Emergency Crime Scene and Biohazard Cleanup in Tow, TX

Tow is a small unincorporated community and census-designated place in northeastern Llano County, Texas, and it is the oldest community in the county.

Despite its spelling, Tow's name rhymes with 'cow.'

Tow began in 1852 when David and Gideon Cowan and their mother Ruth arrived from Tennessee and, guided by local Indians, developed a salt bed near the Colorado River into a successful saltworks.

The Cowan saltworks supplied salt to local residents and to the Confederate Army during the Civil War, before a tornado destroyed the operation in 1871.

Brothers William and Wilson Tow arrived in 1853 and named the area where they settled Tow Valley; a post office was established under the name Tow in 1886.

Tow sits on Farm Road 2241 on the western shore of Lake Buchanan, about 20 miles northeast of Llano and roughly 61 miles northwest of Austin.

For decades Tow's population stayed near 50, but retirement and recreation growth around the lake in the 1970s and 1980s lifted it to about 305.

A severe Central Texas drought that began in 2007 lowered Lake Buchanan and cost Tow roughly half its population, forcing many businesses to shut down.

By 2018, with the lake full again, Tow's shuttered businesses had begun to reopen, and the 2020 census counted 226 residents in the CDP.