For nearly half a century the biggest thing in Freestone County wasn't in Fairfield at all but a few miles northeast of it: the Big Brown Steam Electric Station, a 1,150-megawatt coal plant whose two units came online in 1971 and 1972. Big Brown ran on lignite, the soft brown coal that lies in thick seams under this part of Texas, strip-mined right next door at the Turlington Mine. To cool the plant, engineers dammed Big Brown Creek in 1969 and backed up the water into Fairfield Lake. The plant became one of the county's largest employers and, less proudly, by 2016 the single biggest source of sulfur-dioxide pollution in the nation. Cheap natural gas and cheaper wind finally undercut it; Big Brown shut down for good on February 12, 2018, and its twin smokestacks were imploded on April 18, 2021, a boom heard for miles. The mined-out land and the lake passed into private hands. It's a clean arc of Texas energy history: lignite built it, lignite ran it, and the market closed it. (Source: Wikipedia; Sierra Club; Freestone County Times.)

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The Temptations' Secret Weapon Was Born in Fairfield RoadyGoat

Some of the most famous guitar on records cut in Detroit started with a kid from Fairfield, Texas. Cornelius Grant was born here on April 27, 1943, and went on to become the longtime guitarist, bandleader, and live musical director for the Temptations, steering the group's stage show from the mid-1960s into the early 1980s. He wasn't just the man counting off the band behind those tuxedoed harmonies. Grant helped shape the actual songs, most famously co-writing the Temptations hit "I Know I'm Losing You" with producer Norman Whitfield and Eddie Holland and laying down its urgent, instantly recognizable opening guitar riff. While the five singers got the spotlight and the matching suits, it was Fairfield's Grant in the wings making the machine run night after night on the road. It's an easy thing to miss when you pass through a quiet East Texas county seat, that one of the architects of the Motown live sound grew up on these same streets before the world ever heard him. (Source: Wikipedia; The HistoryMakers.)

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Fairfield, TX RoadyGoat

Fairfield is a place where the past feels close, maybe because it's always been a crossroads. You can almost hear the rumble of stagecoaches pulling up near the courthouse square, imagining the dust kicked up by those early travelers.

Rock-and-Roll

1926

Texas musicians have profoundly influenced the development and evolution of rock-and-roll and the various branches of its musical tree-rockabilly, blues rock, Tex-Mex, psychedelia, and redneck rock. Some of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's most high-profile inductees, including Buddy Holly , Roy Orbison , and Janis Joplin , pioneered the direction of the musical idiom. The Hall has also honored other musicians, both native Texans and those who made a name in the Lone Star State, as early influences critical to the genre's development. These musicians include T-Bone Walker , Lead Belly , Robert Johnson , Charlie Christian , and Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys. Rock-and-roll's historic roots lie in a fusion of several musical genres that came into prominence in the early decades of the twentieth century. Texans played major roles in pioneering these varied styles, including blues , jazz , and western swing. Blues guitarist Blind Lemon Jefferson from Freestone County, Texas, is credited as the first blues star. His recordings from 1926 to 1929 were the first blues records to be commercially successful and thus introduce what had been an African-American music form to a national audience. In the 1930s, "race labels" recorded many black blues musicians in Texas. Two landmark sessions in San Antonio (1936) and Dallas (1937) captured the only recorded legacy of guitarist Robert Johnson, the itinerant Delta bluesman from Mississippi. Many music historians and guitar aficionados credit these songs, which include his legendary "Cross Road Blues," for laying the fundamental groundwork for rock-and-roll. Another historic blues great, Huddie Ledbetter ("Lead Belly"), traveled to Texas where he played his twelve-string guitar with the likes of Jefferson in Deep Ellum . Field-recording pioneers John and Alan Lomax discovered his guitar prowess while he was incarcerated in the Louisiana State Penitentiary and thus brought his blues to the world. These early players inspired later guitarists like Sam "Lightnin'" Hopkins , Freddie King , and Albert Collins and their Texas blues sound, a highly improvisational style that encouraged a variety of personal playing techniques. The early bluesmen played an important role in the evolution of rock guitar. Legendary groups and players from the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, and Jefferson Airplane, to Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, and Jimmy Page, all credit these blues players as major musical influences. Interestingly, the song "Rock Awhile" recorded in 1949 by a little-known Houston blues and jazz man and his group-Goree Carter and his Hep Cats-has been lauded by some rock historians as a forerunning anthem to the new genre . Texas jazz players also contributed significantly to the development of rock. In 1935 guitarist Eddie Durham of San Marcos was one of the first performers on the electric guitar, and he made the first jazz recording of the amplified instrument. Fellow jazzman Charlie Christian of Dallas further elevated the electric guitar as a lead instrument. Guitarist Aaron "T-Bone" Walker, born in Linden, forged the link to the modern electric guitar in the 1940s and established the instrument as the foremost soloing tool for rhythm-and-blues. In Texas in the 1930s another musical sound, the interesting mix of jazz, hillbilly, boogie, blues, and country that became known as western swing, also influenced the beginnings of rock. Three bands were very representative of the catchy sound that caught on: the Light Crust Doughboys , Milton Brown and His Musical Brownies , and Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys. Both Brown and Wills had originally played in the Light Crust Doughboys before forming their own groups, and radio presented a popular medium to reach a wide listening audience. In the late 1940s and throughout the 1950s the Big D Jamboree barn dance and radio program in Dallas cultivated local talent and recruited national acts. In additional to country performers, the show also explored new trends

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Rev. George Washington Baines

1809

(1809-1882) Noted Texas religious leader. Pastor, 1850, to Gen. and Mrs. Sam Houston. Founded first Baptist paper in state, 1855. In difficult Civil War years, served as president of Baylor University, 1861-63, and pastor of the First Baptist Church in Fairfield, 1864-66. A North Carolinian. Uneducated, at 21 he cut and rafted timber to pay for schooling. Received A.M. Degree, University of Alabama. Moved to Arkansas. Founded 7 churches. Served in Arkansas Legislature, 1843-44. Lived and preached in Louisiana, 1845-49. He had 10 children. His wife, Melissa Ann (Butler), died here in wartime. He made her coffin with his own hands. One of their great-grandsons, Lyndon Baines Johnson, became 36th President of the United States, the first Texan to receive this high honor. Churches were vital to military and civilian morale in Confederate Texas. Rev. Baines and other ministers led their congregations in prayer days, soldier relief work, aid to families, distribution of Bibles. They also inspired numerous conversions. Later Rev. Baines served as agent for the Baptist State Convention and its education commission. (1965)

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Gregg, General John

1854

In 1854-61, Fairfield civic and political leader. Helped found first newspaper here. Served as district judge. A key member of Texas Secession Convention. 1861 Confederate congressman. Organized the Texas Infantry. As brigadier general, led troops near Vicksburg; at Chickamauga. Commanded Texas Brigade, Battle of the Wilderness. Was killed near Richmond, Oct. 7, 1864. Gregg County is named in his honor. His widow went in person by wagon, through battle lines, to Virginia to get his body. Later she was among ladies whose efforts began U. S. Memorial Day.

