BARTLETT, Texas — It’s just about noon in Bartlett, Texas, as a long Union Pacific freight train makes its regular run through town. Its blaring horn and the clacking of the tracks are just about the only sounds at lunch time in this quiet Central Texas town.
The census says that about 1,600 people live there, a pleasant town with a picturesque, brick-lined main street and several blocks of mostly well-maintained store fronts that are over 100 years old.
But the stores are empty, and the businesses are gone.
And just a few weeks ago, Bartlett suffered the loss of another business: its hometown newspaper. The Tribune Progress, which had been published nearly every week since its inception in 1886, has shut down.
The owner and editor of the newspaper, Gail Biells, said the decision to close wasn’t an easy one.
“My children had been after me for years to give it up,” Biells said. “It got to where it was really difficult for me to get around.”
Biells said several people had looked at buying her newspaper business, but so far, there have been no deals. And even if a new buyer were to be found, Biells said business isn’t what it used to be, as there hasn't been recent enough income from advertising to support the printing and postage costs.
Although the Tribune Progress is gone, thousands of old editions of the historic paper still exist. The Library of Congress has added the Bartlett newspaper to its collections, and the University of North Texas’ website, The Portal to Texas History, has posted a large collection of the newspapers online, thanks to a gift from the Bartlett Activities Center.
The collection includes almost 138 years of Bartlett area history from a town where that history, as seen through the eyes of a newspaper editor, is no longer being written.