Crime Scene & Biohazard Cleanup Near Downtown Lipscomb Lipscomb, TX

Lipscomb is an unincorporated community and census-designated place in the Texas Panhandle that serves as the county seat of Lipscomb County, on State Highway 305 in the Wolf Creek Valley.

Lipscomb was founded in 1886, when J. W. Arthur opened a combination store and post office at the site expecting the Panhandle and Santa Fe Railway to arrive, naming the townsite for pioneer judge Abner Smith Lipscomb.

Lipscomb became county seat in 1887 after a heated contest with the rival townsites of Dominion and Timms City, and land in the new town sold for just three dollars an acre.

The railroad Lipscomb's founders counted on never actually reached the town, yet Lipscomb held onto the county seat anyway and remains the permanent seat today.

Lipscomb's yellow-brick Classical Revival courthouse, built in 1916, still anchors the town and celebrated its centennial in 2016.

Lipscomb is one of the smallest county seats in Texas — after hovering near 200 people for much of the twentieth century, it counted just 44 residents in 2000 and 66 in the 2020 census.

Despite its tiny size, Lipscomb is home to the Wolf Creek Heritage Museum, which preserves pioneer-era photos and artifacts from the county's ranching past.

The townsite in Wolf Creek Valley was once called a cattleman's paradise, and ranching and wheat farming around German settler farms shaped the county's economy for generations.