Castle Peak

Duane's take

Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Castle Peak, out here in Taylor County. Now, picture this. The year is 1858, and the Butterfield Overland Mail is up and running, the first public transportation operation to stretch all the way from the Mississippi to the Pacific, carrying passengers and mail across a country most folks had never dared cross.

That route ran from 1858 to 1861, and out here in this wide open Texas landscape, the drivers and passengers needed something to fix their eyes on. They found it. A 2,400-foot peak sitting to the northeast, and you could see that thing from 30 to 40 miles out.

Thirty to forty miles. Think about that the next time you complain about your commute. In those days, the peak went by the name Abercrombie Peak, named for Colonel J.

J. Abercrombie of the U.S. Army, a man who was active in the defense of this frontier.

So there's some history already stacked up on that summit before we even get to the good part. The good part is a man named Waterman Ormsby. He was a newspaper reporter, and he had the distinction of riding the very first Butterfield Stage to pass this way.

Now Ormsby looked up at that peak rising out of the Texas scrub, and what did he see? A fortress. That's what he wrote.

It resembled a fortress, he said, and once you hear a description like that, it tends to stick. The height was later renamed Castle Peak, and that name has held ever since. One reporter, one ride, one good look, and a mountain got a new name it's been wearing ever since.

What the marker says

The Butterfield Overland Mail, the first public transportation facility spanning the area from the Mississippi to the Pacific with passenger and mail service, 1858-61, used the 2400-foot peak to the northeast as a beacon. The drivers and passengers viewed it for 30 to 40 miles. In that era it was called Abercrombie Peak, for Colonel J. J. Abercrombie of the U.S. Army, active in defense of this frontier. Waterman Ormsby, a newspaper reporter riding the first Butterfield Stage to pass this way, noted that the peak resembled a fortress. Later the height was renamed Castle Peak. (1968)