Everything Bellville is known for
Songs written about the waterways and highways that run near Bellville.
In downtown Bellville, the Austin County seat about an hour west of Houston, sits Trump Burger — a small, openly MAGA-themed burger joint near the historic courthouse square that opened around 2020 and quickly became a local talking point. Decked out in red-white-and-blue and Trump memorabilia, it draws regulars and road-trippers alike, and locals will happily point a hungry traveler straight to it for an old-fashioned Texas hamburger.
Bellville is a place where time seems to slow down, where the post oaks whisper stories of the past. Named for James Bell, one of the early settlers who carved a life out of this land, it became the heart of Austin County back in 1846. You can almost picture the stagecoaches rattling through, carrying travelers and news along what's now Highway 36, connecting us to the wider world. That location helped us grow, and even today, you see that mix of folks just passing through and those rooted deep in this soil. The Brazos River nearby shaped everything, from the land to the lives lived here. Before Bell or any of us, the Tonkawa people knew this land. But even with all that history, Bellville's story keeps growing.
Bellville, Texas. It's a place that grew up alongside the state itself. You can feel it in the courthouse square, see it in the shade of the post oaks, hear it in the stories passed down. It all started with folks like James Bell, who saw the potential in this land. The choice to make Bellville the county seat back in '46? That was a turning point. Suddenly, it was more than just a collection of farms. It was the heart of Austin County. That strategic location on the stagecoach route helped, too. It connected Bellville to the wider world, bringing in travelers, commerce, and new ideas. Of course, long before any of that, the Tonkawa and other tribes called this area home, shaping the land in their own ways. The Brazos River, snaking its way nearby, was always vital. Then came the booms and busts, the slow steady rhythm of rural life. You drive down Highway 36 today, and you’re traveling a path that's been worn smooth by generations of Texans, each leaving their mark on this little corner of the world.
San Felipe de Austin, on the west bank of the Brazos River at the Old San Antonio Road crossing, a site now on Interstate Highway 10 two miles east of Sealy in southeastern Austin County, was founded in 1824 by Stephen F. Austin as the unofficial capital of his colony. It became the first urban center in the Austin colony, which stretched northward from the Gulf of Mexico as far as the Old San Antonio Road and extended from the Lavaca River in the west to the San Jacinto River in the east. By October 1823, after briefly considering a location on the lower Colorado River, Austin, with the assistance of the Baron de Bastrop , decided to establish his capital on the Brazos near the settlement at which John McFarland operated a ferry. The site chosen was on a high, easily defensible bluff overlooking broad, fertile bottomlands. The location offered a number of advantages, including a central location and sources of fresh water independent of the Brazos. In late 1823 surveyor Seth Ingram began the tasks of defining the boundaries of the five-league expanse of prairie and woodland encompassed by the municipality and platting the town proper. The town's name was proposed by the governor of the Eastern Interior Provinces, Felipe de la Garza, to honor both the empresario , Austin, and the governor's own patron saint. Although planned on the basis of the prevailing Mexican town model with a regular grid of avenues and streets dominated by four large plazas, the settlement soon began to sprawl westward from the Brazos for more than a half mile along both sides of the Atascosito Road . By 1828 the community comprised a population of about 200, three general stores, two taverns, a hotel, a blacksmith shop, and some forty or fifty log cabins. Ten of the inhabitants were Hispanic, and the rest were of American or European origin; males outnumbered females ten to one. The town, generally called simply San Felipe, was the unquestioned social, economic, and political center of the Austin colony. Its expanding but unstable population was swelled by large numbers of immigrants and other transients. Austin built a residence on Bullinger's Creek, a half mile west of the Brazos, from which he directed the government of his colony for four years before handing responsibility for the management of most affairs to the ayuntamiento of San Felipe in 1828. The colonial land office was headquartered in the town, and Austin assumed an active role in its operation. Regular mail service in the colony was inaugurated in 1826 when Samuel May Williams was appointed postmaster in San Felipe; with seven separate postal routes converging here, the town remained the hub of the Texas postal service until the Texas Revolution . One of the earliest newspapers in Texas, the Texas Gazette , began publication in San Felipe on September 25, 1829, under the editorship of Godwin B. Cotten . Gail Borden 's Telegraph and Texas Register , which became the unofficial journal of the revolution, was first published in San Felipe on October 10, 1835. The town's notable early inhabitants also included Josiah H. Bell, James B. Miller, Noah Smithwick, and Horatio Chriesman . Many other significant figures in early Texas history resided temporarily at San Felipe or visited periodically on business. Several large cotton plantations were established in the bottomlands near the town during the 1820s, and from the outset San Felipe became a trading center for the staple. By 1830 John Cummins had constructed a grist and lumber mill near the town. As stock raising developed in the vicinity, small herds of cattle were driven from the town across the country to Nacogdoches. San Felipe was located only some eighty miles above the mouth of the Brazos, and keelboats were used extensively to transport goods between the town and various coastal ports. Nevertheless, most articles of commerce were carried overland to the coast by wagon until after the revolution. Unreliable water levels and turbulenc
The Ernest Witte Site, an aboriginal cemetery, is located on a bluff overlooking the Brazos River in Austin County, about forty miles west of Houston. A low sandy knoll marks its location. In the 1930s Ernest Witte and his brother, then young boys living on a nearby farm, began digging for a treasure that they believed an eccentric uncle had buried in the area. In a deep hole dug into the sandy knoll they found human bones. In 1974 Witte relayed this information to a team of field archeologists from the Texas Archeological Survey of the University of Texas at Austin, which was investigating prehistoric Indian sites on land where the Houston Lighting and Power Company proposed to build the Allens Creek Nuclear Generating Station. The Ernest Witte Site was therefore included in the investigation, which was sponsored by the company. The site is coincidentally located where engineers planned to place one of the reactors for the nuclear plant. Excavations began in 1974 and continued into 1975. The field crew was headed by Grant D. Hall and under the general supervision of David S. Dibble, director of the Texas Archeological Survey. The site contained the skeletal remains of 238 people buried at various times over a period of more than 4,000 years, from 2700 B.C. to A.D. 1500. Reflecting the gradual accumulation of soil on the site and its periodic use as a burial ground by local prehistoric Indian populations, the burials occurred as four distinct, superimposed groups separated by layers of soil in a deposit with a maximum depth of about eight feet. The group of skeletons buried deepest in the site, and hence the oldest, contained the remains of an estimated sixty-one people. Radiocarbon assays indicate that these earliest burials occurred between 2700 and 1600 B.C. These Group 1 burials, affiliated with the Middle Archaic Period, thus constitute the oldest human cemetery presently known in Texas. Artifacts were placed in the graves of seven people. A Pedernales dart point and some pencil-shaped bone implements represent the complete array of grave goods for these Middle Archaic burials. Remains in the next layer were interred in the period from 600 B.C. to A.D. 300. This layer, designated Group 2, contained the skeletal remains of 145 people. Numerous interesting and significant artifacts were placed in the graves of these Late Archaic people. Seventy, or 48 percent, of the burials in Group 2 contained artifacts. Among these were dart points, marine-shell ornaments, corner-tang chert knives, boatstones, a ground-stone gorget, a graphite abrader, red jasper pebbles, ocher, biotite schist, various worked bone artifacts, and deer skulls and antlers. The rocks out of which some of the boatstones and the ground-stone gorget were made originated in the Ouachita Mountains of Arkansas. This fact suggests that the people represented by the Group 2 remains were participants in a far-reaching exchange network. Five of the people in Group 2 apparently died violently, as indicated by chert dart points stuck into their bones. Above Group 2 was a third layer of burials consisting of ten individuals. Group 3 developed in the period from A.D. 550 to 950. Only one individual in this group had grave inclusions. Scattered about the chest of an adult male were seven chert projectile points. The final use of the Ernest Witte Site as a cemetery was evidenced by a shallowly buried layer of the skeletons of thirteen people. These Group 4 burials, assigned to the Late Prehistoric Period, were probably interred well after A.D. 1000. No artifacts were found in any of these latest graves on the site. Development of cemeteries in Middle and Late Archaic times at Allens Creek and elsewhere on the Texas coastal plain has been interpreted as evidence for substantial growth of human populations in the region. As these people were hunters and gatherers who lived off the natural products of the land, it may have become necessary to define territories containing adeq
Asa Thompson Oliver, planter, was born on November 14,1819, in Elbert County, Georgia, the son of Simeon and Mildred Oliver. He moved with his wife and children from Mississippi to Texas in the mid-1850s. By 1858 he had acquired almost a half league of prime farmland in the Hempstead area east of the Brazos River in Austin County, now in Waller County. That year his estate, which included seventy slaves, was valued at almost $48,000. By 1860 he had accumulated 105 slaves and held property worth $205,000, ranking him among the county's wealthiest residents. Following the outbreak of the Civil War in the spring of 1861, Oliver was chosen to help organize public defense as a member of the Central Executive Committee of Austin County. Like most large planters he was badly damaged by the Confederate defeat and emancipation; by mid-1865 his estate had plummeted in value to $25,000. In 1866 he and his wife and three children joined the postbellum emigration of former Confederates to Latin America; they settled in the colony of Santa Barbara D'Oeste in the Campinas district of São Paulo province, Brazil. There Oliver purchased an extensive plantation and a number of slaves and began cultivating his property. Unfortunately, his wife, Beatrice, and daughter, Indiana, who had suffered chronic distress since the end of the war and remained debilitated during the voyage to Brazil, contracted tuberculosis. Beatrice succumbed to the disease on July 13, 1868. Since there were no non-Catholic cemeteries nearby, Oliver devoted a small corner of one of his fields to burials and interred his wife there. Indiana, age seventeen, died on April 19, 1869, of the disease and was buried near her mother. That same year Oliver's younger daughter, Mildred, fourteen, distraught over the deaths of her mother and sister and burdened with the care of her father and younger brother, also fell gravely ill; she died shortly before Christmas and was interred beside her loved ones. The family burial ground, known as the "Campo," became a significant Protestant cemetery for the American settlers of the vicinity. A. T. Oliver was buried beside his family after he was murdered by one of his slaves on July 28, 1873. Subsequent owners of the Oliver property erected a small chapel on the cemetery grounds.
