Clovis owes its existence to the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, which laid out the town as a division point in 1906 and built this depot a year later. The Mission Revival building was restored in the 1990s and now houses a model train museum, with working operating layouts on several scales depicting Clovis and the AT&SF mainline in different eras.
For railway-history travellers the depot itself is the main draw — it is one of the few large AT&SF depots in the region still standing — but the model layouts are well-made and entertain children. The active railway lines run a few yards away; long freight trains pass through Clovis at all hours.