Carrizo Springs: Artesian Wells and the Eagle Ford Boom

Carrizo Springs is the oldest community in Dimmit County, founded in eighteen sixty-five by a group led by Levi English, a pioneer who had lived among the Comanche. The name comes from the Spanish word for a type of cane grass that grew around the natural springs here. By nineteen oh four, thirty artesian wells were irrigating the surrounding farmland, a railroad spur arrived, and the population climbed to about twelve hundred.

A handsome Italianate courthouse went up in eighteen eighty-four, upgraded to Classical Revival in the nineteen twenties. The quiet ranching town was transformed again starting around two thousand eight, when hydraulic fracturing unlocked the Eagle Ford Shale beneath Dimmit County and turned Carrizo Springs into a staging ground for South Texas oil and gas drilling. The boom brought traffic, hotels, and roughnecks; the shale is still producing.