In 1896 Eugene Garlock constructed a stamp mill near this spot for the crushing of gold ore from the Yellow Aster Mine on Rand Mountain. Known originally as Cow Wells by prospectors and freighters during the 1880s and early 1890s, the town of Garlock continued to thrive until water was piped from here to Randsburg in 1898 and the Kramer-Randsburg rail line was completed in the same year.