History
Austin County
A part of the grant to Stephen F. Austin in 1821, created a municipality under the Mexican government in 1828, became a county of the Republic of Texas, March 17, 1836. Named in honor of Stephen Fuller Austin, 1793-1836, pioneer empresario, founder of Anglo-American Texas. San Felipe de Austin, capital of Austin's colony, 1824-1836, seat of provisional government of Texas, 1835-1836.
History
Austin County Jail
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.
History
Bellville
Brothers Thomas and James Bell came to this area from Florida in 1822 with Stephen F. Austin's colony and acquired about 2,000 acres of land in 1837. Thomas Bell offered a portion of his land at this site for a new townsite to replace San Felipe as the county seat; his offer was accepted by voters in 1846.
History
Bellville Concordia
(Name adopted in 1938) Singing society organized in home of Fritz Schlecht, at Piney (3.5 mi. E), 1860. Members: Fritz Brandes, Heinrich and Gustav Koch, Joseph and Theo Menke, Herman Mueller, Fritz Schultz. Emil Koch, director. Hall (built 1877), wrecked by 1900 storm, was moved here, rebuilt same year. Land given by Henry Strauss. (1968)
History
Bellville General Hospital
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.
History
Bellville High School
Bellville's 1918 two-story brick schoolhouse served all grades, but by the 1930s had overcrowding and structural problems. An initial application for funds from the Public Works Administration (PWA), a federal New Deal program, was denied in 1936. After H.F.
History
Bellville Turnverein Pavilion
In the 19th century two organizations, the Bellville Social Club and the Bellville Turnverein Gut Heil, sponsored community-wide social activities. The Social Club purchased this property from Herman Miller in 1883 and planned construction of a pavilion. The Bellville Turnverein, founded in 1885, built an opera house in 1889 which became the center of the town's social activity.
History
Charles Fordtran
(May 7, 1801-Nov. 1, 1900) In Jan. 1831 Charles Fordtran, a German of Huguenot descent, joined the colony of Stephen F. Austin. His first work was to survey land for Austin's partner, Samuel May Williams. He was given a league (4,428.4 acres) as his fee. Soon he brought in two families of settlers who worked for him for a time, then obtained their own land in present Fayette county.
History
Citizens State Bank
Sealy developed on the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe railway in 1879. Cotton, rice, corn, cattle and related agricultural businesses supported a quickly-growing economy. In 1907, F. W. Hackbarth, Jr. and his son, John Hackbarth, developed commercial buildings along Main Street, and on May 20, 1907, Citizens State Bank formed and occupied the southwest corner of the John Hackbarth building. R. A.
History
Concord Cemetery
Founded by the Concord Christian church in 1870, Concord Cemetery (also known as the Concord Church Cemetery) sits on 3.4 acres of land in northern Austin County and is part of the Concord Christian Church. The earliest known grave is that of Dr. Buell Eastman (1807-1870), a confederate veteran and early Austin County resident, who died on December 2, 1870.
History
Cumings Family Vault
Rebecca Cumings and her three brothers, James, John, and William, migrated to Texas from Virginia in 1821. As members of Stephen F. Austin's "Old 300" colony, they were given 20,000 acres here in return for the construction and operation of a mill on a nearby creek. Two years after the 1885 deaths of William's son and grandson, Samuel Cumings and Samuel, Jr.
History
David Shelby
Came to Texas in 1822 with Austin's first colony. Born in Pennsylvania April 19, 1799. Died March 1, 1872. Erected by the State of Texas 1936
History
Dr. James West Bostick
(ca. 1840-February 22, 1897) James West Bostick, born in a log cabin near Cat Spring, Austin County, Texas, was the son of J.H. Bostick, Alabama native and one of Stephen F. Austin's "Old 300" settlers. James Bostick served in the Confederate army for 4 years and later became a doctor. He married Rebecca Taylor, daughter of a prominent East Texas family.
Architecture
E. O. Finn Building
Situated on land originally granted by the Mexican government to Austin County pioneer John Nichols, this vernacular Italianate commercial building was constructed in 1896 by E. Oscar Finn and John Thomas Colleton. E.O. Finn (1866-1945), a native of Germany, first came to this country with his parents in 1869.
History
Early Roads to San Felipe
During the mid-1820s, when Stephen F. Austin was founding this town, the only roads in the area were wagon ruts of beaten trails marked by notched trees. Within a decade, however, the village of San Felipe, one of the first Anglo settlements in Texas, had become a hub from which 8 or more roads projected.
History
Education in Industry
Education in Industry German settlers established the town of Industry in 1831. Shortly after they arrived in December 1840, the Rev. Louis C. Ervendberg and Dr. Joseph Anton Fischer founded the town's first school. Fischer is recognized as the first teacher in Industry, and Ervendberg is credited as being tutor to the children of town founder Frederick Ernst.
History
Elemelech Swearingen
(September 25, 1805 - May 15, 1887) Austin County pioneer and Texas War for Independence veteran, Elemelech Swearingen, was born in Shepherdsville, Kentucky (Bullitt Co.) in 1805. He married Angelina Weeks (1811-1883) in 1827 and in 1831, moved with his family to Texas. The Swearingens became the last additions to Stephen F. Austin's Old 300 when another family withdrew their application.
History
First Czech Immigrants in Texas
People from Czechy began to come to America for liberty as early as 1633. First known Czech in Texas was Jiri Rybar (George Fisher), customs officer in Galveston in 1829. Others arrived individually for years before letters sent home by the Rev. Josef Arnost Bergman, an 1849 Czech settler at Cat Spring (9 mi. S), inspired immigrations in large numbers.
History
Fisches Park
Fisches Park is part of the original land granted to Frederich Ernst, known as 'the Father of German immigration to Texas.' Industry is the oldest permanent German settlement in Texas and was settled by J.F. Fisches, who came to Texas from Wuerttemberg, Germany. The Fisches and Ernst families were joined through marriage and J.F. Fisches bought a piece of Ernst's land grant to farm in 1866.
History
Friedrich Ernst
Christian Friedrich Ernst (Dirks) was born in Germany in 1796. Friedrich Ernst was inducted into the German army in 1814 and served for five years. He married Louise Gesine Auguste Weber in 1819. They became the parents of Caroline, John Friedrich, Ludwig, Wilhelmine, and Hermann Ernst. In 1829 the family sailed to the United States and settled in New York.
History
Frydek Catholic Cemetery
Czech immigrants began settling in this area in the 1850s. They named their new community Frydek after a town in their homeland. When two people died in 1885, they were buried here on land owned by Jan Pavlicek. By 1890, when Pavlicek officially deeded the land to be consecrated by the church, there were thirteen graves in the cemetery. In 1907 the citizens erected a school building here.
History
Hackfield Farm
Established in the 1850s by German immigrant Friedrich C. Hackfeld (1819-1895) and his wife Elizabeth (d. 1895), the Hackfield Farm evolved through several generations to include structures and landscaping features typical of a late 19th/early 20th century German-Texan farmstead. Friedrich, whose last name was changed to Hackfield when he became a U.S.
Architecture
Harigel House, The
The son of a Prussian immigrant, Emil H. Harigel, Sr. (1859-1904) opened a hardware, tinware, and stove emporium in Bellville in 1881. Soon after, he constructed this residence for his wife, Nannie Louise (Lovette), and children. The home features a Mansard roof and influences of the Gothic revival and Second Empire styles of architecture.
Industry & Science
Haynes Mattress Factory
Daniel Haynes (1828-1913) came to the new railroad town of Sealy in 1881. In 1885 he invented a process and a machine to manufacture a felted cotton, non-tufted mattress. Trademarked under the Haynes name, the mattresses were sold throughout the country and soon became associated with the name Sealy. In 1906 Haynes sold his patents to another company, which adopted the name Sealy.
Architecture
Haynes-Felcman House
This house was built in 1901-1902 for H. Schumacher. It was purchased in 1906 by Richard H. Haynes (1875-1942) who, with his father, founded the Haynes (Sealy) Mattress Company in 1909. Local confectionery store owner F. J. Felcman bought the property in 1927 and added on to the rear in 1929. It remained in his family until 1995.
Elsewhere in Texas
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