Arah was ten miles west of Snyder in western Scurry County. The settlement developed to serve the needs of surrounding ranches and was named for Arah Gray, daughter of E. W. Gray, a rancher in the area in the early 1890s. C. R. Fellmy may have opened a general store in Arah in 1907. About the same time E. F. Sears laid the foundation for a gin that was never completed. In 1912 Ruth Davis arrived in Arah with her family and recorded the presence of a gin, blacksmith shop, general store, and combined school and church building. The population of Arah was estimated at thirty-five in 1914. The settlement acquired a post office in 1907 with Eugene Gray as postmaster; the office was closed in March 1949, and thereafter the mail was brought from Snyder on a rural route. During the 1930s the Arah school was the center of local activity, according to Mary Ellen Chapman, who served as postmistress from 1930 to 1949. It was consolidated with the Fluvanna school eventually. During the 1930s the population was estimated at thirty, and the community had one business. In 1962 Arah had no businesses, and the population remained at thirty. By 1969 the town had disappeared from maps and listings. Oil leasing increased in the area after the discovery of the Canyon Reef oilfield in 1950. But the highest density of oil activity was mostly to the south and southeast; C. T. McLaughlin's Diamond-M ranch, with its rich wells, was located southeast of Arah, which declined as Snyder became the center of the oil trade.

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Kathryn Cotten, Saga of Scurry (San Antonio: Naylor, 1957).
Jeanne F. Lively