That doesn't mean that Amarillo doesn't have mountains. Amarillo previously hosted an independent league baseball team, the Amarillo Thunderheads of the American Association, which played its home games in Potter County Memorial Stadium from 2011 to 2015. [12] The city is also known as "The Yellow Rose of Texas" (as the city takes its name from the Spanish word for yellow),[13] "Yellow City" for its name, and "Rotor City, USA" for its V-22 Osprey hybrid aircraft assembly plant. Amarillo had a median household income of $52,941 and per capita income at $28,274. When you think of Texas, you think of football. The Pantex Plant was reopened in 1950 and produced nuclear weapons throughout the Cold War.[11]. [151] Other utilities are primarily provided by private organizations. Amarillo, Texas, is the pride of the Texas Panhandle. Grady Hazlewood, a 1930s district attorney in Amarillo, served in the Texas Senate from 1941 to 1971. On August 30, 1887, Berry's town site won the county seat election and was established in Potter County. The Lights. Considered a regional airport, Amarillo International accepts flights from three commercial airlines-Southwest, United, and American. In the mid-to-late 1990s, the AEDC gained notoriety by sending mock checks to businesses across the country, placing full-page advertisements in The Wall Street Journal, and paying an annual $1 million subsidy to American Airlines to retain jet service. Another Amarillo industry and a substantial employer is the Pantex Plant, a newly built nuclear weapons manufacturing and assembly plant. The Amarillo Art Center [1], opened in 1972, is a building complex with the Amarillo Museum of Art (AMoA)[86] and concert hall located on the Washington Street Campus of Amarillo College. In 1970, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Amarillo's population as 6.1% Hispanic and 88.5% non-Hispanic white. An estimated 15.4% of the population lived at or below the poverty line. Singer Lacey Brown of Amarillo advanced to the top 24 in season 8 on the hit show American Idol. The United States government, through the Veterans Affairs Medical Center, provided the funding to build the facility, while the Texas government will run it after construction is completed. Driving in some Texas cities can be brutal, with cars sitting for hours in concrete jungles. Palo Duro plunges into the Panhandle flatland like an upside down mountain range, and we spent the . [59] Of the households, 60.8% lived in owner-occupied housing units and the median value of an owner-occupied housing unit was $140,030. The locals cheer, "Fangs Up!". [117] McGraw would later become a regular guest on Winfrey's television show and subsequently started his own talk show, Dr. Phil, in 2002. [88], Founded in 2013, by businessman Tom Warren, The Amarillo Historical Museum is Amarillo's only local museum to exclusively feature local history.[89]. [14] The attractions Cadillac Ranch, and Big Texan Steak Ranch are located adjacent to Interstate 40. Texas Tech University Health Science Center (TTUHSC) School of Medicine in Amarillo, Harrington Cancer Center, and Texas Oncology-Amarillo have added significantly to the prestige of the medical community. Fall is considered the best season in Amarillo, with its cool, crisp mornings and warm, lazy afternoons. Amarillo, TX Expanded 15-Day Forecast ENORMOUS mountains have been found deep under Earth's surface - and they could be bigger than anything above ground. Much of Amarillo's precipitation falls during heavy convective showers and thunderstorms during the late spring and summer months. The ACT transports approximately 350,000 passengers per year on the fixed route and 30,000 paratransit passengers, but it is a declining ridership. [60], According to Sperling's BestPlaces in 2021, 77.83% of the population identified as religious, primarily adhering to Christianity. Golfing is a staple in Amarillo, with 12 public and municipal golf courses located within 20 minutes. Where are the Amarillo mountains? - Answers The organization is headquartered in Amarillo and has a museum. The cost of living in Amarillo, including apartment rentals, is slightly less than its nearest Texas city, Dallas. This table excludes Latinos from the racial categories and assigns them to a separate category. [84] The Amarillo Public Library's main branch is located in downtown and operates four neighborhood branches. [99][100], The Texas Seventh Court of Appeals is located in Amarillo. [72], From 2020 to 2021, Amarillo experienced its greatest amount of economic development in 30 years. Amarillo has been mentioned in popular music such as George Strait's "Amarillo by Morning" by Paul Fraser and Terry Stafford (Stafford did his original version before Strait did his own cover), Mark Chesnutt's Blame It on Texas, Nat King Cole's "(Get Your Kicks on) Route 66", Bob Dylan's "Brownsville Girl" (Amarillo was referred to as the "land of the living dead"), Rob Zombie's "Two Lane Blacktop", "Amarillo Sky" by Jason Aldean, "A Quick Death In Texas" by Clutch, Marty Robbin's "Running Gun", and the song "Is This the Way to Amarillo" written by Neil Sedaka and Howard Greenfield, recorded famously by Yorkshireman Tony Christie and Sedaka, and revived in the UK by comedian Peter Kay through performances in the comedy series Peter Kay's Phoenix Nights and in a charity performance for Comic Relief. While the streets running northsouth honor past presidents and are designated 'streets', eastwest streets are numbered and are designated 'avenues'. census.