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Ingram, Texas

Everything Ingram is known for

1 song mention this city

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Music in Ingram

Songs About Ingram

gadalupe days
gary p. nunn
10%

Artists From Ingram

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Rivers & Roads in Song near Ingram

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

Guadalupe River 18 songs Interstate 10 36 songs Pedernales River 6 songs Blanco River 4 songs Frio River 13 songs

Musical Heritage

An Outdoor Stage on the Guadalupe RoadyGoat

You're on the banks of the Guadalupe River, at the Hill Country Arts Foundation in Ingram, home of the Smith-Ritch Point Theatre. This is an open-air stage that's been putting on shows here since the summer of 1959, the same year the Foundation itself got started. Musicals, plays, concerts — the river runs right past the seats, and it's part of every performance here. Some call it the longest-running outdoor theatre in Texas, a title earned one season at a time since 1959. The Hill Country has never been short on scenery, but this is one of the few places built to put a stage right in the middle of it. If the house lights are up tonight, there's a show going on under the stars, with the river for a soundtrack underneath the band.

RoadyGoat →

The Father of Country Music Chased Clean Air to Kerrville RoadyGoat

Kerrville was once a place sick people came to breathe, and in 1929 the most famous of them was Jimmie Rodgers, the Singing Brakeman and the man country music calls its father. Diagnosed with tuberculosis in 1924, when doctors believed dry air was the only real treatment, Rodgers came to the Hill Country for the climate and started building a hilltop home he named Blue Yodeler's Paradise. He moved his wife and daughter into the two-story house in the summer of 1929, flush with record royalties from the blue yodels that had made him a national star. The good times were short. The stock-market crash and his own lavish spending wrecked his finances while the disease wrecked his lungs, and he was forced to sell the Kerrville house and leave around 1931. Rodgers died in New York City on May 26, 1933, at just 35, two days after a final string of recording sessions. For a couple of years, though, the founder of an entire American music tradition called the hills above Kerrville home. (Source: Handbook of Texas; Texas Highways.)

RoadyGoat → · 6.2 mi away

The Road Goes On Forever, and It Runs Through Kerrville RoadyGoat

Texas songwriter Robert Earl Keen has called the Kerrville area home for decades, working from a ranch in these hills outside town. Keen built one of the most loyal followings in Texas music writing literate, story-driven country and folk, and his signature song, the outlaw ballad The Road Goes On Forever, first appeared on his 1989 album West Textures before becoming a Lone Star anthem covered far and wide. He's a Kerrville fixture as much as a touring star, the kind of resident songwriter who fits a town that has hosted the Kerrville Folk Festival since 1972 and treats songwriting as a local craft. Keen retired from full-time touring after a roughly 40-year run, but his roots in the Hill Country never moved. Driving these roads, you're passing through the country that shaped a writer whose whole catalog is built on Texas characters, long highways, and the kind of small-town detail you only get from living somewhere like this rather than just singing about it. (Source: Wikipedia; Texas Highways.)

RoadyGoat → · 6.2 mi away

History of Ingram

Why the Guadalupe Rises So Fast RoadyGoat

1956

Ingram sits in the heart of what hydrologists call Flash Flood Alley, and the geology explains why. The Hill Country is karst: thin soil over hard limestone on steep slopes, so rain runs off almost instantly instead of soaking in. Warm Gulf air riding up the Balcones Escarpment wrings out heavy rain that funnels into narrow river valleys. The Guadalupe basin has some of the highest flood discharge per square mile in the nation. Ingram Dam, an earthen structure about 20 feet high and 526 feet long, was built in 1956 to steady the river's flow. But engineering has limits. On July 4, 2025, after gauges nearby recorded roughly 10 inches of rain in hours, the Guadalupe just upstream at Hunt rose about 26 feet in around 45 minutes, putting Ingram under a flash flood emergency and delivering a catastrophic reminder of the runoff physics beneath this valley.

The Preacher Who Named the Town RoadyGoat

1879

Ingram carries the name of one man: J.C.W. Ingram, a Presbyterian minister who was also a merchant, postmaster, pharmacist, and at times a constable and sheriff. He set up a store and a post office on the Guadalupe River at the confluence of Johnson and Indian creeks, about seven miles west of Kerrville. Older histories, including the state's own handbook, date his six-acre purchase and store to 1879. Research by his own descendants, working from Kerr County deed records, instead documents the six-acre purchase in July 1883 and his appointment as postmaster on October 31, 1883. Either way, when a post office needs a name, the man running it usually gets to pick, and Ingram picked himself. The little river crossing grew into a town that still sits at that same creek-and-river junction today.

