Hamblen Drive is a scenic road located approximately south of

Claude, Texas Claude is a city in and the county seat of Armstrong County, Texas, United States. The population was 1,196 at the 2010 census. It is located east of Amarillo in the south Texas Panhandle. Claude is part of the Amarillo Metropolitan Statistica ...

, United States, in Armstrong County. Hamblen Drive itself is a section of

Texas State Highway 207 State Highway 207 (SH 207) is a state Highway that runs from Post, Texas through the South Plains and Texas Panhandle to the Texas/Oklahoma state line. History The highway was originally designated on July 31, 1934 between Floydada and Ralls. B ...

, which cuts through

Palo Duro Canyon Palo Duro Canyon is a canyon system of the Caprock Escarpment located in the Texas Panhandle near the cities of Amarillo, Texas, Amarillo and Canyon, Texas, Canyon. As the second-largest canyon in the United States, it is roughly long and has an ...

and crosses the

Prairie Dog Town Fork Red River Prairie Dog Town Fork Red River is a sandy-braided stream about long, formed at the confluence of Palo Duro Creek and Tierra Blanca Creek, about northeast of Canyon in Randall County, Texas, and flowing east-southeastward to the Red River abou ...

. The road is named for Will H. Hamblen (1876–1952) ) who, with his family, first moved to the Palo Duro Canyon area in 1890. He married his wife, Ada, in 1900 and together they ranched near Wayside, Texas after 1905. In the 1890s, Hamblen helped his father haul cedar posts cut from

Amarillo, Texas Amarillo ( ; Spanish for "yellow") is a city in the U.S. state of Texas and the seat of Potter County. It is the 14th-most populous city in Texas and the largest city in the Texas Panhandle. A portion of the city extends into Randall County ...

to sell for three cents apiece. The journey was made over old Indian trails through the canyon. During these trips Hamblen began to create a crude road, which made it a bit easier to make the trip to Amarillo, and cut approximately 120 miles of the journey to the courthouse in Claude, Texas. This crude road was steep and dangerous, and Hamblen still wanted better roads for the settlers to use. He worked for many years to get a road built through the canyon. In 1928 he was elected

county commissioner A county commission (or a board of county commissioners) is a group of elected officials (county commissioners) collectively charged with administering the county government in some states of the United States; such commissions usually comprise ...

and a graded road was built. In 1930, the commissioner's court dedicated the road as Hamblen Drive, and paved it in 1954. In 1968 the State Historical Survey Committee placed a historical marker (marker number 4284) atop a scenic overlook on the cliff of the

. The marker is located at 34° 47.899′ N, 101° 26.16′ W.

References

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External links

Roadside Park on Hamblen DriveThe Handbook of Texas Online The S.P. Hamblen Family
Roads in Texas Transportation in Armstrong County, Texas