Calling their old jail "unsafe, unfit, and inadequate," the Austin County Court contracted in 1896 with Pauly Jail Building Co. of St. Louis to erect this structure at cost of $19,970. Romanesque Revival style, with crenelated parapets, bartizans, and stone window arches harmonized with the 1886 courthouse, which later burned. The gallows, used only in 1901, have been removed; jailer's quarters have been enlarged; but original exterior is preserved. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1976
Influential Austin county resident John Bell Lewis (1845-1920) was born on a plantation near Coffeeville, Alabama. His grandmother Betty Washington Lewis was George Washington's sister. Lewis grew up near present Winedale, Texas, and served the Confederate army in several major Civil War battles. During Reconstruction Lewis served as sheriff of Austin County and helped restore law and order to the area. While performing the sheriff's duties as county tax collector, he saw the need for a local bank. He helped found Bellville First National Bank and Austin County State Bank. When Lewis heard that Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railroad planned to bypass Bellville, he persuaded landowners to donate right-of-way for the line and was instrumental in getting the railroad through Bellville. Lewis acquired this property about 1874. The next year, architect J. J. Stopple built this home which displays a transitional style between the Greek Revival and the more ornate Victorian. Lewis shared the residence with his widowed sister and her son. In 1879 Lewis married Mollie Bell Ervin and their children grew up here. Lewis is buried in Oak Knoll Cemetery, Bellville. (1979) Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1979
Bellville General Hospital Bellville was founded as county seat of Austin County in January 1848, on land provided by Thomas Bell, for whom the town was named. The railroad reached Bellville in 1879-80, and the population increased substantially in the ensuing years. In 1915, Dr. Jubal Allen Neely, graduate of the Galveston Medical School, moved to Bellville and opened a private medical practice. He served in the U.S. Army Medical Corp during World War I and returned to Bellville with an injury. When the injury required bed rest in 1926, Dr. Herbert Edward Roensch, a Bellville native practicing medicine in nearby Kenney, moved to Bellville to help tend to Neely's patients. They formed a partnership, and in 1928, the two doctors opened Bellville's first hospital with four beds. That same year, the discovery of an oil field in the area led to an increase in population, and soon plans were underway for a larger hospital. In 1930, the hospital moved to the Neely Building, still on the town square. Serving an ever-growing population, the hospital again expanded in 1938, and plans for an even larger facility began in 1949. The once private hospital became a corporation, receiving its charter in 1952. A 24-bed hospital opened the following year on land donated by Neely and Roensch. Twenty years later, a 32-bed facility opened, and the former hospital was replaced by a physicians' clinic. Operating under a voter-approved hospital district, Bellville General Hospital continues to serve the community more than 75 years after it opened with the leadership and support of its professional medical and administrative staff, as well as from the board of directors, auxiliary, foundation and friends. 										(2003)
In 1907 a group of Washington County dairy farmers converted an abandoned cotton gin into a creamery and started making butter. Ice cream production began in…
After fires ravaged Brenham three times in a decade the town did something no other Texas city had attempted. They built twenty-seven underground cisterns…
In 1866 Union soldiers occupying Brenham during Reconstruction clashed with local residents and set fire to an entire city block. The flames consumed…
Tour the home of Texas' beloved ice cream in tiny Brenham. Free samples.
In 1867 just one year after Union troops burned part of Brenham a yellow fever epidemic swept through town. The mosquito-borne disease killed dozens and…
When German immigrants fleeing the 1848 revolutions settled in Brenham they brought their traditions with them. The Maifest celebration they started became the…
The Brenham Volunteer Fire Department was organized after the 1866 burning but its true purpose had nothing to do with flames. The department was a civilian…
In 1875 Brenham became the first city in Texas to operate a tax-supported public school system. They didn't stop there. The system included a school for Black…
3 alumni who reached major-college or pro sports
Bellville High School has a proud tradition of athletes who have gone on to compete at high levels, representing their hometown on larger stages. Among the notable alumni, Emmanuel Sanders played as a wide receiver in the National Football League. Richard Reese continued his football career as a running back for the Baylor Bears, showcasing his talents in college sports.
The school's athletic impact extends to professional baseball, with Lucas Luetge playing as a professional baseball player for the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball. These individuals highlight the dedication and skill fostered within Bellville's athletic programs, providing inspiration for current and future Brahma athletes.
Lucas Luetge is a professional baseball player for the New York Yankees of Major League Baseball.
419 stories, landmarks & places within ~20 miles — the same local lore RoadyGoat plays as you drive through.
In downtown Bellville, the Austin County seat about an hour west of Houston, sits Trump Burger — a small, openly MAGA-themed burger joint near the historic courthouse square that opened around 2020 and quickly became a…
Bellville is a place where time seems to slow down, where the post oaks whisper stories of the past. Named for James Bell, one of the early settlers who carved a life out of this land, it became the heart of Austin…
Calling their old jail "unsafe, unfit, and inadequate," the Austin County Court contracted in 1896 with Pauly Jail Building Co. of St. Louis to erect this structure at cost of $19,970. Romanesque Revival style, with…
You're driving past the Harigel House in Bellville, a home with a story tied to Texas commerce. Emil H. Harigel, Sr., son of a Prussian immigrant, arrived in Bellville in 1881 and opened a successful business selling…
Influential Austin county resident John Bell Lewis (1845-1920) was born on a plantation near Coffeeville, Alabama. His grandmother Betty Washington Lewis was George Washington's sister. Lewis grew up near present…
You're driving past the site of Bellville Methodist Church, a story that begins way back in 1822. That's when Thomas B. Bell, one of Stephen F. Austin's original colonists, settled here. He donated land for a church and…
You're driving past the E.O. Finn building in Bellville, a place that was once the heart of a master mechanic's business. Built in 1896 by German immigrant E. Oscar Finn, this wasn't just a shop – it was a home and a…
You're driving past the original site of St. Mary's Episcopal Church in Bellville. Anglicans here started gathering in the 1850s, holding their first official service in 1861. By 1862, St. Mary's was a new congregation…
Bellville, the seat of Austin County, is one of the camps on the Salt Grass Trail Ride — riders bound the fairgrounds here on the way to Houston. A trail-ride camp is its own small town: better than two dozen wagons,…
Bellville General Hospital Bellville was founded as county seat of Austin County in January 1848, on land provided by Thomas Bell, for whom the town was named. The railroad reached Bellville in 1879-80, and the…
You're passing the Shelburne-Reinecker House, a home that saw a century of family life and architectural change. It started in 1882 as a simple one-story house built by James Henry Shelburne, a lawyer, state legislator,…
You're driving past the site of the Bellville Masonic Lodge. Chartered in 1858, this lodge was built by its members that same year. The second floor was for lodge meetings, but the first floor? It served double duty as…
You're driving through Austin County, perhaps near Bellville, and you're passing through a place that holds a piece of Texas's spiritual beginnings. David Ayres, a merchant from New York, arrived in Texas in 1833,…
You're driving through Bellville, Texas, the birthplace of Weldon "Juke Boy" Bonner, a legendary bluesman who learned guitar by age twelve and taught himself to play. He quit school and headed to Houston, where he…
You're driving through Austin County, near Bellville, where William E. Crump made his home. He was a wealthy plantation owner who arrived in Texas in the early 1840s. Though he'd never held public office before, Crump…
You're driving through Austin County, near the town of Bellville, which owes its name to Thomas Bell. Bell was a stockman and farmer, but in 1835, he answered the call to revolution. He joined the Lynchburg Volunteers…
You're driving through Bellville, a town with roots stretching back to the earliest days of Texas settlement. Right here, in 1846, the citizens decided to move their county seat from San Felipe. Thomas Bell, one of…
You're driving through Austin County, near Bellville, where Zimri Hunt first practiced law. He arrived in Texas in 1846, studied law, and was admitted to the bar in 1849. Hunt's political career began in 1850 when he…
You're driving through Austin County, a region that saw action during the Texas Revolution. Right here, Robert McNutt, a veteran of the War of 1812, settled with his family in 1834. Just two years later, he answered the…
You're driving through Austin County, Texas, and right here is where a fascinating character named John Patterson Osterhout landed in 1851. Originally from Pennsylvania, this lawyer and journalist became a staunch…
You're driving through what was once Austin County, and maybe you've heard of Bellville. Right here, David Young Portis, a lawyer and politician, was living in 1860. He owned over 35,000 acres and seventeen enslaved…
You're driving past a true Texas original, the Machemehl house, built in 1920. Designed by famous Houston architect Alfred C. Finn, this Craftsman bungalow is unusual for its one-and-a-half story design, sometimes…
You're driving past where Michael Robert Pilley lived, a man who saw action in the ill-fated Mier Expedition of 1842. Born across the Atlantic in Grantham, England, Pilley came to Texas and joined the fight for its…
You're driving past Saint John Lutheran Church in Bellville, a congregation that started with just seven families back in 1896. They held their first services in the local Methodist church building before completing…
You're driving past Bellville, and right here, we're talking about music! Back in 1860, a group of German immigrants gathered in a home nearby and organized a singing society called Concordia. Members like Fritz Brandes…
You're driving through Bellville, and just a little ways off the road, you might still find them: the unique, round dance halls designed and built by master builder Joachim Hintz. Born in Germany, Hintz came to Texas in…
You're driving past Oak Knoll Cemetery, which began as a family burial plot. Frederick and Marie Luhn bought this land in 1848, and Frederick was buried here in 1854. His wife eventually remarried, and the couple began…
The Hill, at 758 West Main Street in Bellville, is the oldest restaurant in town and has been griddling old-fashioned burgers and spinning malts since 1952. It did not start out with that name. It opened as Schrader's,…
You're driving through Austin County, named for the Father of Texas himself, Stephen F. Austin. This area began as part of Austin's original land grant from Mexico in 1821. It was officially created as a municipality in…
You're driving past Pilgrims Rest Cemetery, established in 1861. It was recognized as a Historic Texas Cemetery in 2006.