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Slaughter, William Baxter

1867

William Baxter (Bill) Slaughter, pioneer rancher, the fifth son of Sarah (Mason) and George Webb Slaughter , was born near the town of Butler, in Freestone County, in 1852. After moving with his family to Palo Pinto County in 1857, Bill grew up with his brothers in the saddle and during the Civil War helped his family furnish beef to the Tonkawa Indians under a contract with the Confederate government. He made his first trail drive with his older brother, C. C. Slaughter , in the fall of 1867, when Col. T. H. Johnson bought the Slaughter cattle to fulfill a contract with a packing plant near Jefferson. In 1869 he accompanied his brother Peter on what was his first trip north over the Chisholm Trail to Abilene, Kansas. The following year Bill was placed in charge of a herd of 1,800 head under contract to a buyer in Kansas City. The drive went along without incident until the Slaughter men neared the Red Fork of the Arkansas River in the Indian Territory. There two cowboys from the W. B. Grimes outfit warned Slaughter that a band of Osage Indians had stampeded the Grimes herd and would likely do the same to Slaughter's. Undaunted, Bill secured a red silk Mexican serape, two brightly-colored bandannas and extra food from the chuck wagon to use as gifts. With these, plus three steers which the Indians demanded, friendly relations were quickly established. After the herd was safely across the river, Slaughter and two cowboys treated the Osages to horse races for several hours before moving on, reaching Abilene in time to make good on the contract. Over the next two decades Bill Slaughter made cattle drives almost annually. In 1877 he formed a partnership with his older brother, John B. Slaughter , and with their combined capital of $6,000 bought steers and drove them north to the Kansas markets. About that time he married Anna McAdams from Palo Pinto County. Their son and only child, Coney, was born in 1878. In 1879 the Slaughter brothers moved their cattle to Scallowag (Home) Creek in Crosby County. There they constructed a ranch homestead to which Bill brought his wife and son. After the Espuela Land and Cattle Company obtained title to that property in 1883, the Slaughters moved their herds west to New Mexico. Bill set up his own ranch in the American Valley, in Sierra County, but continued the partnership with his brother until 1886. In May 1887 he was shot and wounded by two rustlers he had earlier indicted as a grand juror, but soon recovered. Slaughter remained in New Mexico until about 1894, making yearly drives to Nebraska and Wyoming. As early as 1889 Slaughter had begun leasing and buying up tracts of land along Coldwater Creek, in Sherman County. By 1895 he had purchased an interest in the Snyder brothers' Coldwater Cattle Company and built a spacious ranch house near the community of Coldwater, the county's first seat. Many of these purchases were paid off by means of a $30,000 loan he obtained from his brother C. C. in Dallas in 1898. Prior to 1896 he was running 10,000 cattle on 150,000 fenced acres. As more settlers came into the area, however, Slaughter reduced his holdings and began cultivating wheat and other cereal grains on 350 acres. A staunch Baptist, he often sponsored tent revivals at his ranch during the summers, with such prominent guest preachers as George W. Truett and James B. Gambrell . In 1901 he conducted his last cattle drive, in the company of his wife, when he trailed a herd from Clifton, Arizona, to Liberal, Kansas, then the southwestern terminus of the Rock Island Railroad. Later that year he drove a herd of domesticated buffalo from Dalhart, in Dallam County, to Fort Garland, Colorado. In 1900 Slaughter ran for Sherman County judge but lost by four votes to Dudley H. Snyder . However, when Snyder resigned in November 1901, Slaughter was appointed by the commissioners' court to complete the term. Although he did not run in the next election, he was ever after known locally as Judge Slaughter. S

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Bradley, Captain L. D.

1855

(1831 - 1886) Came to Texas from Alabama in 1855. In Civil War commanded Co. B, 2nd Battalion, Waul's Texas Legion. On May 22, 1863, was a leader of one of most daring defensive actions in the Siege of Vicksburg. Volunteered, along with 20 of his own men and 18 others, to seal off a Federal penetration into the Confederate fort defending the Mississippi River; acted under fire. Later commanded a regiment in defense of Texas coast and in 1864 Red River Campaign to prevent Federal invasion of Texas.

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Dorham, McKinley Howard [Kenny]

1924

Trumpet player McKinley Howard (Kenny) Dorham was born in Fairfield, Texas, on August 30, 1924. Dorham, considered one of the finest trumpet players of his era, played with numerous East Coast jazz giants, including Charlie "Bird" Parker. He grew up in a musically inclined family and learned the piano at a young age. He attended high school in Austin, where he learned the saxophone and later the trumpet. At Wiley College he studied chemistry and physics before joining the United States Army. After his discharge in 1942 Dorham pursued a career in music that led him to Los Angeles, where he played in a band led by Russell Jacquet , and then to New York City. Upon his arrival in New York he began playing with the big bands of Dizzy Gillespie and Lionel Hampton. In 1948 he replaced Miles Davis in the Charlie Parker Quintet and helped define the emerging bebop or bop jazz style. Characterized by fast tempos, complex arrangements, driving rhythms, and experimental solos, bebop took New York by storm in the early 1950s. Dorham was not one to stick with a single band. Through the 1950s he floated about the New York bop scene and played with Thelonious Monk, Charles Mingus, and Art Blakey. In 1954 Dorham, Blakey, and Horace Silver formed the Jazz Messengers, from which emerged Dorham's side project, the Jazz Prophets. Dorham also played with the Max Roach quintet before forming his own combos in the late 1950s and 1960s. Featuring, at one time or another, the great Cannonball Adderley and Joe Henderson, Dorham's various combos recorded several albums, including Whistle Stop (1961), considered by many to be his finest work. Through the 1960s he split his time between playing and attending graduate classes in music at New York University. He also traveled extensively in Europe, taught part-time, and worked as a journalist for Down Beat magazine. Though lauded by his musical contemporaries and critics, his popularity was overshadowed by such players as Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis. In 1966 Dorham was honored at the Longhorn Jazz Festival in Austin. His last few years were spent in relative seclusion because of declining health. He died on December 5, 1972. In 2008 the City of Austin honored Dorham as one of the inaugural inductees of the Austin Music Memorial.

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Sports in Fairfield

🏆 STATE CHAMPIONS Class 3A · Girls Basketball · 2020–2025

Fairfield Eagles — UIL 3A Girls Basketball State Champions — 3 titles

Most recent: 2025 3A Division 1

Fairfield, Texas, is a community that rallies around its high school sports, and the Fairfield High School girls' basketball program has certainly given them plenty to cheer about. Competing in Class 3A, the team has established a strong record, securing multiple state championships. Their achievements reflect consistent performance on the court, bringing pride to the town.

The Fairfield High School girls' basketball team claimed the 3A Division 1 state title in 2025, adding to their previous 3A state championship in 2022. Notably, they also earned a 4A state championship in 2020. These state-level victories highlight a period of significant success for the program.

State titles

3 (2020–2025)

Most recent

2025

Class

The moment

The Fairfield High School girls' basketball team secured the 3A Division 1 state championship in 2025.

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

Everything Near Fairfield

278 stories, landmarks & places within ~20 miles — the nearest 200 are listed here — the same local lore RoadyGoat plays as you drive through.

