Human history here stretches back thousands of years. Archaeological evidence shows that Indigenous Caddo peoples used campsites along streams and water sources in this area for more than 12,000 years. Likely as transients, they hunted, fished, gathered, and farmed on what are now refuge lands, sustaining their families for generations.

Hagerman Train Station

By the late 1830s, Caddoan groups were trading with early settlers along the Red River. The Peters Colony settlement efforts of the 1840s brought new families, and by the 1870s a farming community had taken shape. Known for a time as Steedman to honor county judge S.D. Steedman, the town grew steadily, even gaining a post office in 1880. Before 1910, James P. Smith donated land and laid out streets in what had been a 10-acre wheat field. When the Missouri–Kansas–Texas Railroad (KATY) arrived in 1909, the town was renamed Hagerman in honor of railroad attorney James Hagerman. At its height, the community was home to about 250 residents, complete with churches, schools, and mercantile stores.

T.M. Smith Grocery Store

Change came again in the 1920s with news of the War Department’s Denison Dam project. Lands were purchased by the federal government and families gradually moved away to make room for what would become Lake Texoma. When the dam was completed in February 1944, a new chapter began. Since then, floods and droughts have reshaped the bottomland hardwood forests, while upland areas have seen cedar, locust, mesquite, and winged elm spread into former blackland prairie grasslands—changes clearly visible when comparing historic photos across decades.

John Clark Salyer, a conservationist now known as the “Father of the National Wildlife Refuge System” played a key role in the establishment of Hagerman NWR. Beginning in 1935, he traveled around the country in a car and stopped here during his journey to attend a meeting and help push forward the idea of having two refuges on the new lake – Hagerman and Tishomingo. Impressively, Mr. Salyer grew the refuge system from 1.5 to 29 million acres in his time serving as the national Chief of Refuge Management.

Refuge Headquarters in 1950

On February 9, 1946, Hagerman National Wildlife Refuge was officially established as an overlay of lands purchased by the War Department through Public Land Order 314 signed by President Truman. The refuge itself began to take shape in the late 1940s as an office building—now the Friends Building—was constructed, followed by a residence that has housed refuge staff since the early 1950s. Picnic tables were installed in the three Day Use Areas in 1947, and remarkably, one of those original tables at Goode Picnic Area is still in use today. Recreational opportunities expanded over time, including fishing, which became a year-round activity in the 1970s. In 2011, the current Visitor Center/Refuge Headquarters was completed and replaced a small, 1980’era building at the same location.

Wildlife has always been at the heart of the refuge’s story. Once home to very few deer, the refuge saw populations grow steadily, leading to the start of archery-only hunting in 1984 that is now one of the most popular white-tail deer hunts in Texas. Wild Turkeys were reintroduced in the 1980s and now thrive, primarily Rio Grande turkeys, possibly mixed with Eastern turkeys. Other changes have brought challenges, such as the rise of feral hogs—an invasive species that staff take great efforts to manage.