Lorenzo
Lorenzo, Crosby County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Founded when Crosbyton-South Plains Railway ran first train here, April 10, 1911. Named for Lorenzo Dow, employee of C. B. Livestock Company, which promoted the town, and in 1914 encouraged area to plant cotton. Incorporated in 1924. Now a center of cotton growing, with fine churches, school, businesses. 1966
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Lorenzo sprang to life on April 10, 1911, the day the Crosbyton-South Plains Railway ran its first train to the spot. It took its name from Lorenzo Dow, an employee of the livestock company that promoted the townsite and, in 1914, urged local farmers to plant cotton. Incorporated in 1924, the little High Plains town grew into a cotton-farming center with its own churches, school, and businesses.
Why it matters
Lorenzo is a classic railroad town — proof of how a single rail line could conjure a community out of open plains and steer a whole region toward the cotton economy.
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Related people
- · Lorenzo Dow
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Lorenzo Cemetery
Lorenzo, TX
After the Texas Legislature carved out the Crosby Land District in 1876, ranchers spread across the Panhandle, and in 1890 a group of Chicago and New York investors formed the C.B. Livestock Company. Planning a rail line from Crosbyton to Lubbock in 1910, the company platted towns along the route and named this one for its attorney, Lorenzo Dow. It deeded land here for a community cemetery in 1916, where a child lost to whooping cough was reportedly the first laid to rest.
John Robinson Ralls
Ralls, TX
When the Crosbyton-South Plains Railroad pushed across the high plains of West Texas, John Robinson Ralls saw a town where others saw only ranchland. A Georgia-born storekeeper turned rancher, he traded a thriving general store for a 10,000-acre spread and in 1911 founded the town that still bears his name. He gave away the townsite itself, land for the first school, lots for every church, and built much of the early business district, seeding a community from the ground up.
John R. Ralls Building
Ralls, TX
When the railroad bypassed nearby Emma and cut instead across John R. Ralls's land, he founded a new town in its place and donated ground for homesites, the square, the school, and every church. This bank building was the grandest of the two-plus blocks of business houses he raised between 1915 and 1919 as the town took shape.
City of Ralls
Ralls, TX
Ralls owes its existence to John R. Ralls, a Georgia-born settler who moved West in the 1880s and gave land for a townsite, free lots for its churches, acreage for its school, and even offered 2,000 acres to lure Texas Technological College. After settling litigation with a rival townsite company, he secured a railroad station in 1916, the guarantee of the town's survival. The city was incorporated in 1922, just after its founder's death.