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Please add profiles of those who were born, lived or died in Odessa, Ector County, Texas.
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History
Odessa was founded in 1881 as a water stop and cattle-shipping point on the Texas and Pacific Railway. It is said to have been named after Odessa, Ukraine, because of the local shortgrass prairie's resemblance to Ukraine's steppe landscape.
The first post office opened in 1885 and it became the county seat of Ector County in 1891. It was incorporated as a city in 1927, after oil was discovered on the Connell Ranch.
With the opening of the Penn Field in 1929, and the Cowden Field in 1930, oil became a major draw for new residents. In 1925, the population was just 750; by 1929, it had risen to 5,000. For the rest of the 20th century, the city's population and economy grew rapidly during each of a succession of oil booms.
In 1948 Odessa was also the home of First Lady Barbara Bush, and the onetime home of former Presidents George H. W. Bush and George W. Bush. Former President George H.W. Bush has been quoted as saying "At Odessa we became Texans and proud of it."
Odessa is known for its "Kiss and Kill Murder" in March 1961. Betty Williams, an Odessa native, was killed by Mack Herring because he claimed she begged him to. Her body was discovered in a stock pond several miles outside Odessa. Mack Herring was tried, and acquitted based on temporary insanity. In 2013, Odessa had the highest rate of violent crime in Texas, with 806.4 crimes per 100,000 inhabitants.
Odessa's Presidential Museum and Leadership Library, on the campus of the University of Texas of the Permian Basin, is the only facility of its kind in the United States—dedicated to the office of the Presidency, not any particular occupant of the Oval Office. It also has displays about the presidents of the Republic of Texas. The museum was pushed to fruition by the late State Representative George "Buddy" West of Odessa. The building itself is named for West and his wife, Shirley.
On August 31, 2019, a spree shooting occurred in the West Texas cities of Midland and Odessa when a gunman shot multiple people from a vehicle. Eight people were killed, including the perpetrator, and twenty-five people were injured, including three police officers. Authorities identified the shooter as 36-year-old Seth Aaron Ator from Lorena, Texas, who had been fired from his job the morning of the shooting spree. He was shot and killed by police outside a movie theater in Odessa.