Cypress Shingles From the River Bottom RoadyGoat

1880

Before ranching and hunting leases defined this stretch of Kerr County, the Guadalupe River bottom offered a different kind of wealth: bald cypress. Early Ingram settlers farmed the valley and made shingles by hand from the plentiful cypress trees that lined the river, a rot-resistant wood prized for roofs. Grain was ground and cotton ginned at Sherman's Mill, which stood on the river between Ingram and Hunt to the west. Over time the economy shifted, first to sheep, goats, and cattle, then to deer hunting and imported exotic game on the surrounding ranches. The cypress groves that fed those first shingle-makers still shade the banks where the river passes through town, a quiet reminder of what the valley produced before the pastures took over.

Stonehenge II

1989

A 60-percent scale replica of Stonehenge built by retired oilman Al Shepperd in the Hill Country near Ingram, later relocated to the Hill Country Arts Foundation campus.

Henderson Cemetery

1862

Howard Henderson (1842-1908) came to Texas in 1857. He was a survivor of the Civil War Battle of the Nueces in 1862, in which he and other Unionists were ambushed by a Confederate force near the Nueces River. He later served as Texas Ranger. Henderson married Narcissa Turknett in 1866 and they settled near this site. In 1870, upon the deaths of their infant twin sons Thomas and Philip, they began a family burial ground which became known as Henderson Cemetery. Other family members and neighbors were also buried in the graveyard. (1990)

Historical Marker →

Sherman's Mill

1870

A pioneer Kerr County water-powered mill located near Kelly Creek-Guadalupe River confluence. It ground corn, sawed lumber, ginned cotton. Built in 1870s by John Sherman, it was in use until destroyed by flood in 1932. Sherman, his wife, and 8 children lived in house still standing nearby. (1972) Incise on base of marker: Marker Sponsor: A Sherman descendant, Dovie Turk Talley

Historical Marker → · 3.3 mi away

Butt, Howard Edward

1905

Howard Edward Butt, businessman, was born April 9, 1895, in Memphis, Tennessee, the son of Charles Clarence and Florence (Thornton) Butt . His father, a pharmacist, suffered from tuberculosis, so the family moved to Kerrville in the Hill Country of Texas, where the drier climate was believed therapeutic. To support the family, Florence Butt purchased wholesale groceries in 1905 with which she opened a small store in Kerrville later that year. Her cash resources at the time the store opened were sixty dollars. The family of five lived in rented rooms over the store. Howard, the youngest of three boys, helped his mother with the business, delivering groceries first in a child's wagon and later on horseback. He began to manage the store at age sixteen. He graduated as the valedictorian of Tivy High School in 1914. After hitchhiking to California for the summer, he harvested grapes to earn his return train fare and visited the home of his favorite author, Jack London, to whom he introduced himself. Before enlisting in the United States Navy for service in World War I , Butt chose for himself the middle name Edward. He served from 1917 to 1919, part of that time as aide to the commandant at the Great Lakes Naval Station. In 1919 he returned to Kerrville and joined his mother in managing the small family store. In 1921 he converted the store to cash-and-carry instead of charge and deliver, a move that was considered quite a gamble at the time. He attempted four expansions of the business–a feed store in Kerrville and grocery stores in Center Point, Junction, and Brownwood–all of which failed. Other attempts in such towns as Eagle Pass, Uvalde, and Crystal City also failed. On December 5, 1924, Butt married Mary Elizabeth Holdsworth of Kerrville ( see BUTT, MARY E. H. ). In 1926 he opened a store in Del Rio that proved successful. In 1928 he borrowed $38,000, moved to the Rio Grande valley, and purchased three small stores. He began calling his stores H. E. Butt Grocery Company in 1935 and changed the name to H-E-B in 1946. Butt expanded the grocery business in the Rio Grande valley and South and Central Texas, entering Corpus Christi in 1931, Austin in 1938, and San Antonio in 1942. Company headquarters moved to Corpus Christi in 1940. As one of the first to begin developing "one-stop shopping," he added a meat market, delicatessen, and bakery to his stores. By the 1950s H-E-B was the leading food retailer in South and Central Texas. By 1960 the company operated over eighty stores and its own food processing and distribution facilities. Butt's son, Charles C. Butt, succeeded him as president in 1971 and as chairman in 1984. Butt was a thirty-third-degree Mason and a Baptist deacon. He established the H. E. Butt Family Foundation in 1933, one of the earliest philanthropic foundations in Texas. He and his wife pioneered programs instrumental in eliminating tuberculosis in South Texas. They provided libraries and recreational facilities–swimming pools and tennis courts–to many South Texas communities, making seed-money gifts and urging municipal governments to implement these projects, particularly in low-income areas. He also began developing the H. E. Butt Foundation Camp in 1954. Under Butt's leadership, H-E-B regularly gave the maximum philanthropic contributions allowable under federal law. He maintained a strong sense of involvement in the communities that his businesses served. He was a member of the board of directors of Texas A&I college and the University of Corpus Christi. On March 30, 1972, the Texas Senate gave Butt a special commendation for his contributions to the state. He died at age ninety-five on March 12, 1991, in Corpus Christi. At the time of his death there were more than 170 H-E-B supermarkets.