The strangest part of the acetylene business is where the gas comes from: a grayish rock that catches fire when it gets wet. The rock is calcium carbide, and drop a chunk of it into plain water and it hisses, bubbles,…
Cut open an empty acetylene tank and you will not find a hollow steel bottle, you will find it packed solid with a porous spongelike mass soaked in liquid acetone. There is a deadly serious reason for that. Acetylene is…
Bellville looks like cattle country, but just off Highway 159 sits an industry built around one of the hottest flames in manufacturing. Back in 1985 a company called Western International Gas and Cylinders started here…
Everyone assumes a cutting torch slices steel by melting it, but the real trick is stranger: it sets the steel on fire. A cutting torch does two jobs at once. First the acetylene flame preheats a spot until it glows…
The cheap acetylene that a Bellville plant would eventually pour out by the tankful began with a mistake in 1892. A Canadian inventor named Thomas Willson was trying to make aluminum in an electric-arc furnace, fusing…
Newman's Castle, at 1041 Old Highway 36 just north of Bellville in Austin County, is exactly what it sounds like: a full medieval-style castle, built by hand by one man. Mike Newman ran Newman's Bakery in Bellville, but…
San Felipe de Austin, on the west bank of the Brazos River at the Old San Antonio Road crossing, a site now on Interstate Highway 10 two miles east of Sealy in southeastern Austin County, was founded in 1824 by Stephen…
The Ernest Witte Site, an aboriginal cemetery, is located on a bluff overlooking the Brazos River in Austin County, about forty miles west of Houston. A low sandy knoll marks its location. In the 1930s Ernest Witte and…
Asa Thompson Oliver, planter, was born on November 14,1819, in Elbert County, Georgia, the son of Simeon and Mildred Oliver. He moved with his wife and children from Mississippi to Texas in the mid-1850s. By 1858 he had…
You're driving through what is now Austin County, and right here is where Martin Allen built his life in Texas. He was one of Stephen F. Austin's original Old Three Hundred settlers, arriving in 1821. But before that,…
You're driving through Austin County, not far from Sealy, and right here is the Cat Spring Agricultural Society Hall. Built in 1902 by Joachim Hintz, this place was designed with a unique twelve-sided shape and a…
You're driving through Cat Spring, a community settled in 1834 by German immigrants. Many were drawn here by the letters of Friedrich Ernst, who had settled nearby. But how did it get its name? Legend has it that a son…
You're driving through the heart of Texas, a land shaped by immigrants seeking a new life. Right here, in Austin County, you're near Cat Spring, the community that became the gateway for many Czech settlers. In 1851, a…
You're driving through Austin County, and right here, you're passing through the town named for John Wesley Kenney. But Kenney wasn't just a preacher; he was a pioneer of Methodism in Texas. He arrived in 1833, building…
You're driving through Austin County, and right here is the area where Louis Kleberg fought in one of the more brutal Indian skirmishes of the Texas frontier. Kleberg, a German immigrant who arrived in Texas in 1834,…
You're driving through what was once the Texas frontier, and right here, in what is now Austin County, lived Robert Justus Kleberg. A lawyer from Germany, he came to Texas in 1835 and quickly became a key figure. He…
You're driving through what was once Austin County, a place that holds a dramatic story from the Texas Revolution. It's February of <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1836</say-as>, and a young man named J. Hampton…
You're driving through Austin County, near the tiny community of Peters. Right here, you're passing the Peters-Hacienda Community Hall, a place that started as a shooting club for German immigrants. Organized in 1897,…
You're driving through Austin County, not far from Kenney, and right here in the community of Travis is where James Bradford Pier settled his family in early 1836. Just as they were getting established, Pier and his…
You're driving through Austin County, and right here, the San Bernard River has a mystery that's been baffling locals for over a century. They call it the Singing River, because for more than 100 years, people have…
You're driving through Austin County, not far from the community of Shelby. This place is named for David Shelby, one of Stephen F. Austin's original Old Three Hundred settlers, who arrived here in 1822. Shelby was more…
You're driving through Austin County, near Industry, and you're passing through the echoes of Schoenau. This community was settled by German-speaking Swiss, who built a hall nearby for their 'Harmony Verein.' There,…
You're driving through Central Texas, maybe near Austin County, where some of the most bizarre and important fossil discoveries in North America were made! Back in the 1870s, a collector named Jacob Boll unearthed…
You're driving through Austin County, where in the early 1860s, a local legislator named Andrew Jackson Bell faced a rebellion. Bell, a landowner and former sheriff, was tasked with enforcing the Confederate…
You're driving through Austin County, where Philip Minor Cuney built his life and legacy. Born in Louisiana in 1808, Cuney came to Texas around 1840 and became a prosperous cotton planter. He was a delegate to the…
You're driving through what is now Austin County, a region settled by pioneers like William Kuykendall. He arrived in Texas with his family in 1821, part of Stephen F. Austin's Old Three Hundred. At just sixteen, he was…
You're driving through Austin County, not far from Bellville. Right here is the site of Millheim, established around 1845 by German immigrants. They settled along Clear Creek, building a mill that gave the community its…
You're driving through Austin County, near the junction of Farm roads 389 and 1457. Right here is Shelby, a community with roots stretching back to the early 1840s. Founded by Otto von Röder as Rödersmühl, it quickly…
You're driving through Austin County, a place that was once a frontier zone for early Texas settlers. Imagine this: the early 1820s. Nomadic Tonkawa tribes, and sometimes the more feared Karankawas and Wichitas, were a…
You're rolling through Kenney, Texas, a town that owes its existence to a railroad line. In 1880, the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway pushed north from Bellville, and right here, a station was born. It was first…
You're driving through Austin County, passing the community of Nelsonville. This spot was first settled in the 1850s, but the town really took shape after the Civil War. D. D. Nelson opened a store here, and Isaac Lewis…
You're driving past the Millheim community, where German immigrants brought their love of music and song with them to Texas. The Millheim Harmonie Verein, a singing society, was officially organized in 1873, though it…
You're driving through Cat Spring, but this area was originally settled by German pioneers. Back in 1832, families like the Amslers, Klebergs, and Von Roeders arrived here, carving out a new life. Imagine arriving in a…
You're driving past Buckhorn Cemetery, established in 1880. It was recognized as a Historic Texas Cemetery in 2001.
You're driving past the site where James Bradford Pier lived out his long life in Austin County. Born in Ohio in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1813</say-as>, Pier came to Texas in 1835 with his wife, just in…
You're driving past the spot where Sherwood Y. Reamos, born way back in 1812, played a small but crucial role in the Texas Revolution. On April 21st, 1836, the same day as the Battle of San Jacinto, Reamos was detailed…
You're driving past Montgomery Cemetery, established back in 1850. It was recognized as a Historic Texas Cemetery in 2007.
The Kenney Store, on South Loop 497 in the tiny Austin County town of Kenney, has stood since 1887, when it opened as the town's general store. Its second life began in the mid-1900s, when it became a gathering place…
You're driving through Kenney, Texas, named for a man who was one of the greatest pioneer Methodist ministers in the state: John Wesley Kenney. Born in Pennsylvania, he started preaching at just 19. In 1833, he arrived…
Cat Spring, in Austin County, is where the modern Salt Grass Trail Ride sets out — the 2004 ride, the 53rd annual, left Wittenburg's Pasture near Cat Spring on February 21, 2004. The Salt Grass is the oldest of the…
You're driving through Austin County, home to the first large wave of Czech immigrants to Texas. While a Czech named Jiri Rybar was in Galveston way back in 1829, it was letters from Rev. Josef Arnost Bergman, a settler…
Burleigh, Texas, nestled in the rolling prairie of Austin County, owes its name to a prominent figure from the early days of Texas independence. It's said that the town was named in honor of George W. Burleigh, a land…
New Wehdem sits in the rolling terrain of Austin County, where the coastal plain begins its gentle rise into the Texas heartland. The area's earliest days saw German immigrants drawn to the fertile land, establishing…
This is the ground where a retreating army became a fighting force. At the end of March 1836, General Sam Houston marched roughly 500 demoralized soldiers to this bend of the Brazos River after weeks of retreat. The…
Waller County, part of Stephen F. Austin’s original colony, sits on the Western Gulf Coastal Plain, its landscape a mix of prairies and gently rolling hills. The county’s population has swelled in recent years, and this…
You're driving past the William Shelburne Cemetery, established in 1878. It was recognized as a Historic Texas Cemetery in 2002.
You're driving past Saint Paul Lutheran Church in Bellville, a testament to German immigrants who settled this area. Lutheran services started here as early as 1886, but the congregation officially formed in 1890. Their…
You're driving through Waller County, not far from where Norris Wright Cuney was born into slavery in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1846</say-as>. But this man’s story is one of incredible rise. His…
Somewhere along this stretch of the Brazos ran Crump's Ferry, the crossing kept by William Edmond Crump, who settled his family on the river in the 1830s with a farm and ferry not far north of San Felipe. Crump's day…
You're driving past the Star Hill Cemetery, a burial ground with roots stretching back to the earliest days of Texas settlement. Bryan Daughtrey, a War of 1812 veteran, arrived in Texas in 1822 and settled here in 1829.…
This is the site of Groce's Ferry, established in 1822 by Jared E. Groce where the old Coushatta crossing met the Brazos at his Bernardo Plantation. In April 1836 it hosted one of the great logistics feats of the Texas…
Established across the Brazos in 1822 (the river has since changed its course) by Jared E. Groce (1782-1836). Near here the Texas Army camped from March 30 to April 12, 1836. Erected by the State of Texas 1936
Near here stood Bernardo Plantation, established in 1822 by Jared E. Groce, the first large planter in Texas, on a bluff above the east bank of the Brazos about four miles south of present Hempstead. Its famous…
You're in Sunny Side, settled in 1866, the year after emancipation, by newly freed families farming the land near Irons Creek in southwest Waller County. An early resident named James Rainwater chose the name, believing…
You're driving past a beautiful example of Greek Revival architecture, a style brought to Texas by planters from the Deep South. This home was built between 1856 and 1858 for William Westcoat Browning, who moved here…
Atkinson Cemetery, on land once owned by town namesake Robert Wooding Chappell and named for an 1857 mayor, holds a grave nobody can point to. In May 1900, a tenant farmer named Browning and his ten-year-old daughter…
You're driving past what was once Lockhart Plantation, built in 1850 by Dr. John W. Lockhart. This wasn't just a home; it was a self-sufficient community on a thousand acres, complete with its own blacksmith shop,…
St. Stanislaus, organized in 1889, is one of the earliest Polish parishes in Texas -- and it would not stay down. Businessman William Swiatkowski went personally to the bishop in Galveston to ask for a church; the land,…
Phillipsburg emerged from the fertile Blackland Prairie of Washington County, a landscape of gently rolling hills and rich, dark soil ideal for agriculture. German immigrants, drawn by the promise of affordable land and…
After the 1867 yellow fever epidemic emptied Chappell Hill, the town got a second founding population. Beginning in the early 1870s, Polish immigrant families arrived from Greater Poland -- the Poznan region, then under…
You're driving through Washington County, where steamboats once played a crucial role in Texas commerce. The Brazos River, just a couple miles east, was a highway for these early vessels. In 1840, the first steamer…
You're driving through Chappell Hill, a town founded way back in 1847. It was named for Robert Chappell, who settled here in 1841. This place was a real hub for education in its early days, boasting the Chappell Hill…
You're driving past the site of Soule University for Boys, established way back in 1855. It was chartered the next year, meant to carry on the legacy of two other colleges. But this school had a rough go. It closed down…
You're cruising through Sealy, and right here is the site of a place that was the heart of German culture in this town. Back in 1899, some of Sealy's earliest German settlers formed a singing society called the…
You're driving through Sealy, and right here is where a mattress revolution happened! In 1885, Daniel Haynes invented a whole new way to make mattresses – a felted cotton, non-tufted kind. He trademarked it under his…
Chappell Hill is a sausage town twice over. The name you see in grocery stores across Texas is the Chappell Hill Sausage Company, founded in 1968 when Frank and Clara Cone moved out from Houston and bought a little…
You're in Monaville, named in 1886 when Daniel C. Singletary opened the area's first post office and grocery store and named the community for his daughter Mona. The farming settlement had a school, a cotton gin, and…
You're driving past the site of the Haynie-Embrey House. It's a Victorian home, built in Brenham back in 1899 by Nellie Haynie and her new husband, John Embrey. Nellie was a widow, and John, a Confederate veteran,…
You're driving past Sealy Cemetery, the final resting place for thousands of Sealy's earliest residents. It all began in 1879 when George Sealy bought over 11,000 acres to build a railroad depot. The town of Sealy grew…
