Standard History of Houston Texas

Benajah Harvey Carroll

• Publisher: Jazzybee Verlag
• Year: 2017
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9783849649197
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: History

The Story of Houston has not proved an easy one to write. A city is in many respects a conglomeration of units rather than an aggregate of unities. the units are of character so varying that it is hard to reduce them to a common denominator. Municipal consciousness is vague and much that happens in the development of a city seems to be fortuitous rather than teleological. Yet Houston has in many respects grown to formula and plan and has often responded heartily to conscious effort made at improvement of conditions. The foundations of the past have been used and effort has been often cumulative in results. Undeniably there is a municipal spirit, an esprit du corps of the citizens that argues well for the future of the town. This book is breathing the history of Houston in 28 stunning and detailed chapters.

CHAPTER I - Settlement and Pioneer Life

HOUSTON, a Monument to Real Estate Promoters' Art. First Built on Paper and Advertised all over America. Prohibitive Prices of Land at Harrisburg Caused Choice of Houston's Site. Foresight of A. C. and J. K. Allen. The First Steamer up the Bayou. City Mapped and Plotted. Rivalry with Harrisburg. Founding of Harrisburg. Geological Formation of Harris County. Early Social Conditions. Fights and Murders. Civil Officers, Laws and Justice. Building Court House and Jail. First Court Trials, First Wedding, First Divorce. City's Mayors under the Republic. Much Litigation and Many Land Frauds.

Houston is a splendid monument to the success of the real estate promoter's art. Other cities have prospered Topsy wise. They just grew. A lucky place at a cross roads, a river bend or a mountain pass where they might catch the drift from the tides of travel and by the simple process of accretion or the fortuitous concourse of human atoms a city came into being. Not so Houston. Its site was selected by promoters, it was mapped and planned ere ever a house was built, its advantages were touted in the national press and it has performed the singular feat of growing largely according to the plans and specifications originally laid out for its development and has surpassed the most “whopping” predictions as to its growth and prosperity.

All the stage wits and travelling vaudeville artists use Harrisburg as the target for their country village jokes and yet curiously enough it was the prohibitive price of land in Harrisburg that caused Houston to be chosen and built. The promoters recognized the obvious fact that Harrisburg is a better place for a city than Houston and tried to buy there but the owners of the proposed townsite were greedy and hence a site farther up the river was chosen.

By a deed of the date of August 26, 1836, and for a recited consideration of $5,000, two New York speculators, the brothers A. C. and J. K. Allen, purchased of Mrs. T. F. L. Parrott the south half of the lower of the two leagues of land granted to John Austin, near the head of tide water on Buffalo Bayou. It was immediately put on the market as a townsite. The first formal announcement is an advertisement published in the “Columbia Telegraph” of the date of August 30, 1836. It reads:

“The Town of Houston,

“Situated at the head of navigation on the west bank of Buffalo river is now for the first time brought to public notice, because, until now, the properties were not ready to offer to the public, with the advantages of capital and improvements.

“The town of Houston is located at a point on the river which must ever command the trade of the largest and richest portion of Texas. By reference to the map it will be seen that the trade of San Jacinto, Spring Creek, New Kentucky, and the Brazos, above and below Fort Bend, must necessarily come to this place, and will at this time warrant the employment of at least $1,000,000 of capital, and when the rich lands of this country shall be settled, a trade will flow to it, making it, beyond all doubt, the great interior commercial emporium of Texas.

“The town of Houston is distant 15 miles from the Brazos river, 30 miles a little north of east from the San Felipe, 60 miles from Washington, 40 miles from Lake Creek, 30 miles south-west from New Kentucky and 15 miles by water and 8 or 10 by land above Harrisburg.

“Tide water runs to this place and the lowest depth of water is about 6 feet. Vessels from New Orleans to New York can sail without obstacle to this place, and steamboats of the largest class can run down to Galveston Island in 8 or 10 hours in all seasons of the year.

“It is but a few hours sail down the bay, where one may make excursions of pleasure and enjoy the luxuries of fish, fowl, oysters and sea bathing.

“Galveston Harbor, being the only one in which vessels drawing a large draft of water can navigate, must necessarily render the island the great naval and commercial depot of the country.

“The town of Houston must be the place where arms, ammunitions and provisions for the government will be stored, because, situated in the very heart of the country, it combines security and means of easy distribution, and a national armory will no doubt very soon be at this point.

“There is no place in Texas more healthy, having an abundance of excellent spring water, and enjoying the sea breeze in all its freshness.

“No place in Texas possesses so many advantages for building, having fine ash, cedar and oak in inexhaustible quantities, also the tall and beautiful magnolia grows in abundance. In the vicinity are fine quarries of stone.