When Lignite Lit Up Freestone County
For nearly half a century the biggest thing in Freestone County wasn't in Fairfield at all but a few miles northeast of it: the Big Brown Steam Electric Station, a 1,150-megawatt coal plant whose two units came online…
The Temptations' Secret Weapon Was Born in Fairfield
Some of the most famous guitar on records cut in Detroit started with a kid from Fairfield, Texas. Cornelius Grant was born here on April 27, 1943, and went on to become the longtime guitarist, bandleader, and live…
Fairfield, TX
Fairfield is a place where the past feels close, maybe because it's always been a crossroads. You can almost hear the rumble of stagecoaches pulling up near the courthouse square, imagining the dust kicked up by those…
The County Seat That Wore Three Names
The little county seat you're rolling into took a while to settle on what to call itself. When the Texas legislature split Freestone County off from Limestone in 1850 and picked this rise on the prairie as its seat, the…
The Bonners, Whose Name Still Marks the Map
Drive the back roads east of Fairfield and you keep meeting one surname carved into a cemetery gate, a creek bottom, and a vanished community: Bonner. Two brothers from South Carolina, William Bonner and the physician…
The Run of Calamities That Couldn't Sink Fairfield
Stand on the Fairfield square and it's hard to picture, but this town took a brutal beating around the turn of the last century. It started in 1890, when a meningitis outbreak swept through and killed thirty-two people,…
No, the County Isn't Named for the Peaches
Here's a fact that trips up almost every visitor: Freestone County, the place you're driving through, was not named after the freestone peach, even though some of Texas's finest peaches grow nearby. The name is older…
Three Generations of Homemade Bread and Fried Pies
If you only stop once in Fairfield, make it Sam's Original Restaurant at 390 East Interstate 45, because it's been feeding travelers off this highway for over seventy years. The story starts around 1952, when Sammy and…
The Power Plant Sat Right On Top of Its Own Fuel
The engineering trick behind Big Brown wasn't the size of the plant, it was where they put it. This was a mine-mouth power station, meaning the generators sat almost directly on top of the coal they burned. Lignite is…
Hopson Burleson Memorial Cemetery · Historical Marker
You're driving through Freestone County, and right here is the Hopson Burleson Memorial Cemetery. Burleson himself moved his family to this area in 1835, right after getting a land grant from the Mexican government. He…
Rev. George Washington Baines · 0.3 mi · Historical Marker
(1809-1882) Noted Texas religious leader. Pastor, 1850, to Gen. and Mrs. Sam Houston. Founded first Baptist paper in state, 1855. In difficult Civil War years, served as president of Baylor University, 1861-63, and…
Bradley, Captain L. D. · 0.3 mi · Historical Marker
(1831 - 1886) Came to Texas from Alabama in 1855. In Civil War commanded Co. B, 2nd Battalion, Waul's Texas Legion. On May 22, 1863, was a leader of one of most daring defensive actions in the Siege of Vicksburg.…

