Have you ever noticed the big rock "hut" at Broadway Park?
Did you know that it was a memorial to a favored district judge who died in an accident? Did you know it was a huge fountain? Here is a story that ran in the Plainview paper years ago that tells about it in all its glory. Oh, how I wish we could bring it back into operating condition!
Before it was known as Broadway Park, the acreage in the south part of Plainview was dubbed City Park. And within that park was built what became known as Rotary Park. The following story was taken from the Jan. 26, 1934, Plainview Herald.
On a plot of ground, 365x380 feet in dimension, in a Plainview city park, a large Rotary wheel laid out with rocks, trees and shrubbery has been built in memory of the late Judge L.S. Kinder, pioneer Plainview jurist who was killed in an automobile accident near Melrose, N.M., June 2, 1931. A fountain built of rocks 12 feet high and 30 in diameter at the base formed the hub of the wheel. (The fountain was surrounded by a low wall that later was torn down.) One-hundred-fifteen Chinese elm trees extending as radii from the hub in six double lines form the spokes. The rim is a circle of shrubs at the extremities of the six lines of trees. (Most of the trees have since died or have been cut down. A drive around the fountain has long since been closed.) The Kinder Memorial Park is a project of the Plainview Rotary Club of which Judge Kinder was a member. On the fountain is a bronze memorial tablet dedicating the park to the memory of the dead jurist. (The plaque is no longer there but the words In Memory of Judge L.S. Kinder, Feb. 22, 1933, are inscribed in the stone.) Judge Kinder, one of the most beloved and respected and widely known residents of West Texas, was intimately associated with the development of this section from its earliest organization. He came to Texas in March 1883, shortly after graduation from law school, and located in Dallas. In September he made a trip to Plainview, returning again in early 1889 to settle permanently. He played an active part in the growth of Plainview. He helped organize the Plainview Independent School District and served as a trustee from 1905 to 1909. He also was instrumental in the organization of the Plainview Masonic Lodge, the first in the Panhandle. Judge Kinder assisted in the reorganization of the Third National Bank in 1924 and became its president, a position in which he continued when the Plainview National Bank was organized, and held until his death. His first public office was that of county attorney in 1889 when he was appointed to succeed L.G. Wilson, who had been elevated to judge of a newly-created judicial district. From 1892 to 1896, he served as district attorney of the old 50th Judicial District comprising 13 counties and nearly 13,000 square miles. He was a judicial judge of the 64th Judicial District from 1905 to 1915. Judge Kinder was a charter member of the Plainview Rotary Club and was instrumental in its organization in 1921. He had long been interested in boys and young men. Finding in Rotary a coordinated movement to assist boys, he immediately became outstanding in the boys work program. Judge Kinder´s love of the outdoors and his tireless efforts to influence the planting and propagation of trees on the bleak plains of West Texas led to the idea of a park as a fitting memorial following his death. Now an enticing mat of green grass under a canopy of shady branches calls invitingly to the youngsters that Judge Kinder loved so well.