You're driving through San Felipe, and right here is the site of Stephen F. Austin's only home in Texas. Imagine, the Father of Texas lived here! But this house met a fiery end. On March 29th, 1836, as Santa Anna's army…
Leal, Texas, isn't like the other little towns scattered along Highway 90. Most of them started as ranching outposts or faded railroad stops, but Leal grew because of the Pecos River. That ribbon of water carving…
You're driving past the site of Dr. James West Bostick's home in Sealy. Born around 1840 in a log cabin, Bostick was the grandson of one of Stephen F. Austin's original 300 settlers. After serving four years in the…
You're rolling through Sealy, a town born and built by the railroad. Back in 1879, the Gulf, Colorado, and Santa Fe Railroad laid its tracks right here, naming the new settlement after railroad president George Sealy.…
The Washington County Rail Road -- chartered February 2, 1856, the same day as Soule University -- built west from Hempstead and reached the east bank of the Brazos in February 1860. Bridging the river took another…
Sealy is a town where the past feels close, almost tangible. You can feel it in the brick buildings downtown, rebuilt after that terrible fire in 1913. It's in the fields stretching out toward the San Bernard River,…
The Brazos beside you was once a working highway. From the 1830s to the Civil War, the river carried Texas's most ambitious steamboat trade, because it drained the state's richest cotton and sugar country and fed the…
You're driving past the Haynes-Felcman House, built between 1901 and 1902. It started as the home of H. Schumacher, but in 1906, Richard H. Haynes bought it. Haynes, along with his father, founded the Haynes Mattress…
In the summer of 1867, yellow fever came ashore at Indianola on a boat from Veracruz, spread to Galveston, and burned through east-central Texas -- roughly four thousand Texans died before the first frost stopped it on…
The Chappell Hill Historical Society Museum stands on old college ground. The Chappell Hill Institute opened here in 1850 on land donated by town founder Mary Haller and her husband; a second building went up in 1852…
Providence Baptist Church was organized in 1842 -- five years before Chappell Hill existed. Its founders are a who's-who of early Texas Baptists: Hosea Garrett, who would lead Baylor University's board for some…
The joined pair of c1860 buildings on Main Street spent the early 1900s as McDermott's Saloon -- and saloons were big business here. By one longtime owner's account, little Chappell Hill once supported fourteen of them:…
Thirty years after the 1867 epidemic, Chappell Hill showed how long fever fear lasts. In October 1897, with yellow fever scares running statewide -- Navasota under armed quarantine, trains from the east forbidden to…
The farm roads in this corner of the county trace something far older: the Atascocita Road, a Spanish military highway established before 1757. It connected Refugio and Goliad with Atascosito, the Spanish outpost on the…
You're driving past the site of Chappell Hill College, a pioneer in higher learning for Texans. Founded in 1850 as an institute for both men and women, it came under Methodist control in 1854. By 1856, the women's…
The Brenham Weekly Banner's 'Chappell Hill Locals' column for January 25, 1878 reads like a comedy sketch. Saturday night, local rowdies went 'on the war-path' and several came away 'bruised.' On Sunday, posses passed…
Jake Winfield's 1913 store stands where an earlier store burned -- local tradition blames firecrackers. Winfield ran year-long credit accounts for the farm families around town; one landowner had fifty families, each…
Every April, this town of a few hundred swells to fifteen or twenty thousand for the Official Bluebonnet Festival of Texas -- a title the Legislature granted in 1997. The festival didn't start as a flower festival at…
Among the preachers who served Chappell Hill's Methodist church was one with a resume that spanned the continent. Orceneth Fisher, Vermont-born in 1803, was riding Illinois circuits by age twenty, wrote an immigrant…
You're driving past the Hackbarth house in Sealy, completed in 1911. It's an unusual example of vernacular architecture, featuring a wraparound porch and Ionic columns. But the real story here is the material: concrete…
You're driving past the Preibisch Building in Sealy, a testament to German immigrant enterprise. Adolph and Emilie Preibisch arrived in Texas in 1860, and by 1885, they were building their future in the new railroad…
You're driving past the historic site of Chappell Hill College. Established in 1852 by the Methodist Church, it started as the Chappel Hill Male and Female Institute. But after Soule University for Boys opened its doors…
You're driving past the site of Chappell Hill's historic Methodist Church. Organized before 1847, its first pastor, Robert Alexander, was already a missionary here in Texas since 1837. The original church, built in…
You're driving through Sealy, a town named for railroad official George Sealy. Just five years after Sealy was founded, this congregation got its start in 1885. Their first church building, put up in 1889, was wiped out…
You're cruising past Chappell Hill, and right here is the history of Providence Baptist Church. It was founded way back in May of 1842, originally a couple of miles northwest of here. An arm of the church opened up on…
Everyone knows the story of George Washington and the cherry tree: 'I cannot tell a lie.' It never happened. A parson named Mason Locke Weems invented it for his bestselling Washington biography -- the tale first…
Robert Wooding Chappell came to Texas in 1838 with his family and a pack of bear hounds, and planted cotton on land from Stephen F. Austin's original colony. But the town isn't his doing -- it's his granddaughter's.…
The 1850 Stagecoach Inn at Main and Chestnut was the family business of the town's founder: Mary Haller, her husband Jacob, and her mother Lottie Chappell Hargrove built it as the stop roughly halfway between Houston…
Chappell Hill once had a university. Soule University, chartered February 2, 1856, drew about a hundred and fifty students, and finished its forty-thousand-dollar three-story stone building in May 1861 -- just as its…
Early on Sunday, June 16, 1974, four burglars from Houston hit the grocery and the adjoining Farmers State Bank -- and, as the wire story put it, they needed just one mistake to get caught and made at least four. The…
Bever's Kitchen, at 5162 Main Street in the historic heart of Chappell Hill, sits in a Victorian-style cottage built in 1907. Ann Bevers bought the cottage in 1984, soon after she and her husband Ken moved to the area…
Grapevine on Main, at 5120 Main Street in the historic heart of Chappell Hill, is a wine bar with dining set inside a building that dates to 1915, where it originally operated as Winfield's General Store. Owner Cherie…
Imagine weary travelers in the 1850s, kicking up dust as their stagecoach pulled up right here. This is the Stagecoach Inn of Chappell Hill, and it was a vital stop on the road between Houston and Austin. Built around…
The 1880 clapboard building on Main housed the Lesser family's general store for over a century. Harry Lesser was literally born in the back of the store in 1894, and spent decades as 'Judge' Lesser -- justice of the…
One footprint on Main Street has lived every small-town life. In the 1850s it held Sterling Hall, a two-story lodge hall and saloon where the Knights of Pythias later met -- and where the Baptists worshiped after an…
You're driving past the Applewhite House in Chappell Hill, built way back in 1852. Look for its classic Victorian style! This wasn't just a home, though. The builder, Isaac Applewhite, was a minister, a lawyer, and a…
You're driving past the John Sterling Smith House, a beautiful example of Queen Anne architecture right here in Chappell Hill. It started life in 1855 as a simple one-story dog-trot home. But in 1910, it was transformed…
In a town built almost entirely of hand-hewn cedar and cypress clapboard, merchant John E. Glass put up the one building made of stone: the 1869 Rock Store, with sandstone walls a foot and a half thick tied by massive…
A reminder of how dangerous ordinary farm life was: in December 1906, Mike Woniska -- as the papers spelled his Polish name -- a well-to-do farmer of about thirty-eight living two miles west of Chappell Hill, was…
This quiet acre west of Hempstead is where many of the Union prisoners who died at Camp Groce finally rest. For more than a century their graves were essentially lost; after the war the army found only two marked…
The c1853 Wallis House belonged to John Crockett Wallis -- his mother was a cousin of Davy Crockett -- a Chappell Hill merchant and planter who served as a captain in the Twentieth Texas Infantry. After the war, John…
Several Confederate military facilities were positioned near Hempsted (2.5 mi. w), an important railroad junction, during the Civil War. Camp Groce (then about 6 mi. e) was a prisoner-of-war stockade established on the…
Caspar Witteborg, born in Prussia, bought his lot from town founder Mary Haller and built this house in 1853. He's remembered as the first cabinetmaker in Washington County, and by local tradition the house's original…
You're passing Waverly, an antebellum home built around 1850 by Dr. William Leigh Tunstall. But it's Colonel William Sledge, who lived here from 1854 to 1860, who really put his stamp on this place. He built a railroad…
On Buller Road between Monaville and Sunny Side is one of Texas's smallest cemeteries: Vesely Cemetery, with exactly three graves. Frank Vesely immigrated from the Czech lands in 1897 with his wife Josefa and four…
On this spot in 1836, a man named John Bricker took a Mexican cannon shot to the body while trying to stop Santa Anna's army from crossing the Brazos River. San Felipe de Austin was the capital of Stephen F. Austin's…
The Brazos floods of July 1899 set this tragedy in motion. On John Carlisle's bottomland plantation, roughly five miles east of Chappell Hill, tenant farmer King Howard took in his wife's sister after the flood left her…
You're driving past the Hill House in San Felipe, a home with roots stretching back to the Texas Revolution. Imagine this place, or at least its original structure, being built right after the community of San Felipe de…
Every February, more than a thousand riders and some two dozen mule-drawn wagons spend a week walking 103 miles from Cat Spring to downtown Houston, camping at fairgrounds and farms in Bellville, Hempstead, Brookshire…
Ever wonder where Texas really began? This unassuming spot was once San Felipe de Austin, the heart of Stephen F. Austin's colony and the first, albeit provisional, capital of Anglo-American Texas. Between 1823 and…
You're driving through Waller County, not far from where the Texas Army made camp in the spring of 1836. From March 31st to April 13th, the army gathered here, just five miles southeast of your current location. They…
You're cruising through San Felipe, and right here is a building that's seen it all. Back in 1837, it started as a multi-purpose town hall, school, and church. Built from super-tough cypress wood, it's still standing…
Sealy High School in Sealy, Texas is where Eric Dickerson, a state-champion sprinter, rushed for roughly 2,667 yards as a senior in 1978 and led Sealy to a state title, with a legendary performance of around 296 yards…
You're driving through what was once the wild Texas frontier, and right here, you're near the story of Abner Kuykendall. He was one of Stephen F. Austin's original Old Three Hundred colonists, arriving in Texas in 1821.…
You're driving through Sealy, Texas, where A.C. Littlefield was born back in 1925. He became the lead singer of a gospel group called the Bells of Joy. In 1951, their song "Let's Talk About Jesus" became a massive hit,…
You're driving past San Felipe, the very first settlement of Stephen F. Austin's colony. Right here, in 1823, Austin established his headquarters, laying the groundwork for Texas as we know it. This wasn't just any…
You're driving past the final resting place of William Jones Elliott Heard. Born in Tennessee in 1803, Heard came to Texas and volunteered for the fight for independence. He served as captain of Company F in the 1st…
You're driving near Sealy, and right here, Bullinger's Creek played a vital role in the very beginnings of Texas settlement. Back in 1823, when Stephen F. Austin founded San Felipe de Austin, he knew a reliable water…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here is a place named for Horatio Chriesman, a surveyor for Stephen F. Austin himself. He arrived in Texas in 1822, part of the first wave of Austin's colonists.…
You're driving through what was once the wild Texas frontier, near San Felipe. Right here, James Cochran arrived in 1825, a pioneer merchant who would soon play a vital role in the Texas Revolution. When war broke out,…
You're driving through Southeast Texas right now, near where a pivotal meeting took place in the lead-up to the Texas Revolution. In the fall of 1835, delegates gathered for what was called the Consultation. It wasn't…
You're driving near the San Felipe area, a place that was critical in early Texas history. Right here, John Cumings, one of Stephen F. Austin's original colonists, was building a new life. He arrived in the 1820s,…
You're driving through what was once the heart of the Texas Revolution. Right here, in San Felipe, Peter Bartelle Dexter was a key figure. In 1835, he was elected secretary to the Consultation and the provisional…
You're driving through what was once the heart of Stephen F. Austin's colony. Right here in San Felipe, in the summer of 1830, a dispute over a drunken lawyer's insults turned deadly. Seth Ingram, a surveyor and one of…
You're driving through what was once Mexican Texas, and right here, you're passing through land once owned by Hosea H. League. He was one of Stephen F. Austin's original colonists, arriving in the 1820s. League was…
You're driving through Fort Bend County, near San Felipe, where in 1835, Dr. James B. Miller found himself in a real bind. He was the political chief, tasked with keeping the peace with Mexico, but he also supported the…
You're driving through what was once the heart of Stephen F. Austin's colony, and right here, in what is now Brazoria County, you're passing near the story of James Franklin Perry. Born in Pennsylvania in 1790, Perry…
You're driving near the Texas coast, maybe around Matagorda. Back in 1829, a man named Thomas Pilgrim landed here and headed inland to San Felipe. He was a teacher, and he founded the Austin Academy for boys. But his…
You're driving through Austin County, not far from Sealy, and you're passing through a place that was once the heart of Anglo settlement in Texas. Right here, near the Brazos River, stood San Felipe de Austin. Founded…
