Decatur, Texas

Everything Decatur is known for

1 song mention this city 3 artists from here

Music in Decatur

Songs About Decatur

Decatur, or, Round of Applause for Your Stepmother!
Sufjan Stevens
5%
"She took us down to the edge of Decatur"

Artists From Decatur

J
Jarrod Morris
country Pop: 38
C
Cory Michael
country Pop: 14
L
Lawson Harris
country Pop: 12

Rivers & Roads in Song near Decatur

Songs written about the waterways and highways that run near Decatur.

Texas State Highway 199 8 songs Interstate 35 27 songs Interstate 20 10 songs Red River 50 songs Brazos River 16 songs

History of Decatur

Vesey, Randolph

1861

(1832-1908) Respected Negro citizen and homeowner. Champion pioneer fiddler, popular at Forts Belknap, Griffin and Richardson and over county. Once when he was an Indian captive, held in Kansas, Texans sent ponies to ransom him. He is buried in Oaklawn, Decatur. Born in Georgia. He served during the Civil War as body servant and voluntary battle aide to General W. L. Cabell of the Confederate army. Vesey's courage and loyalty were typical. Hundreds of slaves went to war with masters. Many operated farms and ranches of soldiers away at war, producing cotton and food for the Confederacy. Others did work for hire, with wages supporting the master's family. On patrol duty they protected homes from Indians, bandits, outlaws. During War years, 1861-1865, some 30,000 to 50,000 Negros - free and slaves - aided Confederate armies. They served with the Nitre and Mining Bureau and departments of medicine, engineers, quartermaster general, ordnance and commissary general. They built fortifications on coasts from Brownsville, Texas, to Norfolk, Virginia, and at inland points. Many were army teamsters, wheelwrights, blacksmiths, butchers, shoemakers, cooks, and nurses. Texas and other states later provided land grants and pensions for many. (1965)

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Colonel Absalom Bishop

1852

COLONEL ABSALOM BISHOP ABSALOM BISHOP (1804-1883) BEGAN HIS MILITARY SERVICE AS A CAPTAIN OF MILITIA IN THE SEMINOLE WAR IN FLORIDA. HE LATER ATTAINED THE RANK OF COLONEL. BISHOP LIVED IN SEVERAL STATES BEFORE ARRIVING IN HOPKINS COUNTY, TEXAS, IN 1852, AND THEN IN WHAT WOULD BECOME WISE COUNTY IN 1855. ONE YEAR AFTER HIS ARRIVAL, HE WAS SUCCESSFUL IN CONVINCING THE TEXAS LEGISLATURE TO CREATE WISE COUNTY OUT OF COOKE COUNTY. BISHOP WAS ONE OF THE FIRST SETTLERS TO ACQUIRE LAND AT THE TOWNSITE HE HELPED CONVINCE VOTERS TO SELECT AS COUNTY SEAT. HE ORIGINALLY WANTED THE TOWN TO BE CALLED TAYLORSVILLE AFTER GENERAL AND PRESIDENT ZACHARY TAYLOR. HOWEVER, WHEN TAYLOR SWITCHED TO THE WHIG PARTY, BISHOP, A PASSIONATE DEMOCRAT, PERSUADED THE LEGISLATURE TO NAME THE TOWN DECATUR IN HONOR OF U.S. NAVAL HERO STEPHEN DECATUR. BISHOP BUILT A MERCANTILE STORE WHICH WOULD EVENTUALLY BE USED AS A TEMPORARY POST OFFICE AND STAGE STOP ON THE BUTTERFIELD OVERLAND STAGE LINE. THE COLONEL ALONG WITH OTHER WISE COUNTY RESIDENTS CONVINCED THE BUTTERFIELD OVERLAND STAGE LINE OWNERS TO RELOCATE THEIR ROUTE TO RUN THROUGH DECATUR AND ON TO BRIDGEPORT. IN ORDER TO DO SO, THEY OVERSAW THE BUILDING OF BRIDGES OVER DENTON CREEK, SANDY CREEK AND THE WEST FORK OF THE TRINITY RIVER. BY DOING SO, COMMERCE INCREASED AND STAGE TRAVEL FROM DECATUR TO AUSTIN ALSO BECAME A REALITY. COLONEL ABSALOM BISHOP PASSED AWAY ON NOVEMBER 30, 1883, AND WAS BURIED ALONGSIDE HIS WIFE IN OAKLAWN CEMETERY. BISHOP, CALLED “THE FATHER OF WISE COUNTY AND DECATUR,” WAS A COLORFUL FIGURE WHO BROUGHT TO TEXAS A BROAD RANGE OF EXPERIENCE THAT ALLOWED HIM TO HELP MOLD A RAW AND WILD LAND INTO A BUSTLING TOWN AND NEW COUNTY. (2014)