Tsha Handbook → · 6.9 mi away

H-E-B

1905

H-E-B, a Texas-based supermarket chain, began in 1905 when Florence Thornton Butt moved her family to Kerrville, Texas. With a sixty-dollar loan, she established Mrs. C. C. Butt's Staple and Fancy Grocery, a one-room grocery store on the ground floor of the family home. In 1919 she turned management of the business over to her youngest son, Howard Edward Butt . Howard Butt, who delivered groceries from the store by wagon as a boy, went on to introduce major low-cost distribution innovations that eliminated middlemen and maximized profits when he took over the store's management. In 1922 he replaced the credit-and-delivery system with a policy of self-service cash-and-carry, thus increasing the turnover of goods and heralding a new era of shopping. He also renamed the business the C.C. Butt Cash Grocery and diversified his store by adding a meat market. Despite a lack of success at early attempts to expand into Central Texas, Butt was able to establish a successful enterprise at Del Rio in 1926, followed in 1927 by the purchase of three grocery stores in the lower Rio Grande valley. By specializing in low-priced goods the company survived the Great Depression so successfully that Butt was able to introduce employee picnics and a group life-insurance policy, move company headquarters to the Rio Grande valley , and expand to nearly twenty stores in Southwest Texas, with a gross business of $2 million in 1931. The company also organized a buying department and construction division. It began advertising with free gifts-dispensed in one case by throwing tagged live chickens, good for free groceries, and handfuls of nickels off a store roof-and later gave away cars, mink stoles, trading stamps, and cash prizes. In the mid-1930s, Butt again changed the name of his enterprise-this time to H.E. Butt Grocery Company. Under this name, he moved into manufacturing by acquiring the Harlingen Canning Company and opening a bakery in Corpus Christi in 1936. In 1940 company headquarters moved from the Valley to Corpus Christi to centralize distribution to its growing territory. In 1942, the year Butt installed air-conditioning in stores and introduced frozen foods, he also opened the first store under the name H-E-B, in San Antonio. During World War II the company's Harlingen Canning Company produced food for the armed forces, and won a War Food Administration "A" award for its food processing. Women served as store managers, and H-E-B became known for its interest in personnel development. A store that opened in Austin in 1944 became the fiftieth H-E-B. Grocery stores grew into supermarkets in the 1950s, and during that decade H-E-B introduced in-store fish markets, butcher shops, drugstores, and bakeries, though Butt's stores carried no beer or wine-Butt was a traditional Baptist deacon-until his son took over in the 1970s. The Texas Gold Stamp Company, a subsidiary, was organized in 1955 to produce consumer trading stamps, and the first retail support center, a manufacturing and distribution center, was opened in San Antonio in 1964. In 1971 Charles C. Butt, a graduate of the Wharton School of Finance and Commerce of the University of Pennsylvania, took over his father's position as president and chief executive officer of the company. Under his administration, the firm restructured its management and introduced generic goods. A milk plant opened in San Antonio in 1976, and the company introduced Futuremarkets, a further diversification that added in-store pharmacies, photo processing, and video rentals. During the 1980s, H-E-B stores began offering bulk foods and fresh flowers. The Company headquarters moved to the renovated army arsenal on the San Antonio River in 1985. In 1988 Forbes named H-E-B the thirty-sixth largest private company in the United States, with annual sales of $2 billion. At Howard Butt's death in 1991, the company, centered around its San Antonio Retail Support Center, had grown to 175 stores and twenty-one video stores