[58]. A complete schedule of route times and stop locations is available through the mobile app One Ride. Also located in Amarillo, the 113-year-old West Texas A&M University (WTAMU) is home to an international faculty and over 8,000 students. Amarillo is also mentioned in the song "Route 66". Amarillo's largest parks are Medical Park, Thompson Memorial Park, and Memorial Park, near Amarillo College's Washington Street Campus. This is above the national average. There is a vast array of housing styles in Amarillo. [146] The Ussery-Roan Texas State Veterans Home opened in 2007. The Amarillo mountains are part of the Arbuckle/Ouichita/Wichita mountains in Oklahoma. Amarillo has no passenger rail service but remains an important part of the rail freight system. The tornado touched down southwest of Amarillo, near the town of Hereford, then tracked its way northward, on a collision course with Amarillo. [91] Amarillo had a minor league indoor soccer team called the Amarillo Challengers that competed in the SISL and later the USISL.[92]. 20 Interesting Weekend Getaways from Amarillo, Texas The airport offers both an outdoor self-parking lot, valet parking, and car rental. The museum is now rebuilding its aircraft collection as Texas Air & Space Museum and is located on American Drive on the south side of the airport. amarillo underground mountains Amarillo is home to the Amarillo Gun Club, which features a variety of clay target sports including trap, skeet and 5-Stand. It will accommodate six lanes at the mainlane bridge along with a complete stack interchange with direct connectors to and from I-27. So we started grabbing a bunch of these satellite pictures of cities and towns around Amarillo. [23] In the 1980s, ASARCO, Iowa Beef Processors (present day Tyson Foods), Owens-Corning, and Weyerhaeuser built plants at Amarillo. About 300 million years ago, the Wichita and Amarillo mountains were forced up out of the earth by a fault that begins in Dallas and stretches into northern New Mexico, said University of Texas. Route 66 Motor Speedway, a 3/8 mile clay, high-bank oval track, sits east of the city. For a traditional dance club, 212 Club caters to dancers of all ages. Amarillo is simple to navigate. [19] The U.S. National Helium Reserve is stored in the Bush Dome Reservoir at the Cliffside facility. Does Ghost Of A Betrayed Wife Really Haunt This Texas Airport? Bush named the north to south streets for past United States presidents, in chronological order except for John Quincy Adams because the surname was taken with the second president, John Adams. Initially known for cattle transit, the town soon became a thriving western town. Some of the peaks are believed to be 10,000 feet (3,000m) high. The Lone Star Football League team Amarillo Venom and the NAHL Jr. A hockey team, the Amarillo Bulls both play in the Amarillo Civic Center. The Amarillo area is an outdoor playground. The theater group's two facilities, the Mainstage and the Adventure Space, are located west of Amarillo's downtown. Another notable trial in Amarillo includes the Fort Worth-area murder case of T. Cullen Davis, which involved one of the richest men in the United States, his former wife, and her daughter and boyfriend. Pantex, the only nuclear weapons assembly and disassembly facility in the country, is also a major employer. Texas Beef, a multi-generational family-owned Amarillo company, is the largest cattle-feed employer. Local civil rights attorney Jeff Blackburn took up the case of the Tulia defendants, which became a cause clbre and resulted in the exoneration and pardon of the defendants. He is the father of the farm-to-market road program in Texas. Take a trip into the past with these spectacular vintage postcards, you'll be inspired to take a hike! Routes 60, 87, 287, and 66 intersected at Amarillo, making it a major tourist stop with numerous motels, restaurants, and curio shops. [147], Drinking water is provided by the City of Amarillo and its Utilities Division. The consortium consist of public, college, and school libraries located in the Texas Panhandle that share resources and cooperate with one another. [62][63], Amarillo is considered the regional economic center for the Texas Panhandle,[64][65] as well as Eastern New Mexico and the Oklahoma Panhandle. The Amarillo mountains are really a thing, and they're kind of confusing. Discovery of natural gas in 1918 and oil three years later brought oil and gas companies to the Amarillo area. During the trial, Winfrey hired Dallas-based jury consultant Phil McGraw to