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In early 1822 Stephen F Austin brought the first group of new immigrants from the United States to the Spanish Territory known as Texas. They settled mostly in the area between the Brazos and the Colorado Rivers (About halfway between Houston and Austin.) That small beginning was to become the heart of the new Republic of Texas. They were followed in later years by groups of immigrants from Germany, Poland, France and the Slovak countries who settled in close knit communities and kept their separate cultures and languages alive for many decades, some parts even to this day.
Almost all of these small towns still maintain some of the old countries in the local languages or accents, local cafes, taverns, antique stores, craft shops, local products and even in their local weekly newspapers.
Spend a day or a weekend or even a few weekends and explore these treasuries of the varied life in Texas.
The main attractions are the Lilypons Water Gardens and the Waller County Historical Muesum.
Starts at the Visitor Information Center located on the ground floor of the Stafford Opera House
Eagle Lake was founded in 1851. Today it is called "The Goose Hunting Capital of the World". It also has an Attwater Prairie Chicken Wildlife Refuge. Visit the Prairie Edge Museum.
The town of Katy was first known as Cane Island. The first railroad was the Texas Western RR
extending from Elgin Street at South Main Street in Houston to Pattison. It was demolished soon
after the Missouri-Kansas and the Texas RR was completed in 1895. The first rice crop was cultivated northwest of Katy in 1901. By 1935 the discovery well of the Katy gas field was drilled.
1886 Stafford Opera House, 425 Spring. Texas' largest flat floor opera house still in existence. Restoration began in late 1970's; finished 1990 to magnificent grand hall you see today.
SW corner of Courthouse Square. The Museum originally housed the city's fire department. The water tower was constructed with 400,000 bricks in 1883.
Colorado County Courthouse was built in 1891 in the Second Empire style of brick made from local clay. It features a magnificent stained glass dome in the District Court room .
1014 Milam. Housed in the Brunson Building, the Center hosts national and international exhibits as well as art instruction for all ages ...
616 Walnut. Built prior to the Civil War. In 1880's, the Senftenbergs remodeled it to present ornate Victorian appearance. It now serves as a museum depicting small town life a century ago .
1224 Bowie. This square notch log cabin built in 1836, following the Runaway Scrape, was home to Abram and Nancy Alley. The cabin was moved in 1976 from its original site at Atascosita Trail Crossing below Columbus on the Colorado River. It is fully furnished with Early Texas antiques .
602 Washington, a unique "tabby" construction house, fully furnished, featuring a walnut plantation desk owned by her father, Dr. Pleasant Rose. It was home to Dilue Rose Harris, whose memoirs offer a glimpse of life as a child in colonial Texas .
Mary Elizabeth Hopkins Santa Claus Museum, 604 Washington. Visitors of all ages are delighted by this wonderful Christmas Collection in memory of Mary Elizabeth, whose first Santa was purchased for her in 1913. Over 2,000 Santas in all fill the festively decorated museum
529 Washington. View the wonderful collection of dolls and children's toys given by Miss Lee Nesbitt; informative Texas History and Genealogical Archives.K. Nesbitt Memorial Library
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Chamber of Commerce
(409) 234-2780 Return To Top
Fayetteville's beginings started stiring in the early 1820's when some of Austin's colony setteled in the area. By 1847 the town had been mapped and had long been a stop on the stage line on the old San Felipe Trail to Austin. During the 1850's a large number of German and Czech immigrants settled in the area. Their presence is still evident in the community today. Fayetteville Chamber of Commerce
(409) 378-2222 Return To Top
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Frelsburg (Frelsburgh) was founded around 1837 by Capt. William Frels and his brother John, who immigrated to Texas from Germany in 1834. It located at the intersection of Farm roads 109 and 1291 in the northern corner of Colorado County. The original settlers were Germans from the area around Holstein and Oldenburg followed by immigrants from the Rhineland.
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Giddings was settled about 1871 when the H&TC Railroad was being built. It was settled mostly by Wendish immigrants who moved to the railroad from the community of Serbin 6 miles south.Giddings Area Chamber of Commerce
(409) 885-0000
See the octagonal 1899 courthouse of Lee County.
Visit the Lee County Museum in the over 100 year old home of Dr. York.
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Hallettsville Chamber of Commerce
(409) 885-0000
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Hempstead, Texas is currently the county seat of Walter County. This small town was established in 1856 as a railroad town when the Hempstead Town Company offered lots and blocks to the city of Houston and the Texas Central Railroad as an inducement for a major line to run through this town.
Hempstead Chamber of Commerce
(409) Return To Top
Nancy Shoup
(409) 836-0458
My great great great grandpa, Riggs Pennington, bought his first land in Texas from John P. Coles in 1837 after moving here from Indiana.
Independence was the original home of Baylor University. Some of the ruins are still standing.
It was the last home and burial place of Mrs. Sam Houston
Visit the old stone Independence Baptist Church across the street.
The Texas Baptist Historical Center with it's museum next door houses pre-civil war artifacts and church and family records. Return To Top
(409) 836-0458
Industry was founded on Johann Friedrich Ernst's league of land granted by the Mexican government on April 16, 1831. It was the first permanent German settlement in Texas. It is located on State Highway 159 in northwest Austin County,
The early German residents were described as very industrious, established a cigar industry from which the town was said to gotten it's name. The area was settled by Germans, Czechs, and African Americans.
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La Grange Chamber of Commerce
1-800-524-7264
La Grange was first populated by Austin's Colonists of the Old Three Hundred. The streets had been laid out several years before the organization of Fayette County in 1837. The Old 300 were followed by German immigrant in the 1840 and Czech and Moravians in the 1850's. Their culture still shows in the current population.
LaGrange is unique with it's beautiful old live oak trees in commercial and home landscapes as well as in the streets of La Grange. LaGrange is on the Spring Bluebonnet Trail, the Fall Foliage Trail, the Texas Pioneer and La Bahia Trail, the National Bicycle Trails Network, the MS 150 Annual Bike Tour, Antiques/Collectibles and Bed/Breakfast & Cottage
Overlook of Colorado River and La Grange and of Kreische Brewery Ruins and view of 1950's Kreische House from self-guided Interpretive Trail. Picnic and Playground Area, Nature Trail. Guided Brewery and House tours on Saturdays and Sundays. Group tours by appointment on weekdays from 8-5. Call 409-968-5658. Return To Top
Ledbetter, located on US 290 25 miles west of Brenham, was founded in 1870. Stuermer General Store
In Ledbetter
Visit Stuermer's General Store and Working Museum at US 290 and FM 1291. One of the 2 bars in the store is dated 1836.
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New Ulm, originally known as Duff's Settlement, was established on land purchased in 1841. It is located at the intersection of Farm roads 109 and 1094, in extreme western Austin County. It was settled by Germans from W�rtemberg province.
New Ulm Enterprise
(409) 992-3351 Return To Top
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Prairie View is located halfway between Waller and Hempstead on the north side of business US 290. The town is named for Prairie View A&M. The site was originally the plantation called Alta Vista built by Col. Jack Kirby. After his death, his wife tried to run a girls school for awhile, but deeded the property to the state in1876. The legislature established a college for Negro youths on the site. Prairie View is the English translation of the Spanish Alta Vista.
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Round Top, originally called Townsend, was settled in 1831. It is located between La Grange and Brenham in Fayette County Round Top Chamber of Commerce
(409)249-4042
The smallest incorporated community in Texas. Alwin H. Soergel, built a white house with an octagonal tower in the 1840's. The odd-shaped tower gave rise to the name Round Top.
Round Top has become an internationally recognized cultural center for the arts and education through the programs of the International Festival�Institute, founded in 1971. The 1,200�seat concert hall at Festival Hill is the permanent home of the Texas Festival Orchestra.
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San Felipe de Austin (known as San Felipe) was founded in 1824 by Stephen F. Austin as the unofficial capital of his colony. It is located 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.
. 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. Borden, the inventor of evaporated milk, was also a popular surveyor who surveyed part of Houston.
After the fall of the Alamo, Gen. Sam Houston's army retreated through San Felipe. And burned it to the ground to keep it from falling into the hands of the advancing Mexican army. The terrified residents quickly gathered what they could carry and fled eastward in what was called the Runaway Scrape.
San Felipe became county seat of the newly established Austin County in 1837. Although a courthouse was constructed, the town never regained its former size or importance.
Most of the original townsite now lies within the 4,200-acre Stephen F. Austin State Historical Park, which was dedicated in 1928 and donated to the state by the town of San Felipe in 1940. The park features an obelisk and a bronze statue commemorating the achievements of Stephen F. Austin, a replica of Austin's log house, and a monument on the site of the town hall, where the conventions of 1832 and 1833 and the Consultation of 1835 were held. The Farm Road 1458 bridge, constructed in the late 1940s, spans the Brazos near the site of the original ferry.
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Sealy begin forming in the early 1820's. It is located on State Highway 36 and Interstate 10 four miles southwest of San Felipe in southeastern Austin County.Greater Sealy Area Chamber of Commerce
311 Fowlkes St.
(409 885-3222)
Sealy is well known in Texas because of the Sealy Mattress Factory and the Engleking Brothers Broom Factory.
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Shelby was settled in the early 1840s and was named for David Shelby, reportedly the first settler in the area. It is located at the junction of Farm roads 389 and 1457. It is 24 miles northwest of Bellville in extreme northwestern Austin County. Most of the early residents were from Germany.
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Smithville, was established in 1827. It is located just off State Highway 71 about ten miles southeast of Bastrop in southeastern Bastrop County.Smithville Chamber of Commerce
(512) 237-2313
In 1894 the Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad established its central shops in Smithville which quickly doubled the population.
It is the site of an annual three-day festival, the Smithville Jamboree.
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Schulenburg was founded in 1873. It is Located at the intersection of Interstate 10 and U.S. Highway 77, and Farm Road 1579. The area was settled by German, Austrian, and Czech settlers in the mid-nineteenth century.City of Schulenburg
Chamber of Commerce
(409) 743-4514 Fax (409) 743-4839
Schulenburg has a rich musical heritage and has had several orchestras and the Gold Chain Bohemian Band.
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Waller was established in 1884. It is located on U.S. Highway 290 forty miles northeast of Houston in eastern Waller and northwestern Harris counties. It was named for Edwin Waller.
The South Texas Baptist College was established in 1898 in Waller by the South Texas Baptist Conference. The Galveston hurricane of 1900 badly damaged many buildings, including the college, which was closed and never rebuilt
"God's Mercy Store," a unique general store, began operation about 1918. Goods were marked at cost, and customers paid cost plus whatever profit percentage they felt was appropriate. Owner A. D. Purvis claimed that the store was established "by the spirit of Christ which is Love, Mercy, and Self denial." The store showed a tidy profit and was still operating in the 1930s.
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Wallis was established about 1875. It is located ten miles southeast of Sealy in extreme southeastern Austin County.
A number of Czech immigrants took up residence in the area in the late nineteenth century.
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Serbin, originally called Low Pin Oak Settlement was founded in 1885. In 1860 the name was changed to Serbin (Wendish Land). It is located on Farm Road 2239 seven miles southwest of Giddings in southwestern Lee County. Warda Store at Warda
Hwy. 77S
Between La Grange and Giddings
It was settled by a group of more than 500 Wends who had immigrated from Lusatia to Texas in 1854, forming the mother colony of Wends in Texas
The Texas Wendish Heritage Society founded the Texas Wendish Heritage Museum in the old 1915 parochial school building. It is now a complex of several buildings, including a log home built in 1865 by an original settler. The museum research library and archives preserve, interpret, and make available for study the history of the Wends. Visitors may tour the museum, cemetery, and the church built in 1871.
Serbin Homecoming is held on Memorial weekend, and a Wendish Fest is held in the fall by the museum
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Warrenton was founded about 1847. It is located on State Highway 237 twelve miles northeast of La Grange in northeastern Fayette County. Warrenton Inn
(409) 249-3074
This area of Fayette County was heavily settled by German colonists who, with an admixture of Anglos, formed numerous small farming communities in the area. Return To Top
Visit the Washington On The Brazos Historical Park which contains "Barrington" the restored home of Anson Jones, the fourth and last president of the republic. It also contains a reconstructed Independence Hall, where the Texas Declaration of Independence was signed.
The Star of the Republic Museum in the park is an excellent place to see Texas history first hand.
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Wesley was settled in 1859. It is located at the intersection of Farm roads 2502 and 332, eight miles southwest of Brenham in southwestern Washington County.
The Wesley Brethren Church has been restored and is on the National Register of Historic Places.
It was the site of the first Czech school in Texas in the Czech settlement of Veseli near the Austin County border. Veseli, meaning joyous, was later anglicized to Wesley.
Wesley was the site of a Czech Brethren state convention in 1893.
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Weimar was founded in 1873. It is located on U.S. Highway 90 and Interstate Highway 10, eighty-seven miles west of Houston in western Colorado County. The town was named after Weimar, Germany. Weimar is known as a center of trade for pecans, poultry, and dairy products
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Winedale began around 1870 as a German settlement named Truebsal, It is located in far northeastern Fayette County four miles northeast of Round Top. After local farmers began cultivating grapes, a post office was granted with the name Winedale.
By the twentieth century the town had ceased to exist. It is now known because of the Winedale Historical Center
Winedale is well known by most Houstonions as the weekend home of the popular Houston Chronicle (Formally with the Houston Post) newspaper columnist, Leon Hale.
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