Wellington: Won With Town Lots

Wellington is the seat of Collingsworth County, and it won that title through an act of frontier dealmaking. When Collingsworth County organized in September of eighteen ninety, the neighboring town of Pearl City was widely expected to become county seat. Land promoters backing Wellington persuaded the managers of the Rocking Chair Ranch to deliver their cowboys' votes, and sweetened the offer by promising every voter in the county five free town lots if Wellington won.

Wellington won the election fifty-six to thirty-two. The town had been named by its promoter's wife, who admired the Duke of Wellington, hero of the Battle of Waterloo. A permanent courthouse was completed by eighteen ninety-three. Wellington sits in the rolling cotton country of the Texas Panhandle's eastern edge, where farming and ranching have defined the county ever since, and where the story of how a town bought itself a courthouse is still told with some pride.