aid her attorneys on selecting and analyzing the members of the jury. Amarillo, TX 10-Day Weather Forecast - The Weather Channel The higher education institutions in the city are Amarillo College, a two-year community college with over 10,000 students; Wayland Baptist University, a private university based in Plainview, has a branch campus in Amarillo; Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center at Amarillo Jerry H. Hodge School of Pharmacy, Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center at Amarillo School or Medicine and School of Health Professions and Texas Tech University at Amarillo, a branch campus of Texas Tech University that offers selected master's degree programs. But Amarillo's "rush hour" is an urban myth. Amarillo's Mountains Are Underground Mountains Leave it to a place known for its half-buried Cadillac collection to have mountains that don't make much sense. During April 1887, J. I. Berry established a site for a town after he chose a well-watered section along the way of the Fort Worth and Denver City Railroad, which had begun building across the Texas Panhandle. The saturated thickness of the Ogallala aquifer in the North Plains Groundwater Conservation District ranges from 10 to over 460 feet with an estimated District average of 180 feet. The World Championship Ranch Rodeo sponsored by the Working Ranch Cowboys Association is held every November in the Amarillo Civic Center. It is considered by many as a mecca for culture and creators not just a stop off of I-40. [10] The availability of the railroad and freight service provided by the Fort Worth and Denver City Railroad contributed to the city's growth as a cattle-marketing center in the late 19th century.[11]. [15], On June 19, 1888, Henry B. Sanborn, who is given credit as the "Father of Amarillo",[16] and his business partner Joseph F. Glidden began buying land to the east to move Amarillo after arguing that Berry's site was on low ground and would flood during rainstorms. Amarillo, city, seat (1887) of Potter county (and partly in Randall county), on the high plains of northern Texas, U.S. World War II led the establishment of Amarillo Army Air Field in east Amarillo and the nearby Pantex Army Ordnance Plant, which produced bombs and ammunition. Another option is the Panhandle-Plains Historical Museum highlighting area fossils and natural history. Nicknamed "The Grand Canyon of Texas," it is 277 miles long, 18 miles wide, and 6,000 feet deep. And, the Public House is a modern American restaurant specializing in fusion comfort food, cocktails, wine & craft beer. It also includes a stack interchange that will connect the new freeway to the future I-27 Ports to Plains Corridor (Highway 287, 87). [76] Palo Duro has a distinct hoodoo that resembles a lighthouse. Locals always know the best eateries, but this is especially true in Amarillo. Amarillo's water supply used to come from both from Lake Meredith and the Ogallala Aquifer. Tom Blasingame, considered to have been the oldest cowboy in the history of the American West, worked for seventy-three years, primarily, on the JA Ranch south of Amarillo. The mountains are home to numerous working ranches and quarry operations, the state reformatory, recreational homes and campsites, and scenic parklands. 9 Amazing Experiences In Amarillo | TravelAwaits The park was established to commemorate the volcano that's "considered extinct but could erupt again" according to nps.gov . [130], Local transit services in the city have been available since 1925 and have been provided through the City of Amarillo's Amarillo City Transit (ACT) department since 1966; before that time the system was privately owned. Eat all 72 ozs of steak, and it's FREE! The Loop is a local name for Texas State Highway Loop 335, which encircles Amarillo. Amarillo AMA Cheyenne CYS Amarillo Weather Weather Conditions and Forecast Salina, KS Regional Radar Nearby Personal Weather Stations WunderMap Radar Customize, add layers and zoom in & out. Both Country and Americana music are a staple at HootPub "Hoot's" for the locals. [139][140], Amarillo is home to medical facilities including Baptist St. Anthony's and Northwest Texas Hospitals, the Don & Sybil Harrington Cancer Center, Bivins Memorial Nursing Home, Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, Texas Tech School of Pharmacy, and Texas Panhandle Mental Health and Mental Retardation. [30] Similar to many towns in the Texas Panhandle, the city's downtown has suffered economic deterioration throughout the years. 908 streets in Amarillo, as well as 58 parks and playgrounds, 4 city swimming pools, two world-class skating parks, and 32 miles of jogging trails. Natural gas is distributed by Atmos Energy. Amarillo is infamous for its unpredictable weather patterns, with massive temperature changes on a daily basis, raging winds, devastating hailstorms and "northers", long periods of drought, late frosts, spring tornadoes, dust-storms, and floods. So away we went. Rick Husband Amarillo International Airport is a public airport located 10 miles (16km) east of the central business district of Amarillo, north of Interstate 40. It's always a fun time looking up address or cities and seeing them from a satellite point of view. A helipad is available. Amarillo offers options for renters or those looking for a more permanent location. 