Tsha Handbook → · 6.9 mi away

Butt, Florence Thornton

1905

Florence Thornton Butt, whose grocery store was the first link in the H-E-B chain founded by her son Howard Edward Butt , was born in Buena Vista, Mississippi, on September 19, 1864, the daughter of John and Mary (Kimbrough) Thornton. She spent her youth in Buena Vista, where she often assisted her two pastor brothers in holding revivals. She later enrolled in Clinton College and, as the only female in her class, graduated with highest honors. Afterward, she taught school. In 1889 she married pharmacist Clarence C. Butt. The couple lived in Mississippi and Tennessee before moving to Texas in 1904 in search of a more suitable climate and better medical facilities to treat Clarence's tuberculosis. After a year in San Antonio, the family, which included their three young sons, moved to Kerrville. With her husband unable to work, Mrs. Butt became an agent for the A&P Tea Company, taking and delivering grocery orders door-to-door. She accumulated a small stock of groceries and invested sixty dollars to open the C. C. Butt Grocery on Main Street in Kerrville. The store was on the ground floor of a two-story building, which Mrs. Butt rented for nine dollars a month. She combined her business and domestic responsibilities by moving her family into the second floor of the building and using her sons as delivery boys. She continued to run the store until 1919, when her son Howard returned from the navy and took over as manager. She then concentrated on religious and civic efforts in Kerrville. She was a devout Baptist and a leader in the Eastern Star. She died at her Kerrville home on March 4, 1954, after suffering a stroke, and was buried in Glen Rest Cemetery. Her survivors included her sons Howard and Eugene. By the end of the twentieth century the H-E-B stores were the largest privately owned food chain in the nation.

Tsha Handbook → · 6.9 mi away

Things to Do in Ingram

historical 22.9 mi away
Luckenbach Texas

Luckenbach was a failing ghost town of three residents when Hondo Crouch bought it in 1970 for thirty thousand dollars and declared himself mayor of an…
historical 21.2 mi away
The Treue der Union Monument

Comfort's Treue der Union monument is the only memorial to Union soldiers on former Confederate soil south of the Mason-Dixon line. It honors thirty-four…
historical 21.3 mi away
The Nueces Massacre

In August 1862 sixty-eight German Unionists from the Comfort area fled south toward Mexico rather than fight for the Confederacy. Confederate soldiers caught…
historical 21.2 mi away
The Freethinker Colony

Comfort was founded in 1854 by German intellectuals fleeing the failed revolutions of 1848. They were freethinkers -- educated liberals who opposed slavery and…
historical 21.2 mi away
The Fachwerk Buildings

Comfort has the most intact collection of fachwerk -- German half-timber construction -- in Texas. The settlers used the same building techniques their…
quirky 21.3 mi away
The Town With No Church

Comfort's German freethinker founders were so committed to separation of church and state that the town had no church building for its first forty years. They…
quirky 21.3 mi away
The Bald Cypress Tunnel

The Guadalupe River near Comfort runs through a tunnel of ancient bald cypress trees so thick the canopy blocks out the summer sun completely. Some of these…
quirky 0.7 mi away
Stonehenge II

Two retired Hill Country friends built a sixty percent scale replica of Stonehenge in a cow pasture outside Ingram in 1989 as a conversation piece. They added…
day trip
Stonehenge II, Ingram, TX - Why Is This Here?

Featured on The Daytripper — a full-episode local travel guide.

Everything Near Ingram

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

  • Why the Guadalupe Rises So Fast · 0.2 mi

    Ingram sits in the heart of what hydrologists call Flash Flood Alley, and the geology explains why. The Hill Country is karst: thin soil over hard limestone on steep slopes, so rain runs off almost instantly instead of…

  • The Preacher Who Named the Town · 0.2 mi

    Ingram carries the name of one man: J.C.W. Ingram, a Presbyterian minister who was also a merchant, postmaster, pharmacist, and at times a constable and sheriff. He set up a store and a post office on the Guadalupe…

  • Cypress Shingles From the River Bottom · 0.2 mi

    Before ranching and hunting leases defined this stretch of Kerr County, the Guadalupe River bottom offered a different kind of wealth: bald cypress. Early Ingram settlers farmed the valley and made shingles by hand from…

  • Cade House · 0.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Cade House, a testament to family building. Doctor Guilford Marion Cade moved here in 1883. His son Gilford P. Cade later rebuilt the family home after a storm, and then, with his own son Marion,…

  • Stonehenge II · 0.5 mi · Historical Marker

    A 60-percent scale replica of Stonehenge built by retired oilman Al Shepperd in the Hill Country near Ingram, later relocated to the Hill Country Arts Foundation campus.

  • A Stonehenge in the Hill Country · 0.7 mi

    Ingram is home to Stonehenge II, a plaster-and-mesh reproduction of England's ancient stone circle standing on the grounds of the Hill