--- title: "Dish, Texas, renamed itself after Dish Network in 2005 in exchange for ten years of free satellite TV" url: https://badiyaa.com/dish-texas-town-renamed-dish-network/ published: 2026-11-15T09:04:00+00:00 modified: 2026-11-15T09:04:00+00:00 section: Offbeat publisher: Badiyaa --- # Dish, Texas, renamed itself after Dish Network in 2005 in exchange for ten years of free satellite TV Dish, Texas, was called Clark until 2005, when it renamed itself after Dish Network in return for ten years of free basic TV for every resident. In November 2005, a tiny town in North Texas gave up its founder’s name and took the name of a satellite TV company instead. Clark, in Denton County, became Dish, officially styled in capital letters as DISH, under a commercial deal with Dish Network. The price of the town’s identity: free basic television for every resident for ten years, plus a free digital video recorder. Two decades on, the name has stuck, and the town is still on the map. ## From Clark to Dish The community was barely five years old when the offer came. Landis Clark incorporated it in June 2000, named it after himself and served as its first mayor. When Dish Network proposed a rebrand, the town accepted, and in November 2005 Clark officially became Dish. The deal was simple on paper. Every household got basic satellite TV service at no charge for a decade, and each resident received a DVR from the company. In return, the satellite brand got a real place on Texas road maps carrying its name in all capitals. A quick look at the dates shows how long the perk lasted. Counting ten years from November 2005, the free service would have run until about late 2015, or roughly 120 months of television without a bill. ## A town that more than doubled Dish covers about 1.66 square miles, almost all of it land, at an elevation near 700 feet. It is still very small, but it has grown fast since the rename: - **2010 census:** 201 residents - **2015 estimate:** 387 - **2020 census:** 437 - **2023 estimate:** 442 Going from 201 to 437 between the two censuses is a jump of 236 people, an increase of about 117 percent. Students attend schools in the Ponder school district, with Ponder High School as the local high school. The same year Dish took its new name, energy companies began drilling natural gas wells in the area, and the state later placed an air quality monitoring station in town. That station, rather than any satellite dish, is one of the few landmarks the town is known for in official records. ## Why a town would sell its name Naming deals are common for stadiums and arenas, but a whole incorporated town taking a brand name is rare. For a place of a couple of hundred people, a decade of free TV was a tangible benefit for every household, while the company got a lasting piece of publicity: every map, road sign and census table now prints its brand. The rename caught attention right away, and in January 2006 the town was the subject of a segment on a late-night comedy show. ## More odd American places Dish joins a run of unusual places we have covered, including [Kalawao County, Hawaii, the smallest US county with 82 residents](https://badiyaa.com/kalawao-county-hawaii-smallest-us-county/), and the [Haskell Free Library, which straddles the US-Canada border](https://badiyaa.com/haskell-free-library-opera-house-border/). For more, browse our [Offbeat section](https://badiyaa.com/category/offbeat/). The next headcount for Dish comes with the 2030 census, which will show whether the town of 437 keeps growing. ## Further reading - [Wikipedia: Dish, Texas](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DISH,_Texas) *Image: Nicolas Henderson, CC BY 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons* *This article was produced with AI assistance and reviewed by our Editorial Desk. [How we work](https://badiyaa.com/editorial-policy/).*