Las Escarbadas

The XIT, according to author/historian Joe B. Frantz, was the largest ranch under fence in the United States and probably the world. It was not a financial success, he said, but the ranch was significant.

“It showed there need not be a conflict between now and the future,” he wrote. “As civilization crowded in, the XIT made room for it and welcomed it, and so became a part of the folklore of history. The investors intended from the beginning to sell out, to become a great land development company to bring settlers in.”

The XIT embodies the story of ranching on the plains of Texas, from the free range to enclosed grazing land backed by foreign capital and the development of small ranches and farms. Three million acres were awarded by the state to investors in exchange for construction of the capitol building in Austin. The land ran through 10 Texas counties along the New Mexico border. The Capitol Freehold Land and  Investment Co. was the money and organization behind the bold venture.

By summer 1885, when the first 20,000 heifers, steers and bulls arrived at the Buffalo Springs headquarters, trail driver Ab Blocker suggested the brand be an XIT, because it could be made with a bar iron and would be difficult for rustlers to modify. No basis in truth exists for the XIT brand meaning “Ten in Texas” despite the fact that ranch, indeed, covered all or part of 10 counties.

In addition to its size, the ranch topped the list of “mosts.” It had the most windmills of any ranch – some 335. Among them was the tallest windmill tower of its time, “lifting its wheel 130 feet above the canyon’s floor to catch the wind sweeping across the Plains,” wrote author J. Evetts Haley in “The XIT Ranch of Texas.” Fencing the XIT required more than 6,000 miles of barbed wire, the most on any ranch of that era. The wire was transported to the Texas Panhandle in five boxcars and two additional freight cars carried staples and hinges. Unfortunately, another distinction was having the most destructive grass fire. In the winter of 1894, some 1 million acres – a full one-third—of XIT grass was destroyed.

The ranch’s windmills helped fill 100 stock tanks to supplement the meager natural water supplies in more than 90 pastures spread across the ranch’s divisions: Buffalo Springs, Middle Water, Rito Blanco (Little White River), Ojo Bravo (Bold Spring), Las Escarbadas (The Scrapings), Spring Lake and Las Casas Amarillas (The Yellow Houses). The Bovina Division was established later, and the main headquarters was in Channing. Each division had a specific purpose. For example, the Escarbadas was strictly a breeding range. All of the divisions operated with its own equipment, horses and foremen, who answered to the general manager.

This era in Texas is represented at the NRHC by Las Escarbadas division headquarters, which was moved stone-by-stone from Deaf Smith County. “Las Es” was originally located along a popular Comanchero trail. In the 1800s, these traders exchanged ammunition, beads and knives with Indians for captives and stolen horses and cattle. As the Comancheros traversed the arid plains, they dug shallow pits in a creek bed in search of water. Las Escarbadas refers to “the scrapings” they left in the earth.

Measuring some 70 feet by 30 feet, the headquarters was built in 1886 of limeston brought from Tierra Blanca Draw. Walls were 2 feet thick, providing adequate insulation against heat and cold.

The foreman, his family and the cowboys all used the dining room for meals. The east bedroom belonged to the manager and his wife; the central bedroom was that of the manager’s sons; upstairs was a room on the east end, where as many as 60 cowboys could sleep at a time. The west and middle rooms on the second floor stored bulk provisions, such as flour, cornmeal, dried fruit and molasses.

The XIT was described by historian William Curry Holden as “where the action was and history made.”

Today, the capitol building in Austin, Las Escarbadas and a place in history are all that remain of what was the largest ranch in the United States.