Slaton
Slaton, Lubbock County, Texas
Marker Inscription
The town of Slaton traces its history to the Santa Fe Railroad. O. L. Slaton, a Lubbock businessman and banker, was instrumental in securing the right-of-way for the railroad through this area. When the new town was laid out in 1911, it was named for him. The Pecos and Northern Texas branch of the Santa Fe Railroad line reached Slaton in May 1911, one month after the first town lots were sold. The official opening day of Slaton was held on June 15, 1911, when the first of Santa Fe's four daily passenger trains arrived. Slaton grew rapidly as the railroad established a division point here which included a Harvey House, roundhouse, machine shops, and a two-story freight and passenger depot. A post office was opened in 1911 with Annie Higbee as postmistress. Buildings were quickly erected on the square as businesses were established. The Santa Fe hired Dr. Samuel Houston Adams as surgeon for the Slaton Division. Slaton was incorporated in 1912. R. J. Murray was elected mayor, and Joe H. Teague, Sr., served as first city marshal. Located in one of Texas' foremost agricultural regions, Slaton continues to have an economy based on ranching and farming. 1988
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Slaton owes its very existence to the Santa Fe Railroad. When the Pecos and Northern Texas branch reached the South Plains in 1911, banker O. L. Slaton — who had helped secure the right-of-way — lent his name to the brand-new townsite, which opened for business only a month after its first lots sold. As a railroad division point complete with a Harvey House, roundhouse, and machine shops, Slaton boomed almost overnight into a farming and ranching hub.
Why it matters
Slaton is a textbook railroad town, one of hundreds the Santa Fe conjured across the West where the tracks decided which patch of prairie would become a city.
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Related people
- · O. L. Slaton
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
O'Donnell
O'Donnell, TX
Named for railroad promoter Tom J. O'Donnell, this Lynn County town sprang up in 1909 when the Santa Fe pushed a new line across the South Plains from Slaton toward Lamesa. Founders built a hotel and store, celebrated the first train with a Fourth of July picnic in 1910, and drew churches with free lots before incorporating in 1923. By the mid-20th century O'Donnell had become a dryland cotton center boasting what was briefly the world's largest gin—and the hometown of actor Dan Blocker.
Rockwell Lumber Company Office Building
Slaton, TX
In 1911 Rockwell Brothers and Co. bought land from the Pecos and Northern (Santa Fe) Railway to open a lumberyard serving the brand-new railroad town of Slaton. This two-story vernacular building housed the company office, with living quarters above for the manager and his family — Robert W. Parker being the first to occupy it. It remained the main office until Rockwell closed its Slaton operation in 1941.
Slaton Harvey House
Slaton, TX
Slaton was born of the railroad: the Santa Fe bought this ranchland in 1911 for a division point and, a year later, built both a depot and a Harvey House. Part of the chain founded by Scottish immigrant Fred Harvey, the Slaton house served elegant meals to travelers around a horseshoe counter, staffed by the famed 'Harvey Girls' who roomed upstairs. A commercial and social hub for thirty years, it briefly reopened to feed troops during World War II before the building lived on as a depot into the 1980s, later rescued by local preservationists.
Englewood Cemetery
Slaton, TX
Representing the Santa Fe Railroad, W.B. Storey, Jr. bought the future townsite of Slaton on April 15, 1911, with plans for a roundhouse, switch lines, depot, and Harvey House that would make it a hub of West Texas rail traffic. Rail workers and settlers filled the town so quickly that it incorporated in 1912, the same year residents opened this cemetery with the burial of an infant. Among its thousands of graves are unmarked burials in a potter's field and veterans of wars dating to the Civil War.