House History: Murder and Live Burial at 301 East Lamar, McKinney, Texas

The farm house at 301 E Lamar sported three chimneys, two gables, and one covered porch (Texas Historical Commission, 1985).

Back in 1985, the Texas Historical Commission memorialized an old farm house at 301 E Lamar Street in McKinney, Collin County, Texas. While it was obviously in a dilapidated state, I thought it beautiful enough to do a bit more checking on its history, and once again, the research doesn't disappoint: the history of the house at 301 East Lamar in McKinney includes a murder and a live burial!

The house was first recorded on a Sanborn map in 1897 -- it might have been built earlier, but since the online deed records for Collin County are incomplete, I couldn't find the date. I did, however, find the location in the original deed plat for McKinney, which was re-filed (I think the original records were destroyed in a flood) with a date of 1/1/1900.

At one point, the abode at 301 E Lamar was owned by Mrs. Charles (Dollie) Neely. She and her husband, a farmer and barber, purchased the home as a real estate investment to rent out rooms and apartments. The next owners, Homer and Mary Prichard, did the same thing. They purchased the house and land by the latest in 1937, where they occupied an apartment within the subdivided home and rented rooms to others.

Boarding was a very common practice for many people until after World War II, when the newer suburban homes made that kind of arrangement harder, if not impossible. This is why older homes tend to have more than two doors, and why "historic house museums" are sometimes weaving tall tales of fancy parlors and studies and such. Most rooms in houses built before the advent of birth control were used as bedrooms.

Homer Prichard worked as a lineman for Southwestern Bell Telephone Company, while Mary Walthall Prichard was a telephone operator for the same company. They also made money on the side by selling horses and cows. Homer Prichard belonged to the McKinney Masonic Lodge No. 51, was drafted in both WWI and WWII, and at one point "sold a telephone to a man in a coffin" (see the newspaper article below).

The Prichards never had children, but the house was not quiet. In the 194Os, they shared the house with another couple, and by the 1950s, Mary's brother, a truck driver, and his family lived there. But in 1937, this house witnessed a filicide.

The Prichards had rented a room to Mary McCoy, a young waitress from nearby Westminster, in March of 1937. That same month, Mary McCoy's father came to her room in this house and shot the poor woman point-blank in the chest, killing her instantly. He then aimed the gun at himself. The father survived initially, but succumbed in the hospital a few days later. It appears that the motive for this murder is still a mystery, and probably will remain so.

Homer Prichard passed away in 1974, his wife Mary died in 1997. In the meantime, Mary Walthall Prichard sold the house as an owner-finance twice in the 1980s; the first time was an owner-finance note that fell through, and the second time seemed to be more successful. However, by this point, 301 E Lamar was in an unkempt state from delayed maintenance. When the Texas Historical Commission conducted a survey of historic structures in McKinney for possible inclusion in the National Register and/or creating a historic district in 1985, neglect had taken a toll on this rambling structure. It fell to the wrecking ball before 1995, and by 2020, the lot was developed into handsome town homes.

This was a fun little research project that helped me procrastinate from doing actual work today. Oops.

The house at 301 E Lamar Street was first depicted in an 1897 Sanborn map of McKinney (bottom left).

It was a rambling structure! (THC, 1985)

The house may have still been occupied when the Texas Historical Commission took this photo of the upstairs window in 1985.

But in 1985, the porch was not in the best repair (THC).

In 1937, a young woman was killed "in the home of Mr. and Mrs. Homer Prichard 301 East Lamar Street."

Homer Prichard sold a phone to a man who was buried alive as a stunt. This is an odd stunt, to say the least, as well as an odd sale. This happened in 1935 in Farmersville (Collin County, Texas) and it makes me wonder if it was something that people did to make a bit of money during the Great Depression.