On this day in 1882, the town of Valentine, Texas, was founded and named when a Southern Pacific Railroad crew building east from El Paso reached the site. Valentine, in Jeff Davis County, is thirty-six miles west of Fort Davis. The trains started running in 1883, and Valentine got a post office in 1886. The town became a shipping point for local cattle ranchers, and by 1914 it had an estimated population of 500, five cattle breeders, a news company, a real estate office, a grocery store, a restaurant, and the Valentine Business Club. By the late 1990s, however, the estimated population had dropped to 267.
From the Texas Historical Commission.
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