You're driving through Sealy, Texas, the hometown of Ernie Koy. He was a star athlete at the University of Texas, playing both football and baseball. In 1938, Koy got his shot in Major League Baseball with the Brooklyn…
You're driving past the resting place of William E. Howth, a New Yorker who came to Texas and made his mark. He fought in the capture of San Antonio back in 1835. The next year, he served as a major in the Army of…
You're driving through what was once Mexican Texas, and right here, near San Felipe, you might have passed the land of a man known as "Cow" Cooper. It's tough to sort out exactly which William Cooper is which in these…
You're driving through Sealy, a town born from the railroad age. Back in 1875, the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe railroad bought land and laid out this very townsite. It quickly became a shipping hub for local farmers and…
Nestled within the Western Gulf Coastal Plain of Waller County, Sunny Side Post Office exists in a landscape of gentle slopes and fertile soils, a region historically shaped by agriculture. The post office likely…
You're driving past the Chappell Hill Masonic Cemetery, opened way back in 1853. Look for the grave of Jacob Haller, the very founder of Chappell Hill – he was the first to be laid to rest here. For over a hundred…
You're driving past the site of the San Felipe Town Hall, a building with roots stretching back to 1828. This wasn't just any town hall; it hosted crucial meetings in 1832, 1833, and the Consultation of 1835. These…
You're driving past the site related to Josef Lidumil Lesikar, a tailor who became a voice for freedom. Born in 1806 along the Czech-Moravian border, Lesikar was involved in the revolution of 1848, speaking out for…
You're driving past the Samuel Shelburne Cemetery, established way back in 1863. This small burial ground holds the stories of early settlers in this part of Austin County. Imagine the lives they lived, the challenges…
Here is a fact that sounds like a tall tale but is true: New Ulm picked itself up and moved. For its first forty years the town sat about a mile north of where you are now, up near what is today the New Ulm Cemetery.…
You're driving past where Madison Kilpatrick once lived, a man who escaped slavery to become a leader in Waller County. He arrived before the Civil War as a runaway slave from Alabama. After marrying and raising eight…
You're driving past the site of Hempstead High School, but this wasn't always a place of learning. For years, students here attended classes in rented rooms, and for a time, even the old Waller County Jail served as a…
You're driving through Industry, Texas, a place that holds a significant title: the very first permanent German settlement in the Lone Star State. It all started back in <say-as interpret-as="date"…
You're driving through Austin County, near Industry. Back in March of 1836, as the Mexican army advanced, most settlers fled. But not Mary Theresa Hennecke Juergens. She and her family stayed put. That night, a band of…
You're driving through what was once the wild frontier, and right here near Industry, Texas, lived John York. He arrived in 1822 with his family, settling near San Felipe de Austin. York was a key figure in the Texas…
This town started out under a much plainer name. When a man named James Duff acquired title to this tract back in 1841, the place was simply called Duff's Settlement, after him. But the character of the town changed as…
The German settlers of New Ulm did not just farm and brew, they brought their clubs, and two of them say a lot about the old country. The first was a Turnverein, an athletic and gymnastics society where men did…
Those three little New Ulm breweries were quietly running some serious science, decades before anyone in town would have called it that. The heart of brewing is fermentation, and the worker doing the job is yeast, a…
New Ulm, Texas, out there in Austin County, started with the German Emigration Company. Back in the 1830s and 40s, they were looking for land to bring German immigrants to Texas, and this spot, near the fertile…
You're driving through Central Texas, not far from where Count Ludwig Joseph von Boos-Waldeck arrived in 1842. He was a Prussian army officer who helped found the Adelsverein, a society dedicated to settling Germans in…
You're driving through Fayette County, perhaps near Industry, and you're passing through history. Bernard Scherrer arrived here in 1833, one of the very first settlers in the Biegel Settlement, the second German…
You're driving past the Ahrenbeck-Urban Home, a beautiful Greek Revival house built around 1872. It was constructed by William Ahrenbeck, a German immigrant who became a civic leader, postmaster, and mayor of Hempstead.…
You're driving through Fayette County, maybe near Round Top. Right here, in the 1800s, lived John Friedrich Meinhard Ernst, a man who wore many hats. Born in Germany in 1820, he came to Texas as a boy with his family,…
You're driving through Austin County, and right here is the area where Antonin Stupl built a life and a career. Born in Bohemia in 1834, Stupl came to Texas in 1852, settling with his family near Cat Spring. He was a…
Northwest of Hempstead on Highway 290 stands a Dutch Colonial dairy barn with a remarkable pedigree. The land traces to Austin-colony grants and was owned for about ninety years by the family of Francis Jarvis Cooke…
Before there was a Texas, there was San Felipe. Stephen F. Austin established this town in 1823 as the capital of his colony, the first legal Anglo-American settlement in Mexican Texas. For thirteen years, this small…
You would never guess it from the quiet crossroads today, but in the 1850s New Ulm was a surprisingly busy little industrial town. For a small farm settlement, the list of what it supported is remarkable: six general…
Every small town keeps a couple of stories that are too good to leave out and too thinly documented to swear by, and New Ulm has two beauties. The first: as the local story is told, a young Richard King, the man who…
You're driving past the resting place of Captain Alfred H. Wyly. He was there with Sam Houston at the Battle of San Jacinto, April 21, 1836, commanding a volunteer company. That decisive battle secured Texas…
You're cruising through Austin County, and right here is the site of New Ulm. It wasn't always called that, though. Back in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1841</say-as>, this was Duff's Settlement, named for…
Hempstead and Camp Groce bookend the Confederacy in Texas: the camp helped raise Confederate regiments in 1862, and in the spring of 1865 the same ground saw the Confederate army of the West come apart. As the war…
Chappell Hill, nestled in the rolling hills of Washington County, began as a cotton farming hub along the stagecoach route. Founded in 1847 and named for Robert Wooding Chappell, it quickly became a trading center in…
A seedless watermelon is not found in nature, it is a clever piece of genetic engineering done the old-fashioned way, with crossbreeding. Normal watermelons carry two sets of chromosomes. To make a seedless one,…
This stretch of U.S. Highway 290 in Waller County is named for Texas Highway Patrol Trooper Russell Lynn Boyd. On October 11, 1983, Boyd pulled over a driver for a traffic violation on State Highway 6 near Hempstead.…
You're driving through Industry, Texas, a town founded by German settlers way back in 1831. But did you know these settlers were pioneers in education too? Right here, in December of 1840, the town's very first school…
You're driving through Industry, Texas, where a local bank has been a cornerstone for over a century. It all started on February 11, 1911, when a group of citizens decided to form the First Guaranty State Bank of…
Hempstead is the Waller County seat, an hour northwest of Houston, and today it's best known as watermelon country — the home of an annual watermelon festival. But during the railroad boom of the late 1800s and early…
Hempstead was once one of America's watermelon capitals, and for good reason: into the 1940s it was the single largest shipper of watermelons in the whole United States. People still call it the Watermelon Capital of…
Here is a trick the watermelon industry uses that sounds like science fiction: you can measure exactly how sweet a melon is by shining light through a drop of its juice. The tool is a refractometer, and it works on a…
That deep red inside a ripe watermelon is not just color, it is chemistry, and it is the same pigment that makes a tomato red. The compound is lycopene, a carotenoid, and here is the surprise: ounce for ounce, fresh…
Edwin 'Buster' Pickens, born in Hempstead on June 3, 1916, was one of the last of the Texas barrelhouse blues pianists. In the 1930s he was part of the Santa Fe Group, pianists who rode the Santa Fe freight lines…
Hempstead might seem like any other small Texas town, content to let the world rush by. But a few years back, the quiet was broken by something that really got folks talking: the proposed high-speed rail line. See, this…
You're driving past the site of the First United Methodist Church of Hempstead. Methodism arrived in town around 1857, and the congregation purchased its first building for church use by 1859. The church has moved and…
You're driving through Hempstead, Texas, where Lillie Drennan made history behind the wheel. Born in Galveston in 1897, Lillie became Texas's first licensed female truck driver and owner. She started Drennan Truck Line…
You're driving past the site of a true Texas pioneer, Christian Friedrich Ernst. Born in Germany in 1796, Ernst served in the army before immigrating to America with his family in 1829. Just two years later, in 1831,…
You're driving through Industry, Texas, a town with a big claim to fame. Right here, in 1831, Friedrich Ernst established the very first permanent German settlement in the entire state. Ernst himself arrived from…
You're driving through what was once the heart of Stephen F. Austin's colony, near present-day Hempstead. Right here, in 1822, Jared Ellison Groce arrived with fifty wagons and ninety enslaved people, establishing…
You're driving through Hempstead, Texas, the birthplace of Allen Burroughs Hannay. Born in 1892, Hannay was a legal prodigy. He became the youngest county judge in the entire nation at just twenty-three years old!…
You're driving through what is now Waller County, near Hempstead. Back in 1863, this area was a hotbed of political tension. Dr. Richard Rodgers Peebles, a wealthy physician and railroad investor, opposed secession. He…
You're driving through Waller County, near Hempstead, where a tragic event unfolded in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1905</say-as>. John M. Pinckney, a former Confederate soldier and then a United States…
You're driving past the site of a life that spanned some of the most dramatic chapters in Texas history. John Friedrich Ernst arrived here in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1831</say-as>, just a boy of nine,…
You're driving through Hempstead, a town born from a railroad dream! Back in 1856, founders Richard Peebles and James McDade organized a town company, aiming to be the terminus for the Houston and Texas Central Railway.…
You're driving through Waller County, near Hempstead, where a man named Madison Kilpatrick rose from slavery to become a powerful political leader during Reconstruction. Born enslaved in Alabama in 1829, Kilpatrick…
You're driving through Hempstead, Texas, the birthplace of Edwin "Buster" Pickens, a blues pianist whose music echoed the Texas idiom, sometimes called "sawmill" piano. After serving in World War II, Buster returned to…
You're driving through Waller County, not far from Hempstead, where Martin Kingsley Snell spent his final years. Snell arrived in Texas in 1835, just in time to fight in the Siege of Bexar. He was there at San Jacinto,…
You're driving through Waller County, a place that played a surprisingly big role in early Texas agriculture. Back in 1821, Jared Groce established Bernardo Plantation, and by 1822, he grew a crop of cotton – possibly…
You're driving past the area where General Sam Houston and the Texas Army made camp in April of <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1836</say-as>. This plantation, owned by Charles Donoho, was the last stop for…
Camp Groce, at times referred to as Camp Liendo, was located on Col. Leonard W. Groce 's Liendo Plantation on Clear Creek and the Houston and Texas Central Railway, two miles east of Hempstead in Waller County.…
A watermelon is about ninety-two percent water, which makes growing one a strange engineering puzzle: you are basically using a field to package water into something you can ship and sell. How you deliver that water…
You're driving past the Welcome Store, a landmark that's been serving this community for over a century. It started life around 1890 as the John Reichle General Merchandise store. Imagine this place, then two stories…
You're driving near Hempstead, Texas, a place that was home to Robert Harper Kirby, a man who poured his own fortune into making Texas dry. In 1919, Kirby served as chairman of the statewide campaign for prohibition.…
You're driving through Waller County, not far from Hempstead, the site of a tragic accident that befell a prominent Texas figure. Richardson A. Scurry, a lawyer and politician who fought at the Battle of San Jacinto,…
You're driving through what was once the staging ground for a Confederate regiment organized right here near Hempstead. On March 25, <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1862</say-as>, Colonel George Flournoy gathered…
You're driving through Waller County, near Hempstead, where the Twenty-fifth Texas Cavalry was organized back in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1862</say-as>. Known also as the Third Texas Lancers, this…
You're driving through Texas, maybe near Hempstead, and right here is where the Twenty-second Texas Infantry, also known as Hubbard's regiment, ended its Civil War journey. Formed in August of <say-as…
You're driving through Austin County, near Hempstead, a town that was home to Charles Abbott. Abbott was a Republican merchant who served in the Texas House of Representatives during the turbulent Reconstruction era. He…
You're driving through Anderson County, and right here is where Paul Lawrence Rutledge, Sr., spent a good part of his career. Born in Hempstead back in 1904, Rutledge was an educator and community leader. He served as…
You're driving past Welcome Lutheran Church, a testament to faith and resilience. Organized in 1869 with just 12 members, this congregation quickly faced adversity. Their first church, built that same year, was…