Show all 200 nearby places

Val Verde Battery, C.S.A. · 0.3 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of the Val Verde Battery, C.S.A. Imagine this: six brass field guns, captured in a fierce battle in New Mexico in 1862, are brought back to Texas. These aren't just any guns; they're armed…
First Methodist Church Bell · 0.3 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Fairfield, where back in 1858, students at the Female College pooled their money and jewelry, and citizens added silver, all to give 'tone' to a special bell. It was cast in England, shipped all the…
Freestone County · 0.3 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Freestone County right now, formed from Limestone County way back in eighteen fifty. It was officially organized in eighteen fifty-one. The name? It comes from the stone found here. The county…
Gregg, General John · 0.4 mi · Historical Marker
In 1854-61, Fairfield civic and political leader. Helped found first newspaper here. Served as district judge. A key member of Texas Secession Convention. 1861 Confederate congressman. Organized the Texas Infantry. As…
Eight Old Buildings and a Cell That Held a Gunfighter · 0.4 mi
Right off the square at 302 East Main Street, the Freestone County Historical Museum isn't one building but a whole little village of them, eight historic structures gathered onto one campus. You can walk through 1850s…
Manahan House · 0.4 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Manahan House in Fairfield, a beautiful example of Greek Revival architecture. Built starting in 1855 by Dr. W. D. Strain, this home faced an early tragedy. Dr. Strain died just a year later, in…
1881 Freestone County Jail · 0.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the third Freestone County Jail, built in 1881. Look for those thick, 18-inch brick walls, likely made from recycled bricks from the older jail. This building originally held two cells and the…
Carter Log House · 0.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of the Carter Log House, a prime example of pioneer Texas living. Built in 1845 by David L. Carter, this home was constructed with remarkable skill. Imagine hauling lumber 70 miles by…
Fischer, Fridolin · 0.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Fridolin Fischer home in Fairfield. Fischer, a German native, arrived in Freestone County in 1876. In 1893, the same year he opened a hardware store, he had this distinctive Eastlake-style house…
Potter-Watson Lob Cabin · 0.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of the Potter-Watson Log Cabin, built around 1852 by Daniel Potter, a farmer who tamed wild horses. Look at the craftsmanship: cedar floor, split board roof held by pegs, and securely…
Butler Church Bell · 0.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of Butler Church in Fairfield. Its bell, rumored to have come from the riverboat 'S. A. Ruthven' sunk in 1873, served the congregation for years. After the church was torn down, the bell…
The Ranger at the Still · 0.6 mi
In April nineteen twenty eight, three special Texas Rangers crept up on a whiskey still about seven miles west of Fairfield, and only two of them walked away. On April nineteenth, Rangers Boone Anderson, W. J. Hancock,…
Freestone County Bourbon de Luxe · 0.6 mi
Ten miles northeast of Fairfield is a place called Young, and during Prohibition it was known as a bootleg capital. When farming collapsed in the early nineteen twenties, Freestone County lost hundreds of farms in just…
The Sheriff at the Planter's Hotel · 0.6 mi
On a Saturday morning in March eighteen seventy two, Freestone County Sheriff James Rogers walked up to three strangers sitting in front of the Planter's Hotel in Fairfield. He suspected they were horse thieves. That,…
The Month Fairfield Was Under Martial Law · 0.6 mi
In the fall of eighteen seventy one, Fairfield was placed under martial law. It was Reconstruction, and Texas held an election from October third through the sixth. Reports came out of Fairfield, the Freestone County…
The Tornado That Took the Courthouse Clock · 0.6 mi
On the afternoon of May eighteenth, nineteen oh two, a tornado traveled about forty miles across Limestone and Freestone counties, and it ended its run in Fairfield. It started near Ben Hur, passed near Horn Hill and…
Hold Up · 0.6 mi
In August nineteen eighteen, a Freestone County constable chased two burglars by car, and when he told them to stop, they shot him. Constable Brag Dunbar was forty-eight. After a house was broken into, he and the…
Dorham, McKinley Howard [Kenny] · 0.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
Trumpet player McKinley Howard (Kenny) Dorham was born in Fairfield, Texas, on August 30, 1924. Dorham, considered one of the finest trumpet players of his era, played with numerous East Coast jazz giants, including…
Gregg, John · 0.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, Texas, and right here is where John Gregg made his home before becoming a Confederate general. Born in Alabama, Gregg moved to Fairfield in 1852, practiced law, and even started…
Fairfield, TX · 0.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Fairfield, Texas, a town born from a need for a county seat. Originally called Mound Prairie, the name changed to Fairfield in 1850 when this spot was chosen to govern Freestone County. Settlers…
The Cook Who Became a National Treasure · 0.6 mi
One of the most honored quilters in America began quilting for herself only after an accident ended her first career. Laverne Brackens grew up in Fairfield, the oldest girl of eight children, and learned quilting as a…
Dogan High's Wildcats · 0.6 mi
For more than forty years, Fairfield's Black students went to Dogan High School, and its basketball team kept reaching the state finals. The first public school for African American children in Fairfield opened in…
The Machine That Eats Brown Coal · 0.6 mi
The Big Brown power plant near Fairfield burned Freestone County lignite, a soft coal the Germans call brown coal. And in Germany's brown-coal pits work some of the biggest machines ever built. The most famous is Bagger…
Bradley, L. D. · 0.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, and right here is Fairfield, the Texas home of L.D. Bradley. Bradley was a lawyer and judge, but during the Civil War, he raised troops for the Confederacy. He served with Waul's…
Freestone County · 0.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, right in the heart of East Texas. This land was once home to Caddoan tribes, and later, a place where ambitious empresarios like David G. Burnet tried to settle families. But for…
Johnson, Joseph Burton · 0.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, right where Joseph Burton Johnson built his life after fighting in the Indian Wars and the Mexican-American War. He came to Texas in 1848, settling first in Tyler County, then…
Sold the Week Texas Seceded · 0.6 mi
In February eighteen sixty one, in the same week that the Secession Convention voted to take Texas out of the Union, Fairfield's college for women was sold at public auction. Fairfield Female College had opened in…
A Galveston Empire Started Here · 0.6 mi
One of the great financial empires of Texas started with a sickly baby born in Fairfield. William Lewis Moody Jr. was born here on January twenty-fifth, eighteen sixty five. He was one of only three of the six Moody…
The Medal Taken Away and Given Back · 0.6 mi
A sprinter born in Fairfield won an Olympic medal, lost it, and got it back. Nanceen Perry was born here in nineteen seventy seven. At the two thousand Olympics in Sydney, she ran for the United States in the women's…
Philpott, Benjamin Allen · 0.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, heading towards Fairfield. Right here, Benjamin Allen Philpott served as a lieutenant colonel in the Confederate Army during the Civil War. After eighteen months of service, he…
Fairfield Lake State Park · 0.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
Fairfield Lake State Park is on Farm Road 3285 on the southern and southwestern shores of Fairfield Lake, six miles northeast of Fairfield in northeastern Freestone County. On November 2, 1971, the State of Texas signed…
Love, David Hall · 0.7 mi
You're driving past the site where David Hall Love lived out his days. He was a veteran of the Texas War for Independence, and a hero at the Battle of San Jacinto. On April 21, 1836, Love and eleven comrades captured…
Rogers, James Bonner · 0.7 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Freestone County, just past where Sheriff James Bonner Rogers met his end. It was 1872, a truly lawless time. Rogers was known for his bravery, once pursuing horse thieves alone after his deputy…
The Battle for Fairfield Lake · 0.9 mi
For nearly fifty years, Fairfield Lake State Park was a Texas treasure. Texas Power and Light dammed a creek here in 1969 to make a cooling reservoir for its Big Brown generating plant, and in 1976 the state opened a…
The End of the Big Brown Era · 0.9 mi
As you travel around Fairfield, you're moving through a landscape that was, for half a century, an energy-producing powerhouse. In 1971, the Big Brown Steam Electric Station fired up its generators for the first time,…
Engineering a Powerhouse Lake · 0.9 mi
The existence of Fairfield Lake is a massive feat of industrial engineering. In 1967, when Texas Utilities and its partners announced the Big Brown power plant, they faced a critical problem: how to cool a facility of…
Garfield, TX · 0.9 mi
Garfield, Texas, might seem like just another peaceful dot on the map east of Austin, but this land holds stories. You can feel it in the breeze coming off the Colorado River watershed, hear it in the quiet hum of…
Fairfield Female College · 0.9 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Fairfield, Texas, and right here is the site of the Fairfield Female College. Founded by the Freestone School Association, this place opened its doors in 1859, with Dr. Henry Lee Graves at the…
Colonel Wm. L. Moody · 1.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Fairfield, Freestone County, where Colonel William L. Moody made his mark. He arrived in Texas from Virginia back in 1852. When the Civil War broke out, Moody organized the first Freestone County…
