Herman Specht migrated in 1870 to Galveston from Germany and in 1884 married Clara M. Vogel Lange, a wealthy widow. Adding to earlier property holdings in Galveston, he began buying extensive tracts of land in northern Wichita County that eventually totaled 21,000 acres. In 1886 he platted the town of Clara, naming it for his wife, and its streets were named for Texas heroes. He donated this site for the Trinity Lutheran Church and advertised for German colonists from other states to settle there. Specht built his home in Iowa Park in 1890 and ran a ranch at Clara where he grew wheat. North of the church site, he had a large experimental nursery for unusual plants, but the 1891 drought wiped out the nursery and his crops. The 1900 Galveston storm destroyed the remainder of their vast holdings. Clara included a church, schools, store, garage, and post office, but hampered by an inadequate water supply, the town began to decline with the consolidation of the school with the Burkburnett schools. During the oil boom of the 1920s, many residents moved to Wichita Falls, and good roads and cars made it possible to shop elsewhere. The town finally vanished except for the church, rectory, and cemetery.