You're driving through New Ulm, Texas, a community with roots stretching back to 1841 when it was known as Duff's Settlement. But the real story here is the wave of German immigrants who arrived in 1845, transforming…
You're driving through Palo Pinto County, and right here is the site of Camp Wolters, later Fort Wolters. It was established in 1925 and named for Jacob Franklin Wolters, a Texas legislator and soldier. Wolters served…
You're driving past the site of Industry Methodist Church, organized in 1847 by the Rev. Henry Bauer to serve German settlers. The congregation erected this building in 1867 through great sacrifice, with members doing…
You're driving through Industry, and right here is the site of the Lindemann Store. It all started in 1884, when Edward Lindemann and Franz Getschmann opened a general store for this German community. By 1889, Lindemann…
You're driving through Washington County, and you're passing the site of the Salem Lutheran Church. Organized in November of 1856 by Reverend Johann Ebinger and just seventeen members, this is the second oldest German…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here, you're passing the birthplace of a Texas institution. Back in 1894, a merchant named L. A. Niebuhr had an idea to help farmers protect themselves from fire,…
You're driving through Waller County, passing the former plantation home of Edwin Waller. He was a big deal in Texas history! Waller was a member of the Consultation in <say-as interpret-as="date"…
You're driving past the site of the Brenham "Banner-Press," a newspaper with a dramatic start. Founded in 1866 as the "Southern Banner" by Confederate veterans, its editor, Dan McGary, was jailed and his shop burned…
You're driving through Waller County, named for Edwin Waller, a man who helped birth a nation. Born in Virginia in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1800</say-as>, Waller came to Texas in 1831. He fought at the…
You're driving through Industry, Texas, and just passed the site of Hackfield Farm. This place started in the 1850s with German immigrant Friedrich Hackfeld and his wife Elizabeth. Friedrich became a U.S. citizen in…
Waller County, part of the Upper Gulf Coast region, reflects a blended heritage rooted in its fertile plains. Early settlers, drawn by the promise of rich agricultural land, included Anglo-American farmers and European…
You're driving past the land once owned by Charles Fordtran, a German immigrant who arrived in Texas way back in January of <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1831</say-as>, years before the big wave of German…
You're driving through Frydek, a community settled by Czech immigrants in the 1850s. They named it after a town back home. When two people died in 1885, they were buried right here on land belonging to Jan Pavlicek. By…
You're driving through Brenham, and right here is the site of St. Peter's Episcopal Church. This parish holds the distinction of being the fourth oldest in all of Texas. It was officially organized way back on May 2nd,…
You're near the site of Camp Groce, a Civil War camp on Leonard Groce's Liendo Plantation land east of Hempstead. Built in spring 1862 as a Confederate training camp, it was abandoned because its stagnant Clear Creek…
You're in Pine Island, a community with a rare trick: it vanished and then came back. The old rural settlement coalesced by the 1880s around Pine Island Baptist Church, midway between Hempstead and Waller, with a school…
You're driving past the Giddings-Stone House, a beautiful example of Greek Revival architecture right here in Brenham. Completed in 1870, this home was built for Jabez Giddings, a prominent banker and lawyer who also…
You're driving past Brenham, a city founded in 1844. It's named for Dr. Richard Fox Brenham, a surgeon who served the Republic of Texas. Brenham was a veteran of the Mier Expedition, a disastrous raid into Mexico. He…
You're driving near Brenham, and just up ahead is the site of what was once Milroy's Garden and Orchard. Alexander Douglas Milroy, a Scottish immigrant who made his fortune in the cotton trade, settled here in 1893. He…
You're driving through Brenham, and you might be passing the legacy of William H. Watson, a true pioneer in Texas horticulture. Born in Ireland in 1837, Watson came to Texas by 1859 and established Rosedale Nursery…
You're driving past the site of Highland Home School, a small white frame building that opened its doors in the 1890s. Originally called Boyd School, it served families in this rural area for decades. Imagine just one…
Chapel Hill, Texas, started with cotton in its heart. In the mid-1800s, this area was prime for growing, and the community that sprang up took its name from the church nestled on a nearby hill. You can still feel that…
You're driving past the Hasskarl House, also known as "Far View." The impressive vistas here inspired Dr. Walter Hasskarl to buy this land in 1925. He served as Washington County Health Officer for an incredible 51…
You're driving past Brenham, a town founded way back in 1843. It's named for Richard Fox Brenham, a patriot of the Republic of Texas who died the same year the town was born. Brenham quickly became a vital railhead and…
You're driving past the birthplace of a Texas legend: Blue Bell Ice Cream! It all started back in 1907 as the Brenham Creamery Company, buying up local dairy products to make butter. By 1911, they were experimenting…
Tour the home of Texas' beloved ice cream in tiny Brenham. Free samples.
Hempstead exists because two men read a railroad survey. On December 29, 1856, Dr. Richard Rodgers Peebles and James W. McDade organized the Hempstead Town Company to sell lots at the projected railhead of the Houston &…
Look off to your right as you drive past Hempstead, and you're seeing the legacy of the Groce family, pioneers who arrived in Texas in 1822. Jared E. Groce led a massive wagon train, bringing not just people, but…
Before any cream becomes ice cream, it goes through a quiet bit of microbiology. Raw milk is full of living microbes, so the first step is pasteurization, named for Louis Pasteur: heat the milk just hot enough, for just…
You're driving through Waller County, near Hempstead, where the landscape you see was once dotted with Confederate Army camps. No trace remains today, but historical accounts tell us this area was a crucial training…
You're driving through Wesley, a community founded by Czech immigrants. Look to your right, and you're passing the site of the first Czech-Moravian Brethren church in Texas. Organized in 1864 by Rev. Joseph Opocensky,…
Brenham is famous for making ice cream, but the real story is that an ice cream factory is a giant chemistry lab bolted onto an enormous refrigeration machine. It started with a problem. In 1907, Washington County dairy…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here in Brenham is the home of a Texas legend: Blue Bell Creameries. It started way back in 1907, not as an ice cream maker, but as a cooperative of local dairy…
You're driving through Washington County, near the town named for him: Brenham. Richard Fox Brenham was a doctor who came to Texas before the revolution. He served in the Texas army and practiced medicine in Austin. But…
You're driving through Central Texas, and right here, in what's now Fayette County, lived Thomas H. Short. He was a Texas Ranger, a Civil War veteran, and a farmer. But in 1849, at just seventeen years old, Short joined…
Here's the trick behind every old hand-cranked ice cream maker, the kind Blue Bell used in 1911: you don't pack the churn in plain ice. You pack it in ice AND salt. And that sounds backwards, because salt is what we…
A scoop of ice cream is really four things that would rather not be together: fat, water, air, and sugar. Left alone, the fat floats, the water sinks, the air escapes, and you get a greasy puddle. Making it smooth is a…
From the moment ice cream leaves the line in Brenham, it can never fully thaw again, and keeping it that way is one of the hardest jobs in food. Engineers call it the cold chain: an unbroken run of refrigeration from…
You're driving through Washington County, not far from Brenham, where George Washington Barnett settled in 1834. He wasn't just a doctor; he was a fighter for Texas independence. He was chosen captain of a volunteer…
You're driving through Brenham, home to Blinn College. It started in 1883 as the Mission Institute, founded by German Methodists to train ministers. Imagine, just three students and a president meeting in a church…
You're driving through Brenham, a town with roots stretching back to 1843. It wasn't always called Brenham, though. The community was originally known as Hickory Grove. It changed its name to honor Dr. Richard Fox…
You're driving through Washington County, maybe near Brenham, where Lewis Chapman Clemons died in 1892. But back in 1836, he was right in the thick of it, fighting in the Battle of San Jacinto. He first came to Texas in…
You're driving through Brenham, the site of a shocking crime that rocked this community. Thomas B. Dwyer, a wealthy businessman and former Republican party leader, was murdered right here in his office on January 29,…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here is the town named for Jabez Demming Giddings. Giddings came to Texas in 1838 to claim land bounty after his brother died at the Battle of San Jacinto. He became a…
You're driving through Washington County, not far from Brenham, and you're passing through the heart of what was once Glenblythe Plantation. Opened around 1859 by Thomas Affleck, this wasn't just a farm; it was a hub of…
You're driving through Washington County, maybe even past Brenham itself. Right here, a determined pioneer woman named Arabella Harrington helped shape this landscape. After a life of moves and loss, she arrived in…
You're driving through Brenham, the birthplace of Louise Ozelle Martin. Born in 1911, she overcame significant barriers to become a pioneering African-American photographer. Despite facing segregation in photography…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here in Brenham, a fiery newspaper editor named Dan McGary found himself in a battle for free speech during Reconstruction. McGary, who had served in both the Mexican…
You're driving through Washington County, Texas, where Robert Micajah Powell made his home in Brenham. He arrived in 1849, practiced law, and even served in the Texas Legislature. But when the Civil War broke out,…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here in Brenham, you're passing through the hometown of James E. Shepard. Shepard was a lawyer and a leader, serving in the Texas legislature and even arguing before…
The difference between silky ice cream and a grainy, crunchy mess comes down to one thing: how fast it froze. Ice cream is full of tiny ice crystals, and your tongue can feel a crystal once it gets big enough. Freeze…
Here's a number the industry rarely says out loud: a lot of ice cream is mostly air. When the mix freezes, machines whip air into it on purpose, and the amount has a name, overrun. It's the percent the volume grows from…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here is Brenham State School. It opened in January of 1974, the culmination of a unique alliance. Speaker of the House Gus Mutscher championed services for Texans with…
You're driving through Washington County, near Brenham, where a significant political battle unfolded in the early 1870s. DeWitt Clinton Giddings, a Confederate veteran and Brenham lawyer, won a special election for the…
You're driving through Washington County, heading towards Brenham. Right here, in 1859, Francis Marion Law arrived. He wasn't just a doctor or a pastor; he was a builder of communities and a champion for education. He…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here is where John David McAdoo ended his days. Born in Tennessee, McAdoo came to Texas in 1854 and settled near Washington-on-the-Brazos. He served as a Civil War…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here is where John Milton Morin spent his final years. Morin, who was born in Kentucky around 1822, came to Texas in the 1850s and farmed in Burleson County. At the…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here in Brenham, you're passing through the stomping grounds of John Sayles. He arrived in Texas back in 1846, a lawyer and scholar who would go on to become a legal…
You're driving through Washington County, near Brenham, the birthplace of Seth Shepard. Born in 1847, Shepard became a key figure in Texas politics in the late 1800s. He served as a state senator, leading the fight…
You're driving through Austin County, not far from Millheim, where Carl Urbantke settled after sailing from Austria in 1853. He wasn't just a farmer, though. Urbantke became a pioneer Methodist minister, serving German…
You're driving through Washington County, and right here is a story about how this land got connected. Back in 1856, the Washington County Rail Road Company was chartered, aiming to build a line from Hempstead all the…
You're driving through Washington County, not far from Brenham, the birthplace of Samuel Donaldson Warren Low, Jr. Low was a lawyer and businessman, but you might know him best for his long service as the collector of…
You're driving past the site of Pine Island Baptist Church near Hempstead. This congregation got its start on August 13th, 1888, in the old Hopewell schoolhouse. Thirteen original members formed the church, taking its…
You're driving through Brenham, and right here is the story of Lutheran education in Texas. It all started back in 1851 when eight pastors organized the first Evangelical Lutheran Synod in Texas, gathering German…
You're driving past the former home of Milas Roberson "Burney" Parker, a man who served Washington County for nearly two decades. Parker, grandson of a Nueces County sheriff, first took public office as County Road…
In Prairie Lea Cemetery here in Brenham lies a plain stone marked with the name Philip Houston Coe, and nothing about it hints that the man beneath it died in one of the most infamous gunfights of the Old West. Coe was…
You're near Liendo Plantation, just east of Hempstead, on the ground that held Camp Groce, the largest Confederate prisoner-of-war camp in Texas. It started in 1862 not as a prison but as a 'camp of instruction,' a…
A big part of why Brenham became such a German town arrived almost all at once. In October 1881, a steamship named the Crown Prince Frederick Wilhelm docked at Galveston carrying somewhere between eleven hundred and…
You're driving past Camptown Cemetery, a place with roots stretching back to the end of the Civil War. This is the oldest predominantly African American cemetery in Brenham, dating to the 1860s. After emancipation,…
