Famous Mineral Water Company

Dismuke sold water by the glass, but the larger money in Mineral Wells was in selling it by the box. A rival firm, Carr Collins's Crazy Water Company, evaporated the water into crystals and sold them as a mix-at-home cure, advertised coast to coast on the radio. The Crazy Gang program ran from the lobby of the Crazy Water Hotel, built in 1927, from 1935 to 1941. The company claimed cures for insomnia, diabetes and gout. The Food and Drug Administration later declared such products fraudulent, according to Wikipedia's account of Collins.

What the plaque says

Famous Mineral Water Company Edward P. Dismuke (1860-1957) came to Mineral Wells about 1900. He and Cicero Smith built a recreational lake west of town in 1904, complete with picnic areas and a scenic railroad. When they dug a well for drinking water they discovered a new supply of mineral water. After first selling the water in the Dameron Hotel, Dismuke opened the famous Mineral Water Company in 1913, dispensing the water and other products from a drinking pavilion. The famous Mineral Water Company wells are the only ones in town still accessible to the public. (1990)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Lake Mineral Wells State Park and Trailway — 4.1 mi
  A Cross Timbers park on the old Camp Wolters grounds, built around a 1922 water-supply lake for a spa town, with Penitentiary Hollow's rock climbing and a 20-mile trailway.
• Chandor Gardens — 18 mi
  A portrait painter's English-and-Chinese garden rooms, blasted and planted from a bare 3.5-acre hillside in Weatherford beginning in 1936, abandoned after 1978 and reopened by the city in 2002.

More markers nearby

• Dr. H.H. Milling — steps away
• Mineral Wells — 0.3 mi
• First Baptist Church of Mineral Wells — 0.4 mi
• Old Camp Wolters — 2.2 mi