“Nature appears to have designated this place for the future seat of government. It is handsome and beautifully elevated, salubrious and well watered and now in the very heart or center of population, and will be so for a length of time to come.

“It combines two important advantages—a communication with the coast and foreign countries and with the different portions of the Republic. As the country shall improve, railroads will become in use and will be extended from this point to the Brazos and up the same, and also from this up to the headwaters of San Jacinto, embracing that rich country, and in a few years the whole trade of the upper Brazos will make its way into Galveston Bay through this channel.

“Preparations are now making to erect a water saw mill and a large public house for accommodation will soon be opened. Steamboats now run in this river and will in a short time commence running regularly to the island.

“The proprietors offer the lots for sale on moderate terms to those who desire to improve them, and invite the public to examine for themselves.

Signed A. C. ALLEN, for A. C. & J. K. Allen.

August 30, 1836, 6 m.

“The Commercial Bulletin of New Orleans, Mobile Advertiser, The Globe at Washington, Morning Courier and New York Enquirer, New York Herald and Louisville Public Advertiser are requested to make 3 insertions of this advertisement and forward their bills to this office for payment.”

How familiar it all sounds. Houston boosters ever since then have been consciously or unconsciously plagiarizing that model and brilliantly worded advertisement of the unborn city.

Land in Texas was inexhaustible and cheap, and it is startling only to think of the sheer nerve of the Allen Brothers in buying a large segment of a virgin wilderness on the banks of a brush grown bayou and deliberately starting out to make a great city there and to make it the capital of a new nation and then to advertise it all over a foreign country, for the United States was then a foreign country. Not only did the Allen Brothers start out to work this miracle but they actually accomplished it. Within a year's time this city of paper and tents was the capital of Texas and was entertaining distinguished men from many parts of the world.

Like most promoters, the Allens strained the facts a bit, but the facts could stand the strain. Communication with the coast and foreign countries was not of the best. It took four days to traverse the distance from Harrisburg to Houston by boat and only a bridle path traversed the jungle that intervened between the two points by land.

When the new city was first announced, Dr. Pleasant W. Rose of a neighboring town with a party visited the site of the city. They found “one dug out canoe, a bottle gourd of whiskey, a surveyors chain and compass and a grove inhabited by four men camping in tents.”

Low hanging trees and snags in the bayou made progress slow by water. Francis R. Lubbock, one of the earliest and most prominent citizens, who was later Governor of Texas, “discovered Houston,” in January, 1837. The little steamer on which he came up the bayou required three days to make the trip from Harrisburg, a distance of 12 miles by water. He says: “The slow time was in consequence of the obstructions we were obliged to remove as we progressed. We had to rig what were called Spanish windlasses on the shore, to heave the logs and snags out of our way, the passengers all working faithfully. All hands on board would get out on the shore, and cutting down a tree would make a windlass by boring holes in it and placing it upon a support and throwing a bight of rope around it, secure one end to a tree in the rear, and the other to the snags or fallen trees in the water. Then by means of the capstan bars we would turn the improvised capstan on land and draw from the track of the steamer the obstructions.”

The saddest part of it was that even then the passengers came very near not finding the city. A party of them took the yawl to try and find the landing but missed it and passed on until they stuck in the brush in White Oak Bayou and then backed down until they found wagon wheels and footprints in the mud bank at the waters edge and then saw the stakes driven in the ground that indicated that Houston was there.

This steamer was the “Laura” and was the first to ever reach the wharfless landing.

The Allen Brothers had the germ of faith. It could not move mountains and hence the feature of beautiful elevation in the advertisement was a trifle difficult to find, but it could and did build cities.

The original plan of the city and the map of it contemplated only 62 blocks, all on the south side of Buffalo Bayou. Gail Borden, the man who subsequently discovered or invented condensed milk, and T. H. Borden made the survey and map in 1836. The streets were given the names they now hold except that Austin Street was then Homer Street and LaBranch Street was then Milton Street. Homer Street had its name changed within a short time in honor of Stephen F. Austin and Milton Street in honor of Alcee LaBranch Charge d' Affairs from the United States and the first minister to announce the recognition of Texas among the nations of the world. Epic poets of Greece and England were thus forced to give place to American heroes and statesmen:

Another map, made by Girard, of the Texas Army, is now in the possession of John S. Stewart of Houston.

On the original map, block 31, the present site of the court house, was set aside and marked court house, and block 34, the present market square, was marked Congress Square.