You're driving past the land where Moses Baine made his home after fighting for Texas independence. Born in Ireland, Baine arrived in the U.S. in 1819 before joining Stephen F. Austin's colony in 1830. He fought in the…
You're driving past the site of Brenham's very first hospital. In 1897, Dr. H. Clay Rees built this two-story sanitarium, complete with a separate building for surgeries. It was quite advanced for its time! Sadly, Dr.…
You're driving through Brenham, the heart of Washington County, where German immigrants put down roots in the 1840s. Right here, in 1890, this Lutheran congregation got its start, first known as the German Evangelical…
You're driving past a real Brenham beauty, the Seelhorst-Lehrmann House. Built around 1879 by W.E. Seelhorst, a German immigrant who really knew how to build. Check out those thick, 13-inch plastered brick walls and the…
You're driving past the Wood-Hughes House in Brenham, a beautiful example of late Victorian architecture. Built in 1897 by lumber yard owner W. A. Wood, this home showcases the finest materials of the era, like oak,…
Right now, you're driving past the resting place of George Washington Petty. He was born in Tennessee back in 1812, but he came to Texas and fought in the Battle of San Jacinto, the fight that won Texas its…
You're driving through Wesley, a community founded by Czech immigrants back in 1859. Professor Josef Masik first tutored kids right in his home. By 1863, the Bohemian Slovakian Reading Club built the first schoolhouse.…
On the moonlit night of August 29, 1864, around forty Union prisoners broke out of Camp Groce in its largest escape, helped by sympathetic guards, some of them German and Irish Confederates, who slung ropes over the…
Almost everything we know about daily life inside Camp Groce survives because of one stubborn prisoner. John Read, a Harvard graduate and the paymaster of the captured Union gunboat Granite City, kept a near-daily diary…
There is a hidden water system beneath downtown Brenham, and it began with one of the most violent nights in the town's history. After the Civil War, federal troops were stationed here during Reconstruction, and…
There is a quiet presidential connection right here at Blinn College. During the Great Depression, the federal government set up the National Youth Administration to train unemployed young people, and in 1935 a young…
You're driving through Waller County, and right here is the site of Prairie View A&M University. Back in 1876, Texas was mandated by the federal government to create an agricultural college for Black youth. A commission…
You're driving through Brenham, and right here is the site of Mount Rose Missionary Baptist Church. This isn't just any church; it's the oldest African American Baptist congregation in Brenham, with roots stretching…
In 1867 just one year after Union troops burned part of Brenham a yellow fever epidemic swept through town. The mosquito-borne disease killed dozens and…
Bernardo Plantation, one of the plantation homes of Jared E. Groce , was located on a high bluff on the Brazos River four miles south of the site of present Hempstead in Waller County. In 1822 Groce, the first large…
You're driving through Texas, a land shaped by pioneers. Right here, you're passing through land once owned by James Elijah Brown Austin. He was one of the original Old Three Hundred colonists, brother to Stephen F.…
You're driving through what is now Waller County, and right here, in 1835, a journalist named Joseph Baker, known as Don José, co-founded the Telegraph and Texas Register. <break time="400ms"/> This paper became the…
You're driving through Waller County, and right here is the site of Liendo Plantation. Built by slave labor and completed in 1853, this grand home was a marvel of its time. Imagine bricks fired from local clay, a…
William H. Holland, soldier, legislator, and teacher, was born a slave in Marshall in 1841. He and his brothers James and Milton were probably the sons of Capt. Bird Holland , a White man who bought their freedom in the…
You're driving past the Wittbecker-Weiss House in Brenham. Built in 1895 by Frank Wood, a local builder and lumberman, it was sold the very same year to bakery owners H. G. and Annie Wittbecker. Take a look at the…
You're driving through Waller County, not far from Hempstead. Right here, you're passing through what used to be Gladish, a community founded by Captain Richard Allen Gladish in 1873. He settled here after fighting in…
You're driving past the site of Blinn College, which started life way back on March 28, 1883, as the Mission Institute. It was affiliated with the Methodist church. In 1887, a generous gift from Reverend Christian Blinn…
You're driving through Waller County, near the junction of Farm Roads 1488 and 362. You're passing through what was once Fields Store. This community sprang up around 1872, named for Andrew Field and his son Druey, who…
You're driving through eastern Waller County, and right here is the site of Hegar, also known as Springer. German immigrant Otto Hegar bought land here as early as 1847. His son, Oscar George Hegar, settled here by 1887…
You're driving through what is now Waller County, but back in 1824, this was the wild frontier of Mexican Texas. Right here, one of Stephen F. Austin's original colonists, a man also named John Williams, received title…
Sunny Side (Sunnyside) is near Irons Creek and two miles south of Farm Road 529 some twenty miles southeast of Hempstead and ten miles northwest of Brookshire in Waller County. It was settled in 1866, and a post office…
On the eve of World War One, Brenham was known as a German town. German and Polish were spoken on these streets, a German language newspaper called the Texas Volksbote ran here for about fifty years, and the city even…
After fires ravaged Brenham three times in a decade the town did something no other Texas city had attempted. They built twenty-seven underground cisterns…
In 1907 a group of Washington County dairy farmers converted an abandoned cotton gin into a creamery and started making butter. Ice cream production began in…
Many of the old storefronts around downtown Brenham were cast right here in town. In about 1883, two brothers, Joseph and L.C. Beaumier, bought the Brenham foundry and machine shop and turned it into the Beaumier…
Santa Fe & SP Cafe is a small, family-owned home-cooking diner at 302 West First Street in downtown Brenham. It opens early on weekday mornings and serves classic home-cooked breakfast such as bacon, eggs, pancakes,…
You're driving past Liendo Plantation, a place with a story that spans industry, war, and art. In <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1853</say-as>, Leonard W. Groce built this mansion, surrounded by model plantation…
You're driving past Liendo, a plantation home built way back in 1853 by Leonard W. Groce. For years, it was the scene of lavish Southern hospitality. But then, in 1873, it was purchased by Dr. Edmund Duncan Montgomery,…
You're driving past the old Southern Pacific Freight Depot in Brenham. Back in the 1860s, this town wasn't on the map like it is today. Local folks built their own rail line, hoping to connect to bigger routes. By 1869,…
You're driving past the site of the Brenham Fire Department, but this wasn't just about putting out blazes. Back in May of 1867, two volunteer groups, the Hook and Ladder Company and the Fire Protection Company, formed.…
You're driving through Brenham, Texas, and right here, you're passing the site of a Texas first! In 1875, this area established Independent School District Number One, creating the very first free public high school in…
You're driving past the Ross-Carroll House in Brenham, a beautiful example of Queen Anne architecture. About 1899, Mary Dwyer Ross built this home on land she inherited from her father. Notice the cypress construction,…
You're driving past the Frey-Benignus House, a testament to immigrant grit and family growth. Swiss immigrant John Frey and his German-born wife Mary settled here in late 1889. They started with a simple two-room house…
You're driving past the Frey Cemetery, a family burial ground that started with a tragedy. John Frey, who came from Switzerland in 1877, and his wife Mary, had fifteen children. In 1902, their infant daughter Annie…
By the late summer of 1864 Camp Groce had become a death trap. Some seven hundred prisoners were packed into a stockade of barely two and a half acres, the well had caved in, and the latrines were fouling the creek that…
Brenham is synonymous with Blue Bell ice cream, and that's no accident. It started back in 1907 as the Brenham Creamery Company, a way for local farmers to pool their resources and make butter. But they quickly realized…
In 1866 Union soldiers occupying Brenham during Reconstruction clashed with local residents and set fire to an entire city block. The flames consumed…
Camp Groce held one of the Civil War's most poignant face-offs. In June 1864, about three dozen captured Union prisoners of the 1st Texas Union Cavalry arrived here. They were Texans, many of them German immigrants, who…
Must Be Heaven, at 107 West Alamo Street just off the Brenham square, has been a downtown soda-fountain and deli since 1982. The name is pure Brenham. In the 1970s, Blue Bell Creameries, made right here in town, ran an…
When German immigrants fleeing the 1848 revolutions settled in Brenham they brought their traditions with them. The Maifest celebration they started became the…
The Brenham Volunteer Fire Department was organized after the 1866 burning but its true purpose had nothing to do with flames. The department was a civilian…
Blue Bell started in 1907 as the Brenham Creamery Company, making butter from excess cream that local farmers brought in by horse and wagon. They didn't start making ice cream until 1911, and they didn't bother…
The Best Plantation on the county's old maps was the land of Isaac Best, one of Stephen F. Austin's Old Three Hundred colonists. Best had already lived a full frontier life before Texas: in Pennsylvania and Kentucky he…
You're driving past the site of Isaac Best's Texas home. He was one of Stephen F. Austin's original 300 settlers, arriving in Texas around 1824. But before coming here, Best was already a seasoned frontiersman. Back in…
You're cruising past the Pampell-Day Homestead, a home built way back in 1844. It started out with native pine and sand brick, a solid start for any Texas family. Then, in 1875, T. J. Pampell, a Civil War veteran who…
You're driving past the Schuerenberg House in Brenham, a beautiful example of Queen Anne architecture. Built in 1895 by local contractor Alex Griffin, this home was the center of life for Frederick William Schuerenberg,…
You're driving past Mt. Zion United Methodist Church in Brenham. After emancipation in 1865, African American families settled here, and by 1877, services were being held under a brush arbor. This congregation,…
LJ's BBQ, at 1407 West Main Street in Brenham, is a family-owned barbecue joint that has grown into one of the finest in the state. Pitmaster Matt Lowery opened it in 2015, honing his craft after graduating from the…
In 1875 Brenham became the first city in Texas to operate a tax-supported public school system. They didn't stop there. The system included a school for Black…
You're driving through Brenham, and right here is the Washington County State Bank. This isn't just any bank; it's the oldest state-chartered bank still operating in Texas! It all started back in <say-as…
After failed revolutions swept across German states in 1848 a wave of immigrants washed up in Washington County Texas. They brought brewing traditions…
In 1885 Jewish residents of Brenham founded an Orthodox congregation in a town better known for German Lutherans and Baptist churches. They built a community…
You're driving through Brenham, and right here is the First Christian Church. Organized in 1877 with just 18 members, this congregation was born from missionary work. It took them a while to find a permanent home, but…
You're driving past the site of Brenham's First Baptist Church. It all started way back on December 20, 1846, originally called New Year's Creek Church. Imagine, meeting in a schoolhouse with founders like Judge R. E.…
You're driving past the site of a Texas Revolution veteran and pioneer, Mike Muckleroy, known fondly as "Uncle Mike." Born in Tennessee in 1808, he arrived in Texas in 1840. Just two years later, he joined the fight to…
You're driving through Brenham, and right here on South Park Street is the site of a vital community service. In 1914, educator Columbus H. Hogan founded the Washington County Undertaking Company, the only funeral home…
You're driving through Brenham, and right here is the site of the first public library in Washington County. It all started back in 1901, thanks to the Fortnightly Literary Club. They founded it and still help maintain…
You're driving past the Giddings-Wilkin House in Brenham. Jabez Giddings, a lawyer and businessman from Pennsylvania, bought this land way back in 1837. He built this home before marrying Ann Tarver in 1843, using…
You're driving through Brenham, and right here is the site of the very first Methodist church in town, established way back in 1844, the same year Brenham was founded. Imagine, in 1846, an early member named R. B. Wells…
You're driving past the site of Brenham's first real school, the Masonic Academy. It started way back in 1840 as Hickory Grove School. Then, in 1849, the local Masons, Graham Lodge No. 20, built this academy, making it…
After the war ended, the most famous cavalryman in America came to live on the very same plantation that had held Camp Groce. In late 1865 General George Armstrong Custer led a division into Texas to keep order, and he…
Just outside Brenham lies the town of Independence where Texas declared its freedom from Mexico in 1836. Washington County became the cradle of Texas liberty…
Soon after the Civil War General George Armstrong Custer and his cavalry unit arrived in Texas as part of a large U.S. force sent to establish order and counter the threat posed by French-controlled Mexico. From August…
You're driving through the Mentz-Bernardo Community, a place shaped by German immigrants starting as early as the 1830s. They bypassed formal colonization efforts, choosing this region for its agricultural potential. By…
Somewhere along this reach of the Brazos stood Rock Island, the first real town of what's now northern Waller County. It took its name from a small rocky island Amos Gates spotted in the river; his family is credited as…
Former legendary brothel immortalized in Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. Now just a field.
