BALCH, TEXAS. Balch was a mile southwest of the Lubbock county line on U.S. Highway 62/82 and the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway in southeast Hockley County. The settlement was named for A. P. Balch, a director of the railroad from 1868 to 1871. It served area farmers as a shipping station. Although Balch remained on county maps of the 1980s, a grain elevator and several abandoned buildings are all that remains.