Temple is a small Texas town with a transportation heritage starting with the 19th-century Chisholm Trail and continuing today with distribution facilities strategically located to maximize trade with Mexico and proximity to other cities in the state. Headquartered there is McLane Company, Inc., the nation’s largest convenience store supplier now owned by Wal-Mart, and Wilsonart International, a maker of plastic laminates. Temple’s nondescript downtown is currently undergoing a renovation with focus on points of historic interest. Temple is also home to the Scott and White Memorial Hospital and Clinic, a large regional teaching hospital.

Killeen, 20 miles to the west, serves the massive Fort Hood military installation. Not surprisingly, the area has a very low cost of living profile, one of the best for Texas outside of border towns. But there isn’t much to do nor much intellectual stimulation. The area is known for spring wildflowers in the Grand Prairie to the west.

Temple and Killeen sit at the border between the Blackland Prairie agricultural area to the east and the Grand Prairie dry hills to the west. The area around both cities is mostly level to gently rolling. The climate is humid subtropical and continental with large variations in temperature. July and August days are particularly hot, with clear skies and relatively low humidity. Spring can be quite wet and stormy, and mild winters are punctuated by windy, cold-air invasions from the north. Winter precipitation may be a mix of snow, rain, sleet, and freezing rain, but snow accumulation is usually minimal.