Texhoma, Oklahoma

We're so big it takes two states to hold us!-So says the town of Texhoma, which has an area of 0.64 square miles for its 1300 residents, and which straddles the state line dividing the panhandles of Texas and Oklahoma.Thus the town name, invented by combining the first three letters of Texas with the last four of Oklahoma.

Texhoma dates back to 1901 and includes the distinction of being called the "Bread Basket of the World," before the drought, wind erosion and depression of the 1930s. Now it's known for its livestock, grain, gas, water, a historic downtown with brick streets and"?a number of good folks and a few old grouches!"

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But if all goes well, by July 2001, Texhoma - at least the Oklahoma part of it - will have a new distinction. Its school district will be the first in that area to build a Monolithic Dome facility.

Rick Kibbe is superintendent of the Texhoma School District, whose facility for pre-kindergarten to grade four is in Texas, while the school for grades five through 12 is about eight blocks away in Oklahoma. Its combined school population totals 415 students.

Kibbe said, "On January 31, 2000 the Texhoma Oklahoma School Board met in an open meeting and presented its $1.5 million proposal for an 18,000-square-foot facility. The Board approved, and on April 4, 2000 the bond issue went to the voters and passed 192 to 50."

Plans at Texhoma call for two Monolithic Domes, with diameters of 108 feet and 66 feet, both on ten-foot-high stem walls, connected to each other with conventional construction. Seven classrooms and a central administrative area will take up the lower floor of the large dome. Its upstairs is reserved for a future library open to the community and students, and equipped with an elevator or wheelchair lift.

Texhoma's smaller dome will house a cafeteria, with kitchen facilities and a lobby in the connector.

"We began researching the possibility for this building project approximately three years ago," Kibbe said. "As far as domes go, I received a dome magazine (the Roundup) just from a blanket mailing, and I read an article about Payson (Unified School District in Arizona). And we got interested."

As interest grew, Kibbe and five board members visited the Monolithic Dome school at Heber/Overgaard, Arizona. Then, as they got closer to deciding whether or not they wanted domes, Kibbe took his elementary and high school principals and a teacher for a site visit.

"The initial factor that caught my attention was the cost per square foot," Kibbe said. "Then we began really researching and learned about the storm factor. We do not have a facility here for protection from a tornado, so that became very attractive, not only for the school, but for the community."

Texhoma is now formulating its disaster plan. Kibbe said, "We're going to be working with the community in making our cafeteria accessible during a storm. We'll be giving our emergency people at our volunteer fire department a key, and they will open the facility as they deem necessary. They won't have to look for school officials; they can alert folks and begin getting them immediately and directly to the domes."

Construction at Texhoma is slated to start this October. 'We're really excited about this project," Kibbe says. "We haven't had any media coverage yet, but our newspaper will be out here for the ground breaking and the inflation of the Airforms. There's lots of excitement and curiosity, and we're really anxious for school to begin next August in our new domes."