Lone Star Ordnance Plant Payroll — Bowie County

Lone Star Army Ammunition Plant occupies a 24,300-acre tract nine miles west of Texarkana, next to Red River Army Depot. Construction cost $45.5 million; the contract was let July 23, 1941, and the first small-caliber ammunition shipped May 27, 1942. The plant loaded artillery shells, bombs, fuses, boosters, and auxiliary ammunition items for the army, operated by Lone Star Defense Corporation, a B. F. Goodrich subsidiary. In April 1943 it merged with Red River Depot as Texarkana Ordnance Center. Defense-plant folklore imagines worker payroll boxes cached near loading lines when shifts changed or camps relocated. Coordinates approximate the Lone Star plant west of Texarkana. Active ordnance facility — no trespassing.