The first white settler in the Artesia area was Union soldier John F. Truitt, who named his homestead Blake's Spring. Later part of the Chisum cattle holding, Truitt's place became known as South Chisum Camp, and in the summer of 1880, the camp employed the notorious outlaw Billy the Kid.
By 1894, when the Pecos Valley Railroad was completed, the community's name changed to Miller's Siding; it was changed again a couple of years later when John Chisum's niece married Baldwin Stegman, and they named their new town - now complete with a post office - Stegman. In a short, though, the area's vast underground water resources had been discovered, and the name was again changed, this time, and finally, to Artesia.
In November, 1903, the Artesia Townsite and the Artesia Improvement companies combined forces and drilled an 830-foot-deep well - at the time the deepest in the world - and water, always in short supply in New Mexico, flowed freely over the area's prairieland. Over the next three years, Artesia grew into a substantial farming community, as 1,200 new settlers - attracted by the new found irrigation - put down stakes in the area.
The Abo Underground School in Artesia is a civil defense shelter, as well as a grade school. In case of nuclear attack, it purportedly will shelter 500 students and as many as 2,000 Artesia adults.