14 Top-Rated Things to Do in Amarillo, TX | PlanetWare [73] Amazon, Asset Protection Unit, and Texas Tech University Vet School were named some major organizations contributing to the city and metropolitan area's economic growth. In the 20052006 television season, Amarillo is the 131st largest television market in the United States designated by Nielsen Media Research.[115]. Palo Duro Canyon State Park, 30 miles southeast of the city, offers hiking, biking, horseback riding, and zip-lining. It is the creation of a group of "underground" artists from San Francisco, known as the Ant Farm, it and was sponsored by Texas millionaire Stanley Marsh 3. Another three districts, Canyon Independent School District (CISD) to the south, Highland Park (HISD), and River Road Independent School District (RISD) immediately adjacent to Porter County, contribute additional educational options to the area. U.S. Highway 66 also passed through the city. Christie's version, which only managed to reach 18 when originally released in 1971, made it to the number 1 spot in the UK Singles Chart in 2005 for 7 weeks. The Amarillo Film Commission is a division of the Amarillo Convention and Visitor Council that was created to provide film crews with locations and other assistance when filming in Amarillo. One of the telling trends in Amarillo is the growing number of thrift shops inexpensive stores elevated by hipsters to trendy boutique status. Amarillo | Texas, United States | Britannica Nicknamed "The Grand Canyon of Texas," it is 277 miles long, 18 miles wide, and 6,000 feet deep. Amarillo Country Club and Dell Wood are the city's two private country clubs. The rocky ridges sit 400 miles beneath our planet's crust in a mysterious. The median homeowner costs with a mortgage were $1,272 and without a mortgage $479. AISD encompasses 50 public elementary, middle, and high schools and private academies. The cost of eating out is comparable to most Texas cities. Think about ice ages, volcanic eruptions, earthquakesand not to mention the Texas panhandle wind that I'm pretty sure could blow a mountain over on the right day. Wonderland Amusement Park is located in northern Amarillo at Thompson Park, named for Ernest Thompson. But, the Amarillo Civic Center Coliseum is also home to the North American Hockey League team, the Raging Bulls. Don Harrington Discovery Center, located in the city's hospital district, is an interactive science center and space theater with over 60 hands-on exhibits. 10 Beautiful Texas Towns With Breathtaking Scenery - OnlyInYourState 1908), Yet America is a poem in our eyes; its ample geography dazzles the imagination, and it will not wait long for metres.Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882), Is not their climate foggy, raw, and dull,On whom, as in despite, the sun looks pale,Killing their fruit with frowns?William Shakespeare (15641616). In addition to intermodal and general goods, a big portion of rail shipments involve grains and coal. In 2002, the producers changed its name to Texas Legacies after retiring the previous script that was used for 37 years for a more historically accurate one, but attendance declined over the next four seasons, so it was decided to revert to the original Paul Green script in 2006.[82][83]. [152] Wired telephone service is mainly provided by AT&T. North of downtown the highway becomes US 87 & 287 and continues northward to Dumas, Texas.[64]. They are some thousands of feet underground. The Alibates Flint Quarries National Monument provides for a fascinating day of exploration. In many cases, taxis are the least expensive option. Berry established the city in 1887 near the mainline of the Fort Worth and Denver City Railroad. [18] The plant was the sole producer of commercial helium in the world for a number of years. Previously, the Texas Zephyr to Denver and Dallas, last served Amarillo in 1967. Area architecture choices range from traditional to French cottages, from trendy hipster to Spanish Revival. The Amarillo City Transit bus is scheduled Monday through Saturday, 6:20 a.m. and 7:00 p.m. Amarillo City Transit (ACT) closes for major holidays. Greyhound Bus provides daily commercial service to Amarillo. These signs, bearing messages such as "Road does not end" or displaying a random picture, are scattered throughout the city of Amarillo. You can still see evidence of the geologic event in the cavern walls . The Pioneer Amphitheater, located in nearby Palo Duro Canyon, is the setting for the outdoor musical drama Texas, which plays nightly during the summer. [93] During high school football season, the Amarillo Independent School District schools' home games are in Dick Bivins Stadium which had a $5.7million renovation in 2005.