Crime Scene & Biohazard Cleanup Near Downtown Windthorst Windthorst, TX

Windthorst is a small town in eastern Archer County, Texas — extending slightly into Clay County — about 25 miles south of Wichita Falls on U.S. Highway 281, within the Wichita Falls metropolitan area.

Windthorst was founded in 1891 as a German Catholic farm colony on roughly 75,000 acres of the Clark and Plumb company's Circle Ranch, where settlers planted a wooden cross inscribed with the town's name on July 26, 1891, and the first families arrived that September.

The town is named for Ludwig Windthorst, a prominent Catholic statesman in Germany.

The first Mass in Windthorst was celebrated on January 1, 1892, and Father Joseph Reisdorff, who founded the town's St. Mary's Catholic Church, went on to establish four more German-Catholic towns across North Texas and the Panhandle.

St. Mary's Catholic Church stands on the highest point in Archer County, and its steeple can be seen from miles away across the surrounding pastures.

At the base of the church stands St. Mary's Grotto, an outdoor shrine dedicated in 1950 that was paid for entirely with money sent home by 64 Windthorst servicemen during World War II — every one of the 64 men returned home safely, and their names are displayed in the grotto.

Windthorst keeps its German-Catholic heritage alive with two Knights of Columbus sausage festivals each year, held on the first Sundays of December and March.

The 2020 census counted 342 residents in Windthorst, down 16.4 percent from 409 in 2010, spread across about 2.5 square miles.

Windthorst's Bridwell Park is named for Joseph Sterling Bridwell, a Wichita Falls oilman, rancher and philanthropist.

Windthorst High School's Trojans have won UIL state championships in football, volleyball, baseball, softball and track — most recently the 2020 Class 2A Division II football state title — and the town produced Hank Gremminger, a defensive back on Vince Lombardi's championship Green Bay Packers teams of the 1960s.