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<br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br /> <br />00225~ <br /> <br />Few towns existed at the time, and as was typical of all settle- <br />ments in mid-America, real development had to await arrival of the <br />railroad, This biggest and most signficiant of events in a town's <br />history often came much later than county and town establishment. <br />The Santa Fe railroad came to Plainview on January 1, 1907 -- <br />nearly 40 years after it had reached Dodge City, Kansas. It was <br />extended south to Hale Center, Abernathy and Lubbock in 1909, but <br />the promise of cereal-king C. W. Post that it would come to the <br />Garza County-seat town of Post was not fulfilled until 1911. <br />Hockley County to the west had to promise and pay the Santa Fe a <br />$250,000 bonus to bring the railroad from Lubbock west to Levelland, <br />its County-seat town, by 1925. Such was the power of the railroad <br />barons, Today. the Santa Fe extends northwest from Lubbock to <br />Littlefield, east through Crosby ton, and southwest through Brown- <br />field. <br />Agricultural Produ:tion and Marketing <br />As the Texas South Plains awaited the coming of the railroad, <br />it remained a cattleman's empire. Huge ranches -- a million acres <br />and more -- were established on originally open and free-grazing <br />range, In these early times, the great cattle drives over the <br />Chisholm Trail and others northward to Dodge City took place. <br />George Littlefield, after whom the Lamb County-seat town is named. <br />bought a 235,000-acre spread in 1901. The "four-sixes" ranch, so <br />named because it was won in a poker game, covered nearly a million <br />acres, Originally, the only stock-water supply was diked <br /> <br />IV-5 <br /> <br />Arthur 0 Little.lnc <br />