Photo courtesy of the author
From Picturesque Southwest: Travelers’ Guide to Southwestern Attractions, 1937, published in El Paso.
come back from the Klondike
with a case of rheumatism that
required four years of hot
spring treatments to cure. After
developing the site commer-
cially in the 1930s with adobe
cottages and a bathhouse, the
family operated the border
resort for half a century.
“Gases in the springs are
continually ascending to the sur-
face and keep the water in con-
stant agitation,” wrote Presidio
County historian John Ernest
Gregg in a 1934 issue of Voice of
the Mexican Border. “The water is
strongly impregnated with salt,
soda, and magnesia, and the
temperature is about one hun-
dred and ten degrees. These
waters are highly medicinal ...”
Artist Donald Judd bought
the property in 1990 and
closed the springs to the public.
Under different ownership
today, the waters are again
available for therapeutic
bathing under the name
Chinati Hot Springs.
Upriver from Chinati, anoth-
er borderland spa, Indian Hot
Springs, awaits a potential
reopening. In times past the
potent waters tuned up the
innards and toned up the hides
of Apaches, boxing champi-
ons, New York fashion models,
famous musicians, eccentric oil
tycoons, poets and other folks
from far north and south of the
Rio Bravo/Rio Grande.
“The old signs and trails
leading into the springs,” wrote
Captain Jeff Maltby in an 1884
report commissioned by curi-
ous cattle ranchers, “indicated
that the Indians held the virtues
of these springs as the people of
old Biblical times held the Pool
of Siloam.”
Commercial development
at Indian Hot Springs started
as early as 1907, and in 1929
an El Paso corporation built a
22-room stone hotel, cabins
and a bathhouse for soaking in
the nine hot springs and one
cool spring. Two physicians
and a number of nurses set up
at the resort to render the bal-
neotherapy to health-seekers
making the adventurous trek
down remote mountain trails.
By the 1950s, the resort had
closed, and the land was
bought by a West Texas family
by the name of Babb. “I'd
heard of the springs,” Jewel
Babb remarked years later,
“but I didn't believe it …” After
living in the remote hotel for a
time and observing the myste-
rious procession of pilgrim
bathers who obtained relief for
a variety of ailments, she did
indeed believe. As Pat Littledog
explains in the book Border
Healing Woman, Babb learned
how to treat people with the
waters, muds and mosses and
evolved a remarkable healing
technique that drew on
Appalachian folk medicine
while establishing “a unique
border tradition that relied on
both Anglo and Mexican val-
ues.” Supple ment ing the
springs’ medicines with mas-
sage and a treatment she called
mind healing, Babb reported
incredible cures or substantial
improvements in cases of polio,
tuberculosis, phlebitis and
many other serious ailments.
Though she gained a wide
reputation as a skilled aide to
sojourners in pursuit of
restoration, Babb could not
make the resort a profitable
enterprise, due in part to its iso-
lation and primitive road and
in part to her compassion
toward those unable to pay. At
the end of the 1950s the bank
in Del Rio took over Indian
Hot Springs, and Jewel Babb
moved off into the desert where
health-minded pilgrims contin-
ued to seek her out.
An equally singular figure
bought the springs in 1966. A
self-professed “billionaire health
crank,” Dallasite H.L. Hunt
filled in the dull moments of his
life as a wildcat oilman by
preaching the benefits of apri-
cots, pecans, aloe vera and
Indian Hot Springs, while pro-
moting his peculiar brand of
right-wing politics. Hunt
restored the hotel and enlisted
the aid of Jewel Babb to teach
him about the springs and to
administer foot massage for a
recurring pain in his groin. He
learned that the Chief Spring,
one of the hotter springs, could
reputedly restore a man’s fad-
ing sexual powers. And he
Marfa Book Co.
105 S. Highland
Marfa, Texas 79843
432-729-3906
learned that the Squaw Spring
was used primarily for female
complaints and complexions.
The two “Bleaching Springs”
at the spa were said to be capa-
ble of removing freckles.
Indian Hot Springs and
other Rio Grande resorts never
boomed like spas in more
accessible spots of the Ameri -
can landscape, and a grander
plan for an early mineral water
health resort at Candelaria
failed even to develop beyond
the publicity stage.
Trans-Pecos residents were
likely glad for that. A part of
the territory’s rejuvenating at -
mosphere is the relative amount
of elbow room one finds West
of the Pecos. It’s understand-
able that folks wouldn’t want
things to get too crowded.
I figure the brother-in-law of
Van Horn rancher A.G.
Goynes must have seen it that
way, too.
Maisie Lee
Hand-carved Doors
for Homes and Churches
Custom Sizes, Designed to Order
See the Marathon Catholic
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for Examples
Contact 432.386.4295
in Marathon
Cenizo
First Quarter 2011
19