The Big Spring - Big Spring, TX - Natural Springs on Waymarking.com

On the south central side of Big Spring TX sits the namesake of the town The Big Spring. Have you ever wondered how a town got its name, well now you can see how this town did.

Along what was once known as Marcy's Trail...Mapped by Captain Randolph B. Marcy, in charge of the U.S. Army detail gaurding citizens bound for the California Gold Rush sits the spring. He was making a map of a chain of springs, which culminated in a converging of many indian trails at The Big Spring. No it wasn't a very creative name but it is a good description.

The Big Spring is not only the namesake for the town, but once was the single free flowing water source for the region.

Excerpt from Wikipedia ^{..> LINK <..}

The city got its name from the single, large spring that issued into a small gorge between the base of Scenic Mountain and a neighboring hill in the southwestern part of the city limits. Although the name is often mistakenly pluralized, it is officially singular; Big Springs, Texas, is actually a community in eastern Texas' Rusk County.

The spring was sourced from a relatively small aquifer situated on the northern end of the Edwards Plateau and the southern end of the High Plains, being, structurally, a collecting sink of lower Cretaceous (Fredericksburg) limestones and sands. The spring aquifer held a large quantity of water due to the great number of fractures, solution channels, and interstices in the rocks and underlying sands, although the aeral extent of the Big Spring sink is estimated to be only one mile in diameter, with the main area only 3000' in width and almost circular, with some ellipticity trending towards the west. The Cretaceous beds subsided about 280' below their normal position, centered around the SE quarter of Section 12, Block 33 T1S; T&P RR Co survey, and the entire strata appears to be preserved within the sink, the surface topography roughly following the subsurface subsidence. (US Department of the Interior publication, 'Geological Survey Water-Supply Paper 913', 1944). This writing identifies the sink as one of a number of similar subsurface geologic features in the surrounding area, differing from the Big Spring sink only in the fact that the surface topography above the others, while showing some decline, does not dip low enough to intersect the top of the water tables; hence, no springs could form from the other aquifers. In a passing comment, enigmatic in its content and disappointing in its brevity, the report states that no other comparable deep sinks formed elsewhere on the Edwards Plateau.

Some more interesting information about this spring as well as many many others can be found at this ..>> LINK <<..

<sup>Information about this spring is located on page 46 of the publication in the above link.

While here why not visit the Earth Cache as well.....The Big Spring - Convergence of Many Trails GC2BWAN as it is right here.</sup>

Public or Private Land?: Public Public Land Fees?: 4.00 Private Land access?: Not listed

Visit Instructions:
Please post an original picture of the springs no GPS necessary along with your observations of the spring. What wildlife you saw if any and the condition of the springs. Water level was high, low. The area was clean, trashy ect. Any other knowledge or experiences you have had with this paticular spring that would help document it's history.

Recent Visits/Logs:

Date Logged Log User Rating   03/08/2024 new.neo visited it 05/23/2019 WalksfarTX visited it 05/25/2013 Benchmark Blasterz visited it 07/19/2010 The real thing visited it 07/14/2010 condor1 visited it

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