As a result, various television shows, music videos and movies have been filmed in town most notably: A Perfect World, starring Clint Eastwood and Kevin Costner; The Newton Boys, starring Matthew McConaughey and Ethan Hawke; and New Line's 2003 remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

A strand of wood beams sits on a vacant lot next to the bank—all that remains of a saloon that was constructed for one of the westerns.

In 2004, Carlton Carl, a Washington D.C. lobbyist, purchased 36,000 square feet (3,300 m2) of commercial property in downtown Martindale.

A partial inventory of Carl's purchase includes three empty general stores, a former bank, a cotton-seed weigh station, several warehouses, a movie-set courtroom, an aquarium filled with cotton plants, a seed elevator, 16 seed silos and 300 feet (91 m) of frontage on the San Marcos River.

In Fall 2007, Carl worked with students at Texas State University of San Marcos in the Interior Design program, under the guidance of Assistant Professor and Program Coordinator Nancy Granato, to receive help envisioning further planning of the town.

The project entailed assigning each group of students a specific building (i.e. silos, weigh station, etc.)

[4] Students in the MBA program, under the guidance of Associate Professor Bob Hill, also presented Carl with a market analysis for the town of Martindale, TX.

Martindale Baptist church was organized in 1858, and a post office was established in 1875, when the local population was less than fifty.

Immaculate Heart of Mary Catholic Church, built in 1908, was renovated by the parishioners' own labor in the mid-1980s and then was burned by an arsonist in 1991.

The City of Martindale is served by the San Marcos Consolidated Independent School District.