Wink

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Up until 1874, this stretch of West Texas belonged to the Comanche Indians — ruled by them, plain and simple. Then cattle ranching moved in, and the land became part of what they called the famed W ranch.

Quiet country. Wide open. The kind of place that doesn't seem like it's waiting for anything.

But it was. In 1926, a man named Roy Westbrook made an oil discovery in the Permian Basin, just a mile and a half to the north — and that was that. Ten thousand to twenty thousand people came pouring in.

A town was born. They called it Wink. All that open range, all that cattle country, converting now to industrialization, just like that.

The land that Comanche Indians had ruled, that cattle had grazed, suddenly humming with an entirely different kind of energy. The town took its name from Colonel C. M.

Winkler, a famed Texas Confederate soldier. One oil strike, one and a half miles away, and a place goes from nothing to a city's worth of souls in what feels like the blink of an eye. Wink.

Seems like the right name after all.

What the marker says

On land ruled up to 1874 by Comanche Indians, later part of famed "W" cattle ranch. Town "born" in 1926 when Roy Westbrook's Permian Basin oil discovery 1.5 miles to the north brought in 10,000 to 20,000 people, initiated area's conversion to industrialization. Named for Col. C. M. Winkler, famed Texas Confederate soldier. (1964)