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When the Rangers Came

Seawriter
@Seawriter
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One riot, one ranger is the normal Texas rule. But rules are meant to be broken. Borger, Texas, in the 1920s was so corrupt, so wide open to crime, and so out of control, that in 1927 Governor Daniel Moody sent in a squad of Texas Rangers to clean up the town.

Boomtown: The True Story of the Wickedest Town in Texas, by Joe Pappalardo, tells the story of that clean-up effort. It shows how the Rangers went to Borger and how they shut down a lawless town.

Borger was established in 1926, when Asa Philip “Ace” Borger and John R. Miller purchased land and platted a townsite in Hutchinson County of the Texas Panhandle. Oil had been discovered nearby, and the two hoped to profit by setting up a town there.

As Pappalardo shows, they intended to earn money through more than land sales. From the start the two intended Borger to be an “open” town, where bootlegging, prostitution, gambling, and vice would flourish. Miller, Borger’s appointed mayor when it opened, was elected by supporters who ran the town’s vice industries. They skimmed money from these, along with profiting from graft — pocketing tax money intended for municipal improvements, setting up sweetheart deals for school and hospital construction.

The predictable happened. Local crime spiraled out of control. Criminals used Borger as a base for crimes committed in Oklahoma and elsewhere in Texas. Borger became a synonym for vice, nicknamed “Booger Town.” After a series of murders of prominent residents, Texas’s new governor sent the Rangers, led by the legendary captains Frank Hamer and Thomas Hickman, to take control of the town.

Boomtown describes how they did it, following the occupation from March through August 2027. It shows how the Rangers arrived, started their clean-up by forcing Borger’s vice-friendly police chief to resign (replaced with an ex-Ranger), and then shuttered Borger’s red-light district. Rangers kicked out the bootleggers and criminals, and destroyed area stills.

Over the next few months, they sought the resignation of city and county officials most viewed as corrupt. Surprisingly, as Pappalardo relates, even those favoring reform in Borger tired of the Ranger presence. They believed the Rangers were heavy-handed (spoiler alert – they were) and felt the continued occupation gave Borger a bad reputation.

Boomtown is a delightful book. Filled with larger-than-life characters (on both sides of the law), Pappalardo provides color and excitement in this history of Borger’s bad days.

“Boomtown: The True Story of the Wickedest Town in Texas,” by Joe Pappalardo, St. Martin’s Press, April 2026, 352 pages, $31.00 (Hardcover), $15.99 (E-book), $20.78 (Audiobook), $45.95 (Audio CD)

This review was written by Mark Lardas, who writes at Ricochet as Seawriter. Mark Lardas, an engineer, freelance writer, historian, and model-maker, lives in League City, TX. His website is marklardas.com.

This post was promoted to the Main Feed by an editor.

Discussion (4)

  • John H.@JohnH

    Guess the Rangers did their job. When I bicycled through Borger in the summer of 2005, it was serene. I think I could buy beer there, though there was not a floozy in sight.

    I recall visiting a used bookstore and finding a justifiably lurid paperback about the life and times of Saddam Hussein. I should've bought it, or at least written down its title and later found it in a library back home. I love the Texas panhandle but its diversions are few.

  • TBA@RobtGilsdorf
    ReplyingtoJohn H.

    John H. (View Comment):

    Guess the Rangers did their job. When I bicycled through Borger in the summer of 2005, it was serene. I think I could buy beer there, though there was not a floozy in sight.

    I recall visiting a used bookstore and finding a justifiably lurid paperback about the life and times of Saddam Hussein. I should’ve bought it, or at least written down its title and later found it in a library back home. I love the Texas panhandle but its diversions are few.

    This is what happens when you remove the biodiversity of local fauna. The American Floozy is on the endangered species list for a reason.

  • Orange Gerald@Jose

    This sounds very similar to the Bruce Willis movie Last Man Standing.

    Yes, I know that's a remake of Kurosawa's Yojimbo, but perhaps it was inspired by Borger, the bootlegger gangs, the compromised police chief, etc.

    Anyway, sounds like an interesting book.

  • Seawriter@Seawriter
    ReplyingtoOrange Gerald

    Orange Gerald (View Comment):

    This sounds very similar to the Bruce Willis movie Last Man Standing.

    Yes, I know that’s a remake of Kurosawa’s Yojimbo, but perhaps it was inspired by Borger, the bootlegger gangs, the compromised police chief, etc.

    Anyway, sounds like an interesting book.

    I don't think Borger was the only place with crooked cops and bootlegger gangs. Borger and Miller were trying to make a Panhandle version of Galveston. (Although, without the constraints the Galveston mob imposed.)

    It's a pretty universal story.