W. L. Moody Confederate Reunion Grounds · 1.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the W. L. Moody Confederate Reunion Grounds, a place that's been a gathering spot since 1891. Organized by ex-Confederates and named for Colonel William Lewis Moody, these grounds hosted thousands…
From the Fairfield Eagles to the Pro Bowl · 1.5 mi
The football field at Fairfield High School turned out one of the best defensive ends the state ever produced. Tony Brackens, born in Fairfield on December 26, 1974, grew up here and starred for the Class 3A Fairfield…
Chancellor Union Cemetery · 1.6 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Chancellor Union Cemetery, a place that started with a family's gift. In the 1850s, Reuben and Mary Chancellor arrived from Alabama, bringing their family and enslaved people. They donated land…
Rock-and-Roll · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Texas musicians have profoundly influenced the development and evolution of rock-and-roll and the various branches of its musical tree-rockabilly, blues rock, Tex-Mex, psychedelia, and redneck rock. Some of the Rock and…
Slaughter, William Baxter · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
William Baxter (Bill) Slaughter, pioneer rancher, the fifth son of Sarah (Mason) and George Webb Slaughter , was born near the town of Butler, in Freestone County, in 1852. After moving with his family to Palo Pinto…
Hanna, Andrew Barry · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, Texas, where Andrew Barry Hanna made his final home. Hanna was a lieutenant on the Somervell Expedition and a survivor of the ill-fated Mier Expedition into Mexico in 1842. He…
Phillips, George Washington · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, Texas, and right here is the area where a unique gospel musician, George Washington Phillips, made his mark. Born in 1880, Phillips was a farmer and preacher before Columbia…
Donie, TX · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Donie is on State Highway 164 eleven miles south of Teague in southwest Freestone County. The site was probably settled in the 1880s. The Dewey Prairie Baptist Church was organized in 1886, and in 1898 the residents…
Fairfield Lake · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Fairfield Lake is on Big Brown Creek about eight miles northeast of Fairfield in northeastern Freestone County. In 1967 Texas Power and Light Company, Texas Electric Service Company, and Dallas Power and Light Company…
Stewards Mill, TX · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Stewards Mill is at the intersection of Farm roads 833 and 2547, seven miles north of Fairfield in north central Freestone County. It was established in 1849 and named after Washington Steward of South Carolina, who…
Young, TX · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Young is just off Farm Road 1124 ten miles northeast of Fairfield in northeastern Freestone County. It was named for an early settler of the area, Dr. Tolbert Fannin Young, who moved to Texas from Memphis, Tennessee, in…
Bonner, William · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, the heart of what was once William Bonner's vast plantation. Bonner arrived here in the early 1850s, already a wealthy man from Alabama. By 1860, he was reportedly the wealthiest…
Avant Prairie, TX · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Avant Prairie is off State Highway 179 four miles southeast of Teague in southwestern Freestone County. By 1848 a few settlers, including Charles Kilgore, had moved to the area. In 1852 more families from Alabama,…
Butler, TX (Freestone County) · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Butler is on U.S. Highway 84 fourteen miles southeast of Fairfield in southeast Freestone County. In 1852, at a nearby location known as West Point Hill, John T. Gill built a store and warehouse, which he moved a few…
Cade Chapel, TX · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Cade Chapel, formerly known as Cade, is a tiny rural community located on Farm Road 246 about seventeen miles south of Corsicana and two miles west of Streetman. The town straddles the borderline of southern Navarro and…
Luna, TX · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Luna was at the intersection of Farm roads 489 and 1451 in Freestone County. On December 22, 1826, empresario David G. Burnet received a contract to colonize this area; he later sold his interest in this land venture to…
Woodland, TX (Freestone County) · 2.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
Woodland is on Farm Road 1449 two miles northwest of Kirvin in northwest Freestone County. The area was settled in the late 1840s and early 1850s by pioneer families. A church was organized in 1854 and a school before…
Ward Prairie Baptist Church · 3.3 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Ward Prairie, a place named for an early pioneer family. As early as the 1860s, a Methodist chapel stood here, serving as a meeting place for various denominations. Then, in 1869, the Ward Prairie…
Trooper Damon Allen Memorial Highway · 3.7 mi · Historical Marker
US Highway Eighty Four through Freestone and Limestone counties is named for Trooper Damon Allen. On Thanksgiving Day, two thousand seventeen, Allen pulled over a speeding car on Interstate Forty Five south of…
Grange Hall Community · 5.0 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past what was once Grange Hall, a community born in the 1850s alongside Freestone County itself. Early farming families, like the Smiths and the Johnsons, settled here. Many became active in the Texas…
Driver Cemetery · 5.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Driver Cemetery, a resting place with roots stretching back to 1852. That's when Julius Driver arrived from Georgia, buying land and eventually donating over four acres for this very cemetery.…
Lake Chapel Cemetery · 5.3 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Lake Chapel Cemetery, established around 1856 on land set aside by the Lake family. It began as a community burial ground near the Lake Chapel Methodist Church and schoolhouse. The earliest…
Johnson, General Joseph Burton · 5.7 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of a 10,550-acre plantation, home to General Joseph Burton Johnson. Born in Georgia in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1816</say-as>, Johnson served in the U.S. Army before coming to…
Mt. Zion Methodist Church and Cemetery · 6.9 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of Mt. Zion Methodist Church and Cemetery, a community hub for over a century. The first log building went up in 1854, founded by Reverends G. W. Walker and Timothy Green. By 1860, the…
Trooper Damon Allen Memorial Highway · 7.1 mi · Historical Marker
Honors Trooper Damon Charles Allen, Texas DPS Groesbeck, killed Thanksgiving Day November 23, 2017, during a traffic stop on US-84 in Freestone County by Dabrett Black. Case produced the Damon Allen Act (SB 6, 2021),…
Harmony Church · 7.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Harmony Church, one of the oldest church buildings in Freestone County. Back in 1876, folks from the Stewards Mill community decided they needed a proper place for worship. On October 7th, several…
Stewards Mill Store, 1869 · 7.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of Stewards Mill Store, a business that started way back in 1849. It began as Washington Steward's grist mill, the only one around for miles. Over the years, this spot grew to include a post…
Compton Cemetery · 8.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Compton Cemetery, a quiet resting place that began with a family tragedy. In 1855, Elizabeth Blackmon Compton Johnson, the eldest daughter of William Scott and Angelina Compton, was laid to rest…
The Town a Drink Company Tried to Rename · 9.1 mi
Dew, Texas, got its name from a mistake. When the town applied for a post office in eighteen eighty five, folks asked to be called Drew, after a local resident. Postal officials misread the application, and Drew became…
Dew Cemetery · 9.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Dew Cemetery, a resting place with roots stretching back to the 1850s. Originally called Avant Prairie, this community grew around the Sunshine Methodist Church. In 1869, local merchant D.A. Self and…
How Mountain Dew Got Its Name · 9.1 mi
Dew, Texas, was not named for the soda. It got its name in eighteen eighty five, when postal officials misread the name Drew. But the soda's name has its own story. In nineteen thirty two, two brothers, Barney and Ally…
The Other DEW · 9.1 mi
Dew, Texas, got its name by accident. But in the nineteen fifties, another DEW was built on purpose, across the top of the world. It stood for Distant Early Warning, a chain of radar stations meant to spot Soviet…
The Magic City Railroad Boom · 9.2 mi
In 1906 the railroad rewrote this place. A drowsy country village called Brewer had stood here for decades when the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway picked the spot as its division point, halfway between Fort Worth and…
Engineering a Railroad Hub · 9.2 mi
The existence of Teague as a town is a case study in transportation engineering. When the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway planned its Fort Worth-to-Houston route in 1905, it faced a critical logistical problem: steam…
Antioch Cemetery · 9.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Antioch Cemetery. ANTIOCH CEMETERY THE BEGINNING OF ANTIOCH CEMETERY IS VERY CLOSELY ASSOCIATED WITH THE TURLINGTON COMMUNITY, THE ANTIOCH AND MT. ZION CHURCHES, AND THE SURROUNDING RURAL AREA. THE…
Teague, TX · 9.2 mi
Teague wouldn't be Teague without agriculture. The land here, that mix of sandy loam and gentle hills, is just right for grazing cattle and growing hay. You'll see pastures dotted with Black Angus and Brahman crosses, a…
First Baptist Church of Teague · 9.4 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Teague, and right here is the site of the First Baptist Church. This congregation started way back in 1877, organized as a small Baptist group in the village of Brewer Prairie. When the town got…
