Slaton

Eli Stilson and J. I. Case, the farm-machinery maker, patented the tract on September 1, 1879; Case sold it six years later to the Western Land and Livestock Company for its IOA Ranch, and J. W. and Herbert L. Kokernot bought it in 1901, promoted settlement and sold to J. C. Phillips. The Santa Fe sent W. B. Storey, Jr., from Chicago to set up the division point. E. W. Dickey began the weekly Slaton Journal on opening day, and a school founded in 1897 anchored the new district in 1912.

What the plaque says

Slaton 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

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Slaton Harvey House — 0.5 mi
  A 1912 Santa Fe Harvey House in the railroad town of Slaton, restored as a museum, event hall and five-room inn overlooking a working BNSF yard.
• American Windmill Museum — 14 mi
  Lubbock's park of restored water-pumping windmills and early wind chargers, more than 70 of them turning outdoors and the rare ones under roof, with a megawatt-era turbine overhead.
• Buddy Holly Center — 15 mi
  The city's museum of Buddy Holly and West Texas music in a 1928 railway depot, with the house where the Crickets worked on That'll Be the Day moved next door.
• National Ranching Heritage Center — 17 mi
  A Texas Tech outdoor museum where ranch houses, barns, windmills and a depot from across the ranching country were moved one by one onto a single park beside the campus.

More markers nearby

• Slaton Bakery — steps away
• Slaton Volunteer Fire Department — steps away
• Mercy Hospital — 0.7 mi
• Ransom Canyon — 6.8 mi