You're driving through Frelsburg, Texas, the very first German settlement in Colorado County! It was founded in 1837 by William Frels, who came to Texas in 1834. He even fought for Texas Independence from 1835 to 1836.…
You're driving past the final resting place of Stacye Ann Marlin Morgan. She was a survivor of the infamous Morgan Massacre. On January 1st, 1839, in Falls County, a brutal attack by Native Americans claimed several…
You're driving past the site of an important Texas crossroads. In the days of the Republic, James Tarrant and Sarah Smith Pattison settled here on their land grant. Their homesite became a vital stagecoach stop, serving…
Pattison's depot marker remembers the Texas Western Narrow Gauge Railway, the first narrow-gauge railroad chartered in Texas, on August 4, 1870, by Houston businessmen. Its paper route ran from Houston through San…
South of Waller lay Slovanville, a farm community named for the European immigrants from Slavic countries, mostly Czechs, who settled this prairie; it was also known as Kulhanek, and the county's own map of forgotten…
You're driving past the resting place of Francis Jarvis Cooke, a veteran of the Texas Revolution and the Battle of San Jacinto. Born in North Carolina in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1816</say-as>, Cooke…
You're driving past Salem Cemetery, a place that started as a family burial ground for T.B. White. His wife Elizabeth, who died in 1857, and her father Henry Kirby, who died in 1854, are among the earliest interred…
You're driving past the Louis Lehmann House, built in the 1870s by a German immigrant who became a leader in his community. Lehmann served in the Confederate Army and was elected President of the local agricultural…
You're driving past the site of Saints Peter and Paul Catholic Church, a testament to German immigrants who settled this area in the 1830s. They founded this congregation around 1843, initially relying on traveling…
You're driving through Washington County, and we're passing the spot where Thomas Deye Owings made his home after the Texas Revolution. But this wealthy Maryland businessman was already deeply involved in the fight for…
You're driving past the site of Trinity Lutheran Church in Frelsburg, a testament to German immigration and faith in Texas. William Frels himself arrived from Germany way back in 1834. By 1855, he donated land for this…
You're driving past the Ludwig Lehmann Family Cemetery. In 1849, Ludwig and Carolyn Lehmann, with their four sons and Ludwig's mother, sailed from Hamburg, Germany, bound for Galveston. Their journey was tough; Ludwig's…
You're driving past Prairie View, near where Jacob E. Freeman made his mark on Texas history. Born a slave in Alabama around 1841, Freeman came to Texas as a boy and later became a mechanic and served on a grand jury.…
Wiedeville sits nestled in the rolling Blackland Prairies of Washington County, where fertile dark soils once fueled a thriving cotton economy. Unlike some neighboring towns that faded with the decline of King Cotton,…
You're driving through Shelby, a community with deep German roots in Austin County. Look for the Witte-Schmid Cemetery, a quiet testament to that heritage. Dr. Ernst Witte and his wife Lizette, immigrants from Germany,…
You're driving through Austin County, and to your right stands the Witte-Schmid House, a testament to German immigration and architectural style. Dr. Ernst Witte, a lawyer from Hanover, Germany, bought this land in 1856…
Truth BBQ, at 2990 US Highway 290 just west of Brenham, is the original location of one of the most decorated barbecue joints in Texas. Self-taught pitmaster Leonard Botello IV opened it in the summer of 2015 in a small…
You're driving past Prairie View A&M University, a place with a remarkable history that began in 1876 as the 'Agricultural and Mechanical College for Colored Youth.' It was Texas' second state-supported college,…
You're driving past the site of Mt. Zion Baptist Church. Organized as Bethlehem Baptist in 1866 by Joe and Abe Osborne and Louis Thompson, it was reorganized as Mt. Zion in the 1880s. The church experienced destruction…
During World War II, Prairie View A&M was home to one of the most popular all-female big bands in America: the Prairie View Co-eds. With more and more men drafted into the armed forces, band director Will Henry Bennett…
You're driving through the Berlin community, settled by Germans way back in 1847. Look around – this area owes its spiritual roots to a Christmas Eve service in 1854. That's when Reverend Johann Ebinger held the very…
Prairie View is a place deeply rooted in the spirit of resilience and the pursuit of knowledge. Established in 1876 with the founding of Prairie View Normal Institute, now Prairie View A&M University, the town's story…
You're driving past the Zimmerscheidt-Leyendecker Cemetery, a final resting place for a German immigrant family who shaped this part of Texas. Frederick Zimmerscheidt arrived in 1832, and his daughter Josephine and her…
You're passing Howth, a community that began in the early 1870s as a flag station on the Houston & Texas Central, probably named for William Edward Howth, who provided the land. Its post office opened in 1872, and while…
You're driving near Prairie View, Texas, where in July 2015, Sandra Bland, a vibrant activist, was pulled over for a minor traffic violation. What started as a routine stop escalated quickly. After refusing to put out…
Prairie View A&M University stands on the grounds of Alta Vista, the plantation home of Jared and Helen Marr Kirby that crowned a hill over the open prairie. After the Civil War, Helen Kirby turned the mansion into a…
You're driving through Prairie View, a community with a unique beginning. Right here, on land once known as Alta Vista plantation, a significant chapter in Texas education unfolded. After the Civil War, the widow of…
You're driving through Waller County, near Pattison, in the heart of Stephen F. Austin's original colony. Right here, in 1824, Isaac Best arrived from Missouri and claimed a large sitio of land. He was one of Austin's…
You're driving through Waller County, not far from Houston, and you're passing through Pattison. This town's origin story is pure Texas legend. Back in 1839, James Tarrant Pattison bought this land and built a…
Willette Rutherford (Scrap) Banks, teacher and university administrator, was born on August 8, 1881, in Hartwell, Georgia, the second of thirteen children of J. M. and Laura Banks. J. M. Banks was a Georgia populist and…
You're driving through Prairie View, home to a pioneering nursing program that started right here in 1918. With just five students, it began as a two-year diploma program. Over the years, it grew, adding clinical…
You're driving through what is now Waller County, near Prairie View, where Jared E. Kirby built one of the largest plantations in Texas. Arriving from Mississippi in 1849, Kirby rapidly accumulated wealth. By 1860, he…
You're driving past the Wyatt Chapel Community Cemetery, a place with roots stretching back to the days of slavery. Originally, this land was part of Jared Kirby's Alta Vista Plantation. Oral tradition says Kirby set…
Somewhere in the creek country roughly seven miles north of Chappell Hill -- the exact spot is uncertain -- stood Camp Felder, one of the grimmest places in Civil War Texas. In October 1864, about five hundred Union…
Brookshire feels like stepping back to a slower time, but its history is anything but still. Imagine this coastal prairie, dark clay loam perfect for grazing, teeming with wild mustangs. Before the hum of I-10, this was…
You're driving through Waller County, passing the site of St. Mary's Catholic Church and Cemetery. It all started in 1891 when Czech immigrants began buying land here. Just a year later, four families founded this…
You're driving through Waller County, and just off the road here is the site of Shiloh Baptist Church. It all started on September 21st, 1871, when thirteen members, carrying letters of transfer, gathered at a nearby…
The rolling Blackland Prairies of Washington County, Texas, once defined by cotton fields, have seen a shift in recent years. While agriculture remains vital, the county’s proximity to the Houston metro area has brought…
You're driving past Shiloh Cemetery, a place with roots stretching back to 1881. That's when Thomas Armer donated land for a Baptist church and, just two years later, sold an acre for this very cemetery. The community…
You're driving through Washington County, passing Bethlehem Cemetery. Land for this community burial ground was set aside in the 1850s by Erwin Brown, on land originally granted by the Mexican government. The earliest…
Smitty's Cafe and Bakery sits in a converted old gas station and store on US Highway 290 west of Brenham, near Lange Lake Road. It is the work of Kallie Schmidt, a culinary-trained Washington County farm girl who came…
Earlywine, Texas, nestled in the rolling Blackland Prairies of Washington County, began as a small agricultural community. Its fertile, dark soils, ideal for cotton cultivation, drew settlers in the 19th century. Like…
The rolling Blackland Prairies of Washington County belie its monumental history. Here, in the town of Washington-on-the-Brazos, delegates gathered in 1836 to declare Texas's independence from Mexico. This pivotal…