Boyd, William Rufus, Jr. · 9.5 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, and right here in Teague, you're passing through the hometown of William Rufus Boyd Jr. He was a banker, a lawyer, and an organizer, but his biggest role came during World War…
Headlee, Dr. Emmet · 9.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Teague's oldest home, built back in 1906. The builder, born in 1848, was the son of a Methodist preacher and a Confederate Army surgeon. He arrived in Texas in 1866 and became a true civic leader in…
Burlington-Rock Island Railroad Museum · 9.5 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Teague, and right here is a building that's a testament to local preservation. This is the Burlington-Rock Island Railroad Museum, housed in the original Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway depot,…
John F. Wallace House · 9.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the home of John F. Wallace, a man who wore many hats in Freestone County. Wallace arrived in Teague in 1908, working as a pharmacist. But by 1912, he was already living at this address, and around…
Teague, TX · 9.5 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Teague, Texas, a town that owes its very existence to the railroad. Originally known as Brewer, this community got a major upgrade in 1906 when the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway built its…
Caney Baptist Church · 9.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of Caney Baptist Church, a fellowship with roots stretching back to the 1830s. Early settlers like Hopson Burleson organized here before 1858, meeting in homes and schoolhouses. For years,…
Old Division Point Office for the "Boll Weevil" Railway · 9.7 mi · Historical Marker
You're cruising past the old division point office for the 'Boll Weevil' Railway. Chartered as the Trinity & Brazos Valley, this line earned its nickname from special trains that roared down its tracks, carrying folks…
Town of Teague · 9.7 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Teague, Freestone County, a town that owes its very existence to a railroad boom. Back in 1905, this was just a quiet village called Brewer. But then, in 1906, the Trinity & Brazos Valley Railroad…
The One-Dollar Depot That Became a Museum · 9.8 mi
The handsome two-story building at 208 South Third Avenue was once called one of the finest railroad stations in Texas. Completed in 1907 at a cost of about 20,000 dollars, it served as the Trinity and Brazos Valley…
Sessions Cemetery · 9.8 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past what's left of the largest of three slave graveyards in this area, founded back in the early 1850s. Local tradition says this place holds the graves of many notable former slaves and their…
Shanks Cemetery · 9.8 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past what used to be the heart of a small farming community called Shanks. It all started back in 1859 when the Matthew and Robert Shanks families settled here from Alabama. By 1870, a schoolhouse went up…
The Beetle Behind the Boll Weevil Line · 9.9 mi
Teague's railroad had a nickname: the Boll Weevil. The line hauled cotton, and it was named for the beetle wrecking that very crop. The boll weevil, Anthonomus grandis, is a quarter-inch snout beetle native to Mexico…
The Town a Railroad Man Named for His Mother · 9.9 mi
Before it had its name, this was a small farm settlement called Brewer. That changed in 1906, when the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway laid its line through western Freestone County and chose the spot for its machine…
Kirvin, TX · 10.1 mi
In 1922, Kirvin was the site of a tragic event that deeply affected the community. Three local African-American men, Snap Curry, Mose Jones, and Johnny Cornish, were lynched by a mob of around 500 townsfolk, including…
The 'Boll Weevil' Railroad · 10.1 mi
Kirvin owes its existence to a railroad with a funny nickname: the 'Boll Weevil Line.' Officially it was the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway, chartered in 1902 to run from North Texas southeastward toward the coast,…
The Power of Lignite · 10.1 mi
While Kirvin's history is tied to oil, the biggest engineering story this county ever told was about a different fossil fuel: lignite. Look around Freestone County and you can still read the shape of the Big Brown Power…
Boyd, Jr., William Rufus · 10.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the marker for William Rufus Boyd, Jr., a man who packed a lot into his life! Born in 1885, he was licensed to practice law at just 19 and became Teague's first mayor at 21. He led the U.S. Chamber…
Notley, Llewellyn · 10.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Teague, Freestone County, past the life of Llewellyn Notley. Born in Paris, Texas, in 1888, Notley dedicated his life to education and history. After earning his degrees from the University of…
Bonner Cemetery · 10.7 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Bonner Cemetery, established in 1867. It's the resting place for William and John Bonner, brothers who came from South Carolina in the 1850s. They developed thousands of acres into cotton plantations…
Shiloh Primitive Baptist Church and School · 11.0 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of Shiloh Primitive Baptist Church and School, a vital center for the Black community in Freestone County. It all started in the early 1850s, with slaves holding informal services under a…
Woodland College for Boys · 11.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Freestone County, near the site of Woodland College for Boys. Established way back in 1863, this school aimed to educate young men, quickly enrolling over 300 students. Colonel L. R. Wortham was a…
Woodland Cemetery · 11.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Woodland Cemetery. In a community founded 1848 by pioneers mostly from Alabama, this cemetery was opened with burial of Capt. John L. Wortham (1841-62), who died in Galveston while in Confederate…
Cotton Gin Cemetery · 11.4 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Cotton Gin Cemetery, a place with roots stretching back to 1845. That's when Margarette Wills and her family, along with their enslaved people, arrived here. Her son, Dr. James S. Wills,…
Harrison Chapel · 11.6 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Dew, and right here is Harrison Chapel, a cornerstone of this community since the 1850s. Organized with just twelve members, it grew thanks to land donated by pioneer George Harrison and hosted…
Cotton Gin · 11.8 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of Cotton Gin, a town that bloomed and faded before the railroad even arrived. Settled before 1848, it got its start with Dr. J. S. Wills and his mule-drawn cotton gin. By 1851, it had a…
Haley, Captain Richard B. · 12.0 mi · Historical Marker
You're passing the spot where Captain Richard B. Haley lived out his long life. Born in Tennessee, Haley came to Texas in 1824, way before it was even a republic. He fought in the Texas Revolution, taking part in the…
Salem Predestinarian Baptist Church and Cemetery · 12.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of the Salem Predestinarian Baptist Church, one of Freestone County's oldest. <break time="400ms"/> It was founded way back on December 3rd, 1853, by the Lee families, with Elders Thomas…
Furney Richardson High School · 12.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of a vital community hub for African American children in western Freestone County. In 1933, the Busby and Grove Island schools merged, creating a new district. This campus, named for its…
Antioch Cemetery · 12.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Freestone County, past the site of what was once the Luna community. After the Civil War, Edward and Frankie Ezell gave land for this Antioch Cemetery. The railroad bypassed Luna in 1906, and the…
Oak Island Presbyterian Church and Cemetery · 12.6 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Freestone County, near Teague. Look to your right, and you'll see the Oak Island Presbyterian Church and Cemetery. This spot marks the very first church organized in what would become Freestone…
The Relief Man from Streetman · 14.1 mi
Long before the modern bullpen, baseball expected a starting pitcher to finish what he began. The man who helped break that rule grew up in this rural corner of Freestone County. Frederick "Firpo" Marberry was born in…
Blind Lemon Jefferson's Freestone County Beginnings · 14.1 mi
The flat cotton country rolling past you here was the early world of one of America's first blues stars. Blind Lemon Jefferson was born in the Couchman community of Freestone County, generally placed in the farmland…
The Veteran Whose Flag-Covered Lawnmower Became a Parade · 14.1 mi
Streetman's Fourth of July parade started with one man and a riding lawnmower. Tommy J. Bryant was a World War II veteran, and he wanted the people of his hometown to celebrate their freedom on the Fourth. So one year…
The Railroad That Built One Town and Erased Another · 14.1 mi
The grid of streets you're rolling through only exists because a railroad decided this spot mattered. Streetman began in 1905 as a station on the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway, with settlers arriving the following…
The Wetlands That Wash a River Before It Reaches the Lake · 14.1 mi
A few miles from Streetman sits one of Texas's largest inland reservoirs, and a quietly brilliant piece of environmental engineering attached to it. Richland-Chambers Reservoir covers more than 41,000 acres and reaches…
The 13-Pound Bass That Ended a 17-Year Wait · 14.1 mi
Richland-Chambers Reservoir near Streetman gave Texas anglers a long, lean stretch of waiting, then ended it with a single fish. On Sunday, January 26, 2025, Dylan Sorrells of Dallas pulled a 13.64-pound largemouth bass…
The Town's First School Met in a Blacksmith Shop · 14.1 mi
When the kids of brand-new Streetman first sat down to learn in 1907, there was no schoolhouse to learn in, so class met inside a blacksmith shop. The arrangement held until a permanent school building finally went up…