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Bishop, Absalom

1855

Absalom Bishop, town founder and Texas legislator, was born on May 4, 1804, in Pendleton District, South Carolina. As a young man he married Mary Tippen, also of Pendleton District; they had six children before her death in 1879. Following his marriage Bishop moved to Spring Place in Murray County, Georgia, and became active in local business and politics following the Cherokee land lottery. Absalom Bishop along with his brother William was a member of the Georgia Guard and was involved in both the Seminole Wars in Georgia and the forced removal of the Cherokee Indians . In 1835 Absalom Bishop was with the contingent of troops that captured and detained "Home, Sweet Home"- songwriter John Howard Payne, who had been traveling with Cherokee chief Joseph Vann. Bishop was later mentioned in Payne's memoirs. William Bishop evicted Vann from his Georgia home and gave the house to Absalom, who was forced to vacate it in favor of the Georgian who won the house in the Cherokee land lottery. During his service in the Seminole Wars and with the Georgia Guard during Indian removal Absalom Bishop acquired the rank of colonel, a title he would carry throughout his life. While in Georgia Absalom Bishop became a notable pro-slavery agitator and was an acquaintance of Sen. Robert Toombs. Inspired by the issue, Bishop may have become too extreme for Georgia politics; his biographer notes that Bishop's activities "became so radical as to necessitate his removal from Georgia," and Absalom Bishop never returned to the state. Bishop traveled north, working for a time in Washington, D.C., on behalf of Georgia land claimants, and later as a goldsmith in New York City, apparently known for his gold pens. In 1849 in Rochester, New York, Bishop and his partner, Thayer Codding, are credited by some sources with the invention of the fountain pen. In 1852 Absalom Bishop came to Texas, settling in Hopkins County and operating a sawmill there. In 1855 he became one of the first settlers in Wise County, settling on Sweetwater Creek about four miles east of what would become the county seat, Decatur. Bishop quickly became an important force in local politics. The first elections in Wise County were held in May 1856, and Bishop's choices were elected to several posts, while Bishop himself claimed the title of county clerk. In 1857 he was elected to the Texas Legislature as the representative for Wise, Denton, Collin, Cook, and Montague counties. Bishop was a powerful force behind the organization of the county and chose both the name of the county and the hilltop site of the town which would become the county seat. The town, originally named Taylorsville for Zachary Taylor, was renamed when Bishop decided that Taylor's Whig politics made him an inappropriate namesake, and introduced a bill to have the name changed to Decatur, for Stephen Decatur of the Revolutionary Navy. Bishop also played a large role in planning the town's layout, which he decided should resemble the town of McKinney in Collin County, a place Bishop had visited and admired. As the Civil War loomed, Bishop became a fiery advocate for secession , speaking before the county secession convention and inspiring Wise County's high enlistment rates. An outspoken advocate and supplier of the Confederacy, Bishop's political career was ended by the surrender in 1865. Bishop lived out his life in Wise County and died on November 30, 1883. Col. Absalom Bishop is buried in Oaklawn Cemetery under the epitaph, "Father of Decatur and Wise County."

