photo by gusto

Lubbock (population 194,000) is the major city of the South Plains and is located 322 miles west of Dallas-Fort Worth. Cattle and ranching provided late nineteenth-century and early twentieth-century growth. Today industry, technology, oil, agriculture, warehousing, and medicine are the economic staples. Lubbock is one of America’s largest cotton producers, and, in addition to that crop, it ships a lot of livestock and grain.

Rock ‘n’ roller Buddy Holly, a Lubbock native, is honored by the Buddy Holly Statue and Walk of Fame that celebrates west Texas entertainers. Mac Davis, Waylon Jennings, Roy Orbison, and Bob Wills are featured on plaques.

Texas Tech University is located here. Its museum covers a broad range of arts, humanities, social sciences, and natural sciences, with an emphasis on the study of arid and semi-arid lands, and environments and cultures that inhabit them.

At the Lubbock Lake Landmark State Historical Park, excavations have revealed remains of extinct mammoths, horses, camels, giant bison, and 6-foot-long armadillos.

The Robert A. Nash Interpretive Center exhibits fossils and artifacts from the site. Prairie Dog Town at Mackenzie Park preserves one of the few remaining prairie dog colonies in the nation. Close-up views reveal the frisky little animals that once inhabited the plains by the millions. Windmills of all descriptions are found at the Wind Power Center.

Lubbock can be reached by car via I-27, US-82, and US-84, or by bus. It has an international airport.