Means, Harvey · 14.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of a remarkable life in Teague, the story of Harvey Means. Born in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1868</say-as>, Means started as a shoe-shine boy, but found his calling when he…
Butler Soldiers' Homes, C.S.A. · 14.5 mi · Historical Marker
As you drive through Butler, look for signs of a unique Civil War effort. Texas counties usually outfitted their soldiers, but some communities went further, creating 'soldiers' homes.' These were places where civilians…
Cade and Birdston emptied into Streetman · 14.6 mi
You're in a town the railroad conjured out of a cotton field, and the neighbors came to it. In 1905 the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway put a station here, and settlement started the next year. The town took its name…
The Boll Weevil's Straight Shot · 14.6 mi
The tracks that cut through Streetman carry a nickname, and it isn't flattering: the Boll Weevil. The company called itself the Valley Road, but everyone else called the Trinity and Brazos Valley the Boll Weevil Line.…
Streetman, TX · 14.6 mi
Streetman, Texas, has a rich history that includes notable residents who left their mark on American culture. One such resident was Arbella Ewing, who was born near Streetman in 1894 and was, at her death in 2008, the…
Marberry Time · 14.6 mi
Fred Firpo Marberry was born on a farm near Streetman in eighteen ninety eight, played the infield for the Streetman town team as a teenager, and didn't pitch until he was twenty one. He threw nothing but fastballs, and…
Five Miles West, Then Down the Tracks · 14.6 mi
Blind Lemon Jefferson, the first country blues singer and guitarist to win a national audience, came from right around here. He was born on a farm at Coutchman, a little community about five miles west of Streetman,…
One Arm, Still Pitching · 14.6 mi
Fred Firpo Marberry, born on a farm near Streetman, pitched fourteen seasons in the big leagues, and for years he held the records for saves in a season and in a career. When the Detroit Tigers released him in nineteen…
One Hundred Fourteen Candles · 14.6 mi
On March thirteenth, eighteen ninety four, Arbella Perkins was born on a Freestone County farm near Streetman, the fourth of twelve children. Her great-grandparents had been enslaved in Mississippi. In nineteen fifteen…
Birdston's First Grave · 14.6 mi
About three miles northeast of Streetman, on Farm Road four sixteen, is Birdston Cemetery, and its very first grave belongs to a traveler. A family was on the road from Fairfield to Corsicana, and they stopped at…
Bennett, Joseph L. · 14.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through what is now Navarro County, not far from the town of Streetman. Right here is where Joseph L. Bennett lived and died in 1848. Bennett arrived in Texas in 1834 and quickly became a key figure in…
Marberry, Frederick [Firpo] · 14.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Central Texas, maybe near Streetman, and you're passing through the birthplace of a baseball legend. Fred Marberry, nicknamed 'Firpo' after a famous boxer, was born here in 1898. He wasn't much of…
Thirty Thousand People Overnight · 14.6 mi
About ten miles southwest of Streetman, the town of Wortham had a boom like few places ever have. On the twenty seventh of November, nineteen twenty four, the Roy Simmons Number One well came in as a gusher. Within…
The First Traffic Light Blew Up · 14.6 mi
Streetman is named for Judge Sam Streetman of Houston, who surveyed the railroad and the town. But since street is right there in the name: the world's first traffic signal went up in London on the ninth of December,…
The School Board in the Parked Car · 14.6 mi
In nineteen forty eight, Streetman fought to keep its own school district, and part of the fight turned on a school board meeting held in a parked car. That August, the Freestone County school board called an election…
Jefferson Survives? · 14.6 mi
Streetman throws itself a Fourth of July parade, so here's the strangest Fourth of July in American history. On July fourth, eighteen twenty six, the fiftieth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, both Thomas…
The Boxer Behind the Nickname · 14.6 mi
Fred Marberry, the big relief pitcher, was born on a farm near Streetman in eighteen ninety eight, and the whole baseball world knew him as Firpo. The nickname came from a boxer. On September fourteenth, nineteen twenty…
A Railroad Town Rises and Fades · 14.6 mi
Streetman was born as a station on the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway in nineteen oh five, and it was named for Judge Sam Streetman of Houston, the surveyor who laid out both the railroad and the town. It grew fast.…
There Really Was a Streetcar Named Desire · 14.6 mi
Street makes us think of streetcars, and there really was a streetcar named Desire. New Orleans started the Desire line in nineteen twenty. It ran from Canal Street down Bourbon Street and on to Desire Street. People in…
The Machine That Made the Lawn · 14.6 mi
Streetman is known for its Fourth of July lawnmower parade, so here's the man who invented the lawnmower. Edwin Budding was an engineer in Stroud, England, who knew the machines woollen mills used, with spinning blades…
Clyde Barrow's Uncle · 14.6 mi
When federal agents were hunting Bonnie and Clyde, their search for Clyde Barrow's family ran through the farm roads around Streetman. In Bureau of Investigation interview notes from the nineteen thirties, later…
Sixteen Hundred Tons in the Ditch · 14.6 mi
On Sunday night, February twenty fifth, nineteen twelve, between ten and eleven o'clock, a southbound freight train on the Trinity and Brazos Valley went into the ditch near Streetman. It was running as an extra. It had…
Shots on Wood Street · 14.6 mi
Just before one in the morning on Friday, August ninth, two thousand twenty four, Freestone County deputies were called to Wood Street in Streetman. Inside one house they found Cody Williamson, forty two, on his living…
St. Elmo, TX (Freestone County) · 14.6 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through northern Freestone County, past what used to be the community of St. Elmo. It started around 1849 when families settled here, and a school opened soon after. The community eventually took its name…
Fisherman's Point: A Streetman Address at the Far End of the Lake · 14.9 mi
About a dozen miles east-northeast of Streetman, in a deep-water cove just west of the Richland-Chambers dam, sits Fisherman's Point Marina and Resort, which carries a Streetman address: 230 FM 416. While downtown…
Union Cemetery · 14.9 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Union Cemetery, a place that's been serving this community for over a century and a half. It started way back in 1860, when Jacob Tacker gave this land for both a school and a graveyard. For a while,…
Winkler · 14.9 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through the quiet countryside near Streetman, but this area used to be a bustling town called Winkler. Settlers arrived as early as 1846, and by the 1860s, farms dotted the landscape. The town officially…
Cade Cemetery · 14.9 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Cade Cemetery, a final resting place for a community that once thrived here. The Cade community, named for early resident Cade Hayes, was established in the 1870s. The first burial was a Mrs.…
New Hope Baptist Church and St. Elmo Cemetery · 15.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of New Hope Baptist Church and St. Elmo Cemetery. The area around here was settled by pioneers in 1849, who found cotton and corn plantations thriving. A school opened in the 1850s, but it…
Birdston Community and Cemetery · 15.4 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Navarro County, passing the site of Birdston. It all started in the 1860s when V.I. Bird opened a general store. Soon, a cotton gin joined it, and the growing community got its own post office in…
Wortham, TX · 15.6 mi
For a small town, Wortham has an outsized claim to fame. It's the final resting place of Blind Lemon Jefferson, the 'Father of the Texas Blues.' Born near here in 1893, his innovative guitar playing and high, mournful…
The Father of the Texas Blues · 15.6 mi
Just a short drive from here is the final resting place of a musical giant: Blind Lemon Jefferson. Born in 1893 near Couchman, he spent his formative years in this area. As a blind street musician, he played for tips in…
The 1924 Gusher that Built a City · 15.6 mi
Imagine the streets you're driving on now, but packed shoulder-to-shoulder with thousands of people, mud up to the axles of Model T's, and the air thick with the smell of crude oil. That was Wortham in late 1924. After…
The Geology and Engineering of a Boom · 15.6 mi
The 1924 Wortham oil boom wasn't just luck; it was a feat of petroleum geology and rapid-fire engineering. The prize lay thousands of feet down, in a trap made by the Mexia-Talco fault zone -- a great crack in the…
Whiteselle, James Emerson · 15.7 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of a major Texas business boom, all thanks to James Emerson Whiteselle. Born in Tennessee in 1851, Whiteselle came to Texas in 1870, starting in the lumber business. By 1875, he was running…
Birdston Valley · 16.3 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through what was once Birdston Valley, a community built by former slaves after the Civil War. <break time="400ms"/> They farmed the Richland Creek bottomlands, their lives centered around faith and…
Daniel Memorial Orphanage · 16.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of the Daniel Memorial Orphanage, a place founded by Jennings Bryan Daniel and his family to care for homeless children. They acquired former military barracks and an army chapel to create…
Wilson Chapel Cemetery · 17.4 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Freestone County, past the Wilson Chapel Cemetery. It began as a burial site in 1867 when Frederich Wilson's daughter, Martha, was laid to rest here. Frederich himself is buried here, along with…
