MTV GIVING AWAY ‘TOWN’ IN TEXAS

People in the Panhandle community of Shamrock are expecting a new neighbor next week--a whole town.

MTV has put up a 100-acre tract of rural Wheeler County as the first prize for the winning postcard drawn in the music video channel’s latest contest.

“The channel is very well known for its outlandish contests,” MTV promotion coordinator Peter Danielsen said from New York. “Now we’re giving away a town.”

The network gave away $1 million in 1985, and sent rock idol Prince to Sheridan, Wyo., to give the winner of this year’s contest a private screening of Prince’s new movie, “Under the Cherry Moon.”

Danielsen said the land, which is northwest of Shamrock and 80 miles east of Amarillo, will be incorporated at the winner’s request.

“It is (a town) because we bought it--and we’ll make it a town,” he said.

Residents of Shamrock, population 3,000, are showering MTV with cards, hoping to keep the land’s ownership in the county, said Jo Rives, wife of Shamrock Mayor Doug Rives.

“I’ve sent in 40 postcards, and everybody around here that knows anything about it has sent numerous cards,” she said Monday. “There’s no money involved. You just sign a card and send your name in. It’s a nice community out there.”

MTV ads promoting the contest began in May, promising the acreage, stereo equipment, 1,000 compact discs, a satellite dish to keep up with MTV, which is not otherwise available there, enough candy and gum from contest co-sponsor Nabisco to supply a town, a Jeep and $100,000 cash.

“We’ll take anyone here who’s got $100,000,” said Mayor Rives.

Jo Rives said the other prizes also would be useful, “especially the Jeep. You’d have to have a Jeep to get there.”

Richard Hefley, the Shamrock realtor who put the deal together, said the spot was ideal for someone trying to get away from it all.

“This county has depopulated since the 1930s,” Hefley said. “Back in the old days when people didn’t need a whole lot of land to make a living, there were a lot more people. No one lives on this particular land now, though several farmers and ranchers live nearby.”

He said the land is rolling, the soil sandy and--critical information for arid West Texas--has good underground water supplies.

Danielsen said MTV chose Wheeler County for MTV Town because land there was relatively cheap, about $300 per acre.