Parmerton is a

ghost town A ghost town, deserted city, extinct town, or abandoned city is an abandoned settlement, usually one that contains substantial visible remaining buildings and infrastructure such as roads. A town often becomes a ghost town because the economi ...

Parmer County, Texas Parmer County is a county located in the southwestern Texas Panhandle on the High Plains of the Llano Estacado in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2020 Census, the population was 9,869. The county seat is Farwell. The county was created i ...

, United States. It was originally known as Parmer Switch when the Pecos Valley and Northern Texas Railway built a line through the area in 1898 and it was named for

Martin Parmer Martin Parmer (born Martin Palmer June 4, 1778 – March 2, 1850) was an eccentric 19th-century American frontiersman, statesman, politician and soldier. On March 2, 1836, Martin Parmer seconded Sam Houston's motion to adopt the Texas Declaratio ...

. The town was composed of 200 acres of land formerly owned by the

XIT Ranch The XIT Ranch was a cattle ranch in the Texas Panhandle which operated from 1885 to 1912. Comprising over 3,000,000 acres (12,000 km2) of land, it ran for 200 miles (300 km) along the border with New Mexico, varying in width from 20 to ...

and had been used for wheat farming. A one-story courthouse was built at the midway point between Bovina and Friona and a post office was established in September 1907, shortly after Parmerton was voted Parmer County seat. After significant political intrigue, a second election was held in December 1907, after which Parmerton was stripped of its status in favor of Farwell. The post office closed in 1908 and Parmerton went into decline; today, nothing remains except for an historical marker and a railroad switch.

References

Parmer County, Texas Ghost towns in Texas {{ParmerCountyTX-geo-stub