Site of Worthy Store · 17.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of the Worthy Store in Donie. Back in 1906, Dillard Monroe Worthy opened this general merchandise store. It wasn't just dry goods, though; it offered farming supplies, a butcher shop,…
Butler faded while Oakwood moved for mud · 17.6 mi
Northwest of Oakwood, over in southeastern Freestone County, sits the old town of Butler. Before the railroad it was the center of life around here — a store and warehouse from 1852, a church by 1854, a post office, a…
Black Gold of a Different Kind · 17.6 mi
While cotton was king on the surface around Oakwood, there was a different kind of wealth underneath: lignite, the soft brown coal of the Wilcox belt that runs right under Leon and Freestone counties. The outfit that…
Engineering the Lignite Boom · 17.6 mi
The country around Oakwood sits on lignite - a soft, brownish coal, geologically young, pressed out of the vegetation of ancient swamps in what geologists call the Wilcox group. Getting it out was the engineering…
Oakwood, TX · 17.6 mi
The racial makeup of Oakwood is diverse, with 62.42% White, 35.03% African American, 0.21% Native American, 0.21% Asian, and 1.70% from other races. Hispanic or Latino of any race make up 3.18% of the population,…
Personville · 17.7 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of Personville, a town that started with a bang in 1854. Benjamin Person laid out the streets, and by 1855, a post office was up and running. The town grew to include a bank, hotel, a dozen…
Jefferson, Blind Lemon · 18.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, not far from where the legendary Blind Lemon Jefferson was born. Born on a farm near Couchman in the mid-1890s, Jefferson became one of the most influential blues guitarists and…
Wortham, TX · 18.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're rolling through Freestone County, and right here is Wortham. This town was just a sleepy little market center until 1924. That's when the Roy Simmons Number One oil well blew in, and suddenly, Wortham was…
Longbotham, Robert Brough · 18.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, heading towards Wortham. Right here, you're passing through land once owned by Robert Brough Longbotham. He sailed from England, fought in the War of 1812, and eventually landed…
Allegre, Judge · 18.0 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the home of Judge Warren Allegre, built around 1895. Allegre arrived in town back in 1869, running a drugstore. But he also gave music lessons and dispensed legal advice, eventually becoming justice…
Satterwhite, Robert Lee · 18.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, and right here is Wortham, where Robert Lee Satterwhite first put down roots as a newspaper man. In 1893, he founded the Wortham Signal, and soon after, he was the publisher and…
Barbee, Lewis N. · 18.0 mi · Tsha Handbook
You're driving through Freestone County, Texas, a place that was once home to Lewis N. Barbee. He was a farmer and businessman, but in 1892, he answered the call of the Populist Party. Barbee won a seat in the Texas…
Wortham · 18.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Wortham, Texas, a town with a name that changed as quickly as its population! It started in 1839 as a settlement by English colonist Robert Longbotham. Fast forward to 1871, and he sold land for a…
Wortham Oil Boom · 18.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Wortham, Freestone County, where a forgotten boom once shook the land. Back in 1912, this town turned away a well that produced gas, not water. But just a few years later, oil and gas exploration…
Bounds, Rev. G. W. · 18.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the marker for Reverend G. W. Bounds, a man who dedicated his life to spreading the Methodist faith across Freestone County. Born in Mississippi in <say-as interpret-as="date"…
United Methodist Church of Wortham · 18.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the United Methodist Church of Wortham. This congregation got its start way back in 1867, organized by Reverend J. Hill Bounds. He and his family had just arrived in Texas from Mississippi, making…
Oakes Cemetery · 18.1 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past Oakes Cemetery, a final resting place that began with two burials back in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1861</say-as>. Later, John Collins Oakes and his wife Winnie, who came from Alabama…
Jefferson, Blind Lemon · 18.2 mi
You're driving past the birthplace of a true Texas legend: Blind Lemon Jefferson. Born right here near Wortham, he took his guitar and his unique voice, singing spirituals and the blues, from the streets to national…
Wortham Schools · 18.2 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving through Wortham, Texas, where education has a long and dynamic history. Back in the 1870s, the Masons and local Methodists teamed up to build the town's very first school, a two-story building stocked…
A Country High School Built Like a College Campus · 18.3 mi
The Buffalo Bison play out of a high school with a quirk you won't find in many towns this size. When the current Buffalo High School building opened in 2010 at 1724 North Buffalo Avenue, its designers laid out the…
Longbotham, Mrs. Lucy Haggard · 18.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the birthplace of Lucy Haggard Longbotham, born way back in 1793. She was one of nine kids whose father was a Baptist minister. Lucy moved to Alabama Territory around 1814, married Robert Longbotham…
Longbotham, Robert B. · 18.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the spot where Robert Longbotham settled in 1848. He wasn't just any settler, though. This Englishman arrived in Texas in 1832, first fighting in the Texas Revolution in 1836. Just a few years later,…
Shiloh Baptist Churc · 18.5 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of Shiloh Baptist Church. On this day in 1881, fifteen neighbors gathered to start their own Baptist congregation. For years, they met in the local schoolhouse, even sharing a Sunday School…
The Boom That Brought Martial Law to Mexia · 18.6 mi
The quiet farm town around you exploded almost overnight. After the Mexia Gas and Oil Company drilled ten dry holes and finally struck gas on its eleventh try, the real transformation came on November 25, 1920, when…
The Cannon Buried Beneath a Buggy House · 18.6 mi
At the bend where Jack's Creek meets the Navasota River sits the Confederate Reunion Grounds, where Limestone County veterans began gathering every year in 1888. Families came by buggy and special train from Dallas and…
German POWs and the Escapee Treed by a Bull · 18.6 mi
During World War II, the federal government opened Camp Mexia in 1942 to hold German prisoners of war. Under wartime labor shortages, prisoners were allowed out in supervised work parties to help local farmers,…
The Mexia House That Was a Hidden Hit Factory · 18.6 mi
On a quiet street in this small town stood one of country music's most unlikely engines. Songwriter Cindy Walker came home to Mexia in the 1950s and lived here for more than half a century, far from Nashville or…
Steel, Alfonso · 18.6 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site where Alfonso Steel, the very last survivor of the Battle of San Jacinto, lived. Steel fought bravely in that pivotal battle, the one that won Texas its independence. But he didn't leave…
The Railroad That Built One Town and Erased Another · 18.6 mi
Mexia was laid out in 1870-71 as the Houston and Texas Central Railway pushed toward it, and the rails made it almost instantly. The town soon had a post office, newspapers, banks, mills, an opera house, and businesses…
Muh-HAY-uh: The General Behind the Name · 18.6 mi
First, the local password: it's pronounced muh-HAY-uh, not MEX-ee-uh, and saying it right marks you as someone who belongs. The town takes its name from the Mexía family, recipients of an eleven-league Mexican land…
The 1916 Opera House Explosion · 18.6 mi
In the heart of old Mexia, the opera house was one of the proudest buildings of the railroad-era town, the kind of place where a small farming community showed off its ambitions. Then, on February 16, 1916, disaster…
How a Fault Line Trapped the Oil Under Mexia · 18.6 mi
The chaos above ground started with quiet geology far below your feet. The Mexia field taught petroleum geologists how oil collects along a fault line. The Mexia Fault Zone crosses several East-Central Texas counties,…
Mace, Albert R. · 18.6 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Mexia area, home to Albert R. Mace, a lawman who served Texas for 45 years. Mace joined the Texas Rangers at just 21, then moved into county sheriff roles, leading Limestone County for 12 years.…
Cindy Walker Days, the Town's Songwriter Festival · 18.6 mi
Every summer, Mexia throws a party for its quiet musical giant. Cindy Walker Days is an annual music and songwriter festival held near Walker's July birthday, spread across Mexia and the nearby town of Wortham,…
The Mexia Rodeo, Going Strong Since the 1930s · 18.6 mi
Mexia keeps a deep Western streak, and nothing shows it like the Mexia Area Chamber of Commerce Rodeo, a tradition that reaches back to roughly 1930. Late each June the town fills up for an event that has run for the…
Karner, John · 18.6 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the Mexia area, where John Karner arrived in Texas back in 1835. The very next year, he fought for Texas independence at the Battle of San Jacinto. Imagine that – arriving in a new land one year, and…
Miss Rogers' Music Room. · 18.7 mi · Historical Marker
You're driving past the site of Miss Rogers' Music Room in Mexia. Imagine this: Laura T. Rogers taught piano and choral music here, six days a week, from seven in the morning to seven at night, for eight months of the…

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When Lignite Lit Up Freestone County RoadyGoat

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Rev. George Washington Baines

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Fairfield Eagles — UIL 3A Girls Basketball State Champions — 3 titles

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