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Pattilou Dawkins

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When the Wolflin brothers came of age in Gainesville, Texas, previously from Canton, Missouri, they looked no further than Amarillo as the premier place to start a business. In 1890, George, Charles, and Frank moved to the newly formed city to open a mercantile store on 5th and Polk Street.

“The Ft. Worth and Denver railroad came right through Amarillo,” says Pattilou Dawkins, the granddaughter of Charles Oldham Wolfin. “It was a place where cowboys could stay the night, feed their cattle and horses, and get back on the track the next day. It was a booming town.”

Shortly after settling in the decade-old town, Charles O. met and courted Alpha Eunice McVean. One day the two stood on the corner of what is now Wolfin Avenue and Washington Street, where Charles O. confessed to his soon-to-be-wife, “ I have two desires in life: You and that piece of land.”

“The story goes that my great-grandmother gave both of them to him,” laughs Pattilou, in her home on Travis. “She didn’t own the land at the time, but she had the money to buy it. She gave it to them as a wedding present. That was the start of the Wolflin Addition.”

The area of Wolflin is bounded by four main roads: Washington in the east, 34th on the south, Georgia on the west and Wolflin Avenue on the north.

The two married on March 30, 1897, and Charles O. operated a dairy farm on that plot of land for nearly two decades. Their son, Charles Alexander Wolflin, attended one of the then-top-rated agricultural schools in the country – the University of California at Davis – with the intention of returning to Amarillo to run the family farm. However, when Charles A. graduated in 1924 after his father died, he realized the people of Amarillo wanted houses more than they wanted milk.

“Together with his mother, Alpha, and sisters, Cornelia and Lela, my mother, they borrowed $100,000 in 1927 to put in streets, curbs, sewers and utilities, and 1,000 elm trees that still line the streets,” says Pattilou. “They used to carry buckets of water to every tree. That was one of their evening chores.”

Forming the beginnings of what would eventually become the Wolflin Mortgage Company, Charles A. hired a city planner from Kansas City, and the two created Amarillo’s premier residential development, a neighborhood defined by brick streets, elm trees and elaborately-built homes. They even built a palatial home for their mother at 2800 Hughes Street, which stood as the family home for decades. Frank Wolflin built his home at 35 Oldham Circle, where Pattilou remembers spending holidays as a child.

The original Wolflin home was built on the same corner of Wolflin and Washington where Alpha’s late husband first proposed a future together. The house was torn down in 1965 and replaced by a gas station and convenience store.

“When the Depression hit, my grandmother had to sell the house on Hughes, when lots stopped selling. My mother and daddy courted at that house,” says Pattilou.

Homebuilding began again after World War II, and Charles A. saw a need for a shopping center in Amarillo, similar to those he had seen in other larger, thriving cities. In 1953, he built Wolflin Village, a place where customers could meander away from the business district and enjoy a day of shopping. Charles O. quickly established himself and the Wolflin name as playing a significant role in Amarillo real estate.

Pattilou was not only born and raised here, but she’s also always lived within the same quarter-mile radius, owning homes at various times on several of the streets in Wolflin. Surprisingly enough, she never considered running the family mortgage business until much later in life.

“I graduated from Oklahoma University in 1957 with a degree in History and Philosophy, and I really wanted to go to law school after that, so I wrote my father a letter telling him that two friends and I were going to go to SMU, and he wrote me back the letter from hell,” she laughs. “He said I just wanted to play, and that I should go to Europe or whatever, but then I needed to come home and work. So he said no. And do you know what makes me mad? I didn’t dream that I could’ve done it myself. I had drive and ambition, but I didn’t know I could work and pay my way through school. I raised my daughters differently.”

Pattilou did as was expected: She came home to Amarillo, got married, had four children and joined the Junior League.

“You know what, I loved that stuff too,” she says, chuckling. “I’ve always done what I loved. I mean, I still do. I just saw Julie & Julia, and after that I went right out and bought Mastering the Art of French Cooking so I could make that Beouf Bourginion. I spent all day cooking that stuff and I am so tired! But it was fun.”

She admits that the Junior League training paid off. Pattilou served on the Hospital Board of Managers in 1976 and went on to run the local phone bank as Telephone Chairman for the election of Bill Clemmons for Texas Governor that same year. (It also happened to be how she met Karl Rove.) After her divorce and the death of her brother and sister in a plane crash, Pattilou went to her uncle, Charles A., about working for the family company. He advised her to get her real estate license, which she did, as well as take business classes at Amarillo College. After his death in 1991, Pattilou stepped in as the operator of Wolflin Mortgage Company.

“I learned early on that to whom much is given, much is required,” she says. “The economy of this city has been good to the Wolflin name. God blessed me. I’ve been very fortunate.”

When Pattilou’s not in the office, you’ll often find her in her “playpen,” or rather, the garden in her backyard.

“I raise artichokes and asparagus, and all kinds of things,” she boasts. “I just go out there and piddle.”

Next: Jay Kirkman, III

by Jennie Treadway-Miller

Jennie was a columnist for the Chattanooga Times Free Press for eight years prior to moving to Amarillo in 2008. She is an avid reader, runner and writer.