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Waggoner, Daniel

1854

Daniel Waggoner, rancher, son of Solomon and Elizabeth (McGaugh) Waggoner, was born in Lincoln County, Tennessee, on July 7, 1828. He moved with his family to Blackjack Grove (now Cumby) in Hopkins County, Texas, about 1848. His father, a successful farmer and cattleman who traded in horses and slaves, died in 1849. Shortly thereafter Daniel married Nancy Moore, daughter of William Moore of Hopkins County. Their only child, William Thomas Waggoner , was born on August 31, 1852. Nancy died the following year. In 1854 Daniel purchased a herd of longhorn cattle and together with his son, mother, brothers, sisters, and a fifteen-year-old slave boy, moved to a small farm of 160 acres located on Catlett Creek in Cooke County (now in Wise County). During the 1850s and 1860s western Wise County was a frontier area frequented by hostile Indians and marauding cattle thieves. In 1856 Waggoner purchased 320 additional acres close to Cactus Hill, eighteen miles west of Decatur. His family lived near Decatur until 1859, when Daniel married Scylly (or Sicily) Ann Halsell, the sixteen-year-old daughter of Electious and Elizabeth J. Halsell. Daniel then moved his family into his log house at Cactus Hill, where they lived until after the Civil War . Waggoner was a member of the local militia and often chased after raiding Indians while Sicily and W. T. concealed themselves in the cornfield. In order to protect his family Waggoner relocated seven miles east of Decatur on Denton Creek. In 1883 he built a $50,000 Victorian mansion, El Castile, on a rocky hill overlooking Decatur. Daniel Waggoner carefully trained his son to handle stock and supervise the ranch. By 1870 they were partners operating under the title of D. Waggoner and Son. That spring a successful cattle drive to Kansas netted a profit of $55,000 and provided the financial impetus for the Waggoner empire. During the next thirty years D. Waggoner and Son heavily invested in land and cattle in Wise, Wilbarger, Foard, Wichita, Baylor, Archer, and Knox counties. Their single D brand was changed to the triple reversed D, which became the Waggoner trademark. Eventually the longhorn cattle were phased out and replaced by Hereford and Durham stock which increased the weight and value of the herds. Although he had no formal education, Waggoner was a shrewd businessman whose investments included not only land and livestock, but also five banks, three cottonseed oil mills, and a coal company. As the Waggoner holdings increased, W. T. moved the ranch headquarters to the Zacaweista Ranch south of the Red River near Vernon; Daniel, however, remained in Decatur. When he died of kidney disease in Colorado Springs, Colorado, on September 5, 1902, Daniel Waggoner owned approximately 80,000 cattle, 525,000 acres of land, and leases on more than 100,000 acres in Indian Territory. The 500,000-acre Waggoner Ranch , administered by Daniel's great-great-grandchildren in 1986, was the largest family-owned block of land in Texas.

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Butterfield Overland Stage Line

1858

Through Decatur passed the Butterfield Overland mail line connecting St. Louis and San Francisco with semi-weekly stage and mail service, 1858-1861. The length of the route, 2,795 miles and the superior service maintained made this a pioneer enterprise of the first magnitude.

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Mitchell Energy and Development Corporation

1952

Mitchell Energy and Development Corporation, with headquarters at the Metro Center in the planned community of the Woodlands just north of Houston in the 1990s, was a major independent producer of natural gas, natural-gas liquids, and oil. In the early 1990s the company was involved in gas transmission and oil and gas exploration and production. It was also involved in real estate development in the Houston-Galveston area. At that time the firm had assets of more than $2 billion, including roughly 1.7 million acres of mineral leases and 60,000 acres of real estate. It owned fifty-seven gas-processing plants and a network of 5,000 miles of intrastate pipeline. By the end of fiscal year 1993 the corporation annually produced 58 billion cubic feet of natural-gas and more than 19 million barrels of natural-gas liquids, crude oil, and other products from holdings variously in North Texas, Limestone County in East Texas, and southeastern New Mexico. In the 1990s, Mitchell began construction of an underground salt-dome natural-gas storage facility in East Texas and developed a plant to produce MTBE, an environmentally cleaner gasoline additive mandated by the 1990 Clean Air Act. The company's 2,800 workers enjoyed a stock purchase and savings plan, health and retirement benefits, and a company Wellness Center at headquarters. Mitchell Energy and Development grew out of Roxoil Drilling, an enterprise incorporated and renamed Oil Drilling in 1946. Among its stockholders was George Phydias Mitchell , the son of a Greek goatherd named Savas Paraskivoupolis, who, to simplify his name, renamed himself Mike Mitchell, after his paymaster when he worked for the railroad. In 1905 Paraskivoupolis settled in Galveston, where his son George was born in 1919. George Mitchell grew up in the immigrant neighborhood of Galveston known as the League of Nations, living in the building that housed his father's dry-cleaning shop. He attended Texas A&M, where he operated a laundry concession and sold stationery to pay his way through. He graduated in 1940 with a degree in petroleum engineering and geology. After working briefly for Amoco and serving with the United States Army Corps of Engineers in World War II , Mitchell entered a newly-formed wildcatting partnership called Christie, Mitchell, and Mitchell with his brother, Johnny, and H. Merlyn Christie. This firm bought out other Oil Drilling shareholders, while Johnny Mitchell and H. Merlyn Christie attracted important investors, including oilman Robert Everett (Bob) Smith , Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton, members of the Oshman and Weingarten merchant families, and Galveston gambling magnate Sam Maceo. In 1952 the partners drilled their first well in North Texas, in an area known as the "Wildcatters' Graveyard," and made one of the biggest gas strikes in industry history in Wise County near Fort Worth with the discovery of the rich gas resources of the Boonsville field. In 1953 the Christie, Mitchell and Mitchell Company, a subsidiary of Oil Drilling, was formed and began acquiring leases and drilling in North Texas. In 1954 the company arranged to supply natural gas to the Chicago metropolitan area through the Natural Gas Pipeline Company of America. Company headquarters for Oil Drilling were in Houston from 1955 to 1971. In 1957 the firm diversified into gas processing with the construction of its GM&A Gas Products Plant at Bridgeport, Texas. George Mitchell became company president and chief executive officer of Oil Drilling in 1959, and around 1962 H. Merlyn Christie retired from the company, leaving the brothers to split their shares seventy-thirty, with George taking the bigger slice. Known subsequently as Mitchell and Mitchell Oil and Gas Corporation, the enterprise, which by this time employed 225 workers and drilled up to 197 wells a year, consolidated its holdings under the control of George Mitchell. After 1955 the firm began to diversify into real estate. When George Mitchell became presi

Tsha Handbook → · 4.0 mi away

Things to Do in Decatur

quirky 19.9 mi away
Chewbacca's Grave — May the 4th

May the 4th be with you — and with the Wookiee. Peter Mayhew the seven-foot-three British actor who brought Chewbacca to life in every Star Wars film from 1977…
quirky 19.2 mi away
Springtown Dinosaur Tracks

A family went out hunting arrowheads along Walnut Creek in 2017 and found something about 110 million years older than they expected. Pressed into the creekbed…
quirky 19.9 mi away
Chewbacca's Grave

The seven-foot-three British actor who played Chewbacca in every Star Wars film from 1977 to The Force Awakens is buried right here at Azleland Memorial Park.…
quirky 23.5 mi away
The Azle Earthquake Swarm

Starting in November 2013 the ground beneath Azle started shaking and it did not stop for 84 days. Twenty-seven earthquakes rattled windows cracked foundations…
historical 23.6 mi away
WWII Marine Glider Base at Eagle Mountain

In 1942 the United States Marines bought 2931 acres of ranchland on Eagle Mountain Lake for a purpose that sounds almost unbelievable now — training pilots to…
historical 19.3 mi away
Comanche Raids at Springtown

For twenty years the settlers of Springtown slept with one eye open. The Comanche considered this land theirs and they were not subtle about making the point.…
historical 19.4 mi away
Springtown's Civil War Frontier Collapse

When the Civil War called the Texas Rangers east to fight for the Confederacy they left behind an unguarded frontier. The Comanche knew it immediately. They…
historical 19.6 mi away
Parker County and Quanah Parker's Legacy

The county Springtown calls home carries a name tangled up in one of the most dramatic stories in Texas history. Parker County was named for Isaac Parker whose…

Sports in Decatur

🏆 STATE CHAMPIONS Class 4A · Girls Basketball · 2025–2026

Decatur Regal Eagles — UIL 4A Girls Basketball State Champions — 2 titles

Most recent: 2026 4A Division 1

The Decatur High School girls' basketball program, a standout in Class 4A, has brought significant pride to the community with their impressive record. The Lady Eagles have secured two UIL State Championships, claiming the 4A Division 1 title in both 2025 and 2026. These achievements highlight a period of sustained excellence and competitive spirit on the court.

Located in the heart of Wise County, Decatur rallies behind its athletic programs. The success of the girls' basketball team reflects the dedication and hard work fostered within the school and supported by local fans. The back-to-back state titles are a source of considerable hometown honor, showcasing the high level of play Decatur High School has achieved in Texas high school basketball.

State titles
2 (2025–2026)
Most recent
2026
Class
4A
The moment

The 2026 4A Division 1 state championship was a particularly memorable moment for Decatur High School.

Sources: Wikipedia · UIL State Championship Archives · SI High School (ScoreBook Live)
🏆 STATE CHAMPIONS Class 4A · Volleyball · 2018–2025

Decatur Regal Eagles — UIL 4A Volleyball State Champions — 5 titles

Most recent: 2025 4A Division 1

Decatur High School, nestled in the heart of Wise County, boasts a remarkable record in Class 4A volleyball. The Eagles have soared to multiple state championships, demonstrating consistent excellence on the court. Their impressive run includes UIL 4A Division 1 titles in 2025 and 2024, alongside 4A championships in 2021, 2020, and 2018.

The community of Decatur rallies behind its Eagles, creating a vibrant atmosphere for high school sports. The team's success reflects a strong program, bringing pride to the town. While no specific alumni have been noted for professional or major-college careers, the tradition of winning at Decatur High School continues to define its athletic story.

State titles
5 (2018–2025)
Most recent
2025
Class
4A
The moment

The 2025 4A Division 1 state championship marked a significant achievement for Decatur High School volleyball.

Sources: Wikipedia · UIL State Championship Archives · SI High School (ScoreBook Live)

Everything Near Decatur

155 stories, landmarks & places within ~20 miles — the same local lore RoadyGoat plays as you drive through.

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