City of Levelland
Levelland, Hockley County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Surveyed and platted in 1912 as "Hockley City" by cereal magnate C. W. Post. Although only a barren townsite, place won race for county seat in 1921. The first meeting of county officers was held at future courthouse site-- in a Cadillac automobile. Soon city square boasted a temporary courthouse (16 by 32 feet), a well, and a community black-eyed pea patch. When a post office opened, in 1922, city was renamed Levelland, for its topography. Prosperity arrived with the coming of the railroad in 1925 and discovery of oil in the county in 1937. (1972)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Surveyed and platted in 1912 as "Hockley City" by cereal magnate C. W. Post, this barren High Plains townsite won the race for county seat in 1921 — the first meeting of county officers reportedly held inside a Cadillac. Early Levelland made do with a 16-by-32-foot temporary courthouse, a well, and a community black-eyed pea patch, before the railroad arrived in 1925 and oil was discovered nearby in 1937.
Why it matters
Levelland's rise from a windswept plat to an oil-boom county seat captures the speculative town-building and petroleum wealth that transformed the West Texas plains.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · C. W. Post
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
The Spade Ranch
Smyer, TX
Isaac Ellwood, who made a fortune as one of the inventors and manufacturers of barbed wire, bought this vast South Plains range in 1889 from the veteran cattlemen D.H. and J.W. Snyder. Branded with the "Spade," the ranch was first stocked with calves from Ellwood's southern Renderbrook Spring holdings and eventually stretched fifty-four miles across several Panhandle counties before farmland sales moved its headquarters in the 1920s. Ellwood's descendants still own and operate it today.
Replica of XIT's Giant Windmill
Littlefield, TX
The sprawling three-million-acre XIT Ranch built a 132-foot windmill on its Yellowhouse Division in 1887, setting it deep in a canyon so it stood tall enough to catch the wind and pump water. Reputed to be the tallest windmill in the world, it stood until high winds finally toppled it in 1926. This replica, raised in 1969, keeps the memory of that engineering marvel alive.
First Irrigation Well in Lamb County
Earth, TX
In 1902, ranch hands dug this well by hand to water the crops, cattle, and household of Ewing Halsell, son of land promoter W. E. Halsell. Only thirty feet deep but six feet across, it fed an irrigation ditch that carried water half a mile to the headquarters of the "Mashed O" Ranch on the dry Texas high plains. It marks one of the first attempts to irrigate this arid corner of Lamb County.
Spring Lake
Earth, TX
Long before fences crossed the High Plains, this spring on the Llano Estacado drew Native hunters who camped and watered here while pursuing the great buffalo herds. In 1882 Tom Lynch trailed cattle up from New Mexico and the surrounding country turned to open range, and after the Capitol Syndicate acquired the land the site became headquarters of the largest division of the sprawling XIT Ranch. The State of Texas raised this marker in 1936 during the Texas Centennial to fix that layered history in place.