John Allen, who selected the site of Houston immediately following the Battle of San Jacinto, called the street now traversed by the Houston and Texas Central Road, Railroad Street, saying, “This is the street which the great Texas railroad will traverse. His foresight was correct and his prophecy came true, but he died before the first locomotive blew its whistle over the right of way. His death occurred in 1838.

On April 7, 1837, the townsite was enlarged and a new map was drawn, extending one tier of blocks beyond Rusk Street on the south, one tier beyond Crawford Street on the east and one tier beyond Clay Street on the west. The square west of the Rice Hotel square on Main Street was originally designated as Capitol Square but when the Capitol building was erected in 1837 it occupied the site now occupied by the Rice Hotel and soon to be occupied by the new 18-story Rice Hotel.

A little group of settlers, among them the promoters of the town, settled in Houston during the year 1836. They lived in tents. On January 1, 1837, the city was still one of tents although Henry Allen had a small log house and several small houses were in course of erection. Logs were being hauled in from the forest for a hotel on Franklin Street at the corner of Travis, now occupied by the Southern Pacific building, where the old Hutchins House stood for many years. Col. Benjamin Fort Smith built the first hotel. He had been Inspector General at the Battle of San Jacinto. All lumber was them sawed by hand and cost from $150 to $200 per thousand feet. There was a saw mill at Harrisburg but some of the earliest houses were built out of lumber that was shipped from Maine by water.

Most of those who came to the new town stayed, possibly because it was practically impossible to get away. The forests that surrounded Houston on every side were filled with abundance of wild game. Bear, deer, antelope, buffalo, wild turkeys in great flocks, and large herds of wild mustang horses roamed within a few miles. On the opposite side of Buffalo Bayou several tribes of wild Indians were accustomed to camp in the splendid forest, a custom which they kept up for several years after the founding of the town.

The streets were broad paths cleared by the axe, and bottomless with mud in wet weather. There were no sidewalks. The tents and huts clustered on the banks of the steam or a few blocks away. The town was still without a hotel, a court house, a jail or a church in December, 1836. Even the saloons occupied large tents. The battle of San Jacinto had been fought and won, but in Houston as elsewhere the inhabitants were without money, without revenue, without credit and without many of the most ordinary necessities of life. Cane brakes were burnt down and corn planted on the charred ground brought forth good crops. Some of the inhabitants had slaves, and cotton was early planted. Harrisburg was still the metropolis because it had a saw mill and its saloons were housed in wood instead of canvas. By December, 1836, the rivalry between the two places was keen, but Houston was pulling for the honor of being selected as the seat of government and aspired to be the capital of the new nation and the city destined to become a nest of sky-scrapers and the most populous city of Texas was fairly launched. One somehow wishes that its valiant yankee promoters could have seen a vision of even the Houston of today with bird men soaring in aeroplanes around the lofty buildings that serrate the city's skyline and give to it for the first time that beautiful elevation of which the initial advertisement spoke.

Under the Mexican government, a short time before the commencement of the Texas revolution in 1833 there had been created the municipality of Harrisburg as a political subdivision.

This included the entire district of which Harris county is only a part. For a short time the island of Galveston also formed a part of Harrisburg County as the municipality was called under the Republic after the Declaration of Independence in march, 1836, and continued to be called for several years.

When Houston was founded this section was sprinkled with settlers in all directions. A Mr. Knight and Mr. Walter C. White at the time of L...

Table of contents

• PREFACE
• CHAPTER I - Settlement and Pioneer Life
• CHAPTER II - Early Day Amusements
• CHAPTER III - Houston and the Red Men
• CHAPTER IV - Capital Days and Annexation
• CHAPTER V - Early Religious Organizations
• CHAPTER VI - Early Growth and the Bayou
• CHAPTER VII - The City Government
• CHAPTER VIII - The Bench and Bar
• CHAPTER IX - Medical History
• CHAPTER X - Church History
• CHAPTER XI - Education and Free Schools
• CHAPTER XII - The Rice Institute
• CHAPTER XIII - Houston Newspapers
• CHAPTER XIV - Transportation and Communication
• CHAPTER XV - Societies and Clubs
• CHAPTER XVI - Societies and Clubs—Continued
• CHAPTER XVII - Organized Labor
• CHAPTER XVIII - Board of Trade and Banks
• CHAPTER XIX Houston's Manufacturers
• CHAPTER XX Wholesale Trade and Big Business
• CHAPTER XXI Music and Art
• CHAPTER XXII Houston's Public Buildings
• CHAPTER XXIII Architecture and Building
• CHAPTER XXIV Insurance
• CHAPTER XXV Theatres
• CHAPTER XXVI Parks and Cemeteries
• CHAPTER XXVII Old Landmarks
• CHAPTER XXVIII Houston's Growth and Progress