Plainview, Hale County
The Plainview Commercial Club, led by President J. O. Wyckoff, saw the potential of irrigation during a 1910 visit to wells in New Mexico. Local banker and farmer J. H. Slaton agreed to bear cost of a test well sunk on his land if it succeeded. G. E. Green and J. N. McNaughton completed the well in Jan. 1911. At 130 feet, using a nine-inch centrifugal pump, it yielded 1,700 gallons of water a minute. The success of the Slaton Well led to extensive irrigation. It transformed this semiarid area of West Texas into one of the most productive food crop regions in the world. (1976)