Every mondy this month, we will be bringing you special stories profiling different Texoma towns. This week, we are going into Baylor County.

Seymour is the county seat of Baylor County and actually is the only town in Baylor County, surrounded by ranches and open country. The "crossroads city" is more than just a place to rest on a long road trip. There are a lot of reasons that you may just want to settle in. Here's what I found out in this Texoma History Special Report.

Seymour is a place of tradition, perhaps most famous for having the oldest rodeo in Texas.

Carolyn Bomberger said, "This is the committee badge from 1897 which is the second one, which we are pleased to have."

In the early days, Seymour had kind of a rough reputation, as cowboys from neighboring ranches would often come into town for some downtime.

Carolyn said, "The Millet Cowboys armed, some of them with up to 4 different kinds of guns. One of the Millet Cowboys had bullet holes in chaps, and every now and then they would come into town and kind of shoot things up. They were rough."

Seymour is located at the juncture of five highways, and it's location that has allowed it to grow from a population of 78 in 1880 to almost 4,000 today. The Baylor County banner follows the local happenings. Mark Gwinn has been working at his family's paper and printing business since high school, and he still does a lot of the printing the same way as he always has.

Gwinn said, "I don't know how old this is. It's over 50 years old. I've kept it up this entire time. In fact, I'll use it today."

Local news also comes from KSEY, our Southwestern Radio News partner.

Mark Aulabaugh said, "The hottest brand in town, KSEY am Seymour and good afternoon, straight up 12 noon and time now."

Many people catch KSEY on the long ride to Lubbock, and travelers have made eating at local favorites, like the Rock Inn Cafe, a tradition where they are most famous for their tall creme pies. Picturesque brick roads still run through much of down town. It may be hard to crank now, but its easy to imagine this old 1924 fire engine screaming down the street, and it's still used for the occational parade. But some of the most interesting things about seymour happened long before people ever arrived.

Dr. Bakker said, "Seymour is a magic place for anyone who loves fossils."

Unique ancient geography make Seymour a hot spot for scientists today.

"When this guy was alive, the surroundings of Seymour were getting rivers and mountains southeast and those rivers bring mud. You died 300 million years ago and you were buried and became a beautiful fossil," said Dr. Bakker.

But its not all about the past, city leaders are talking about new projects, like harnessing wind energy. Something you might expect to see in larger cities.

Mayor Ronnie Reeves said, "You don't have to be a big city to be progressive and and be innovative. Just because we're a small town doesn't mean we don't have big ideas."

Here's an interesting tidbit; the highest temperature ever recorded in Texas happened in Seymour. On August 12, 1936, it got up to 120 degrees!