Founded by Isaac L. Ellwood (1833-1910), an inventor who made a fortune in barbed wire, the Spade Ranch began when he bought in 1889 from veteran cattlemen D.H. and J.W. Snyder an 8 x 25-mile range of 128,000 acres in Hale, Hockley, Lamb, and Lubbock counties. This range was used for Spade-branded calves from Renderbrook Spring, his southmost ranch, in Mitchell County. He continued buying South Plains land until the Spade Range was 54 miles long. The headquarters, originally in Lamb County, was moved to South Camp, 3/10 mile north of here, after farmland sales in the 1920s. Ellwood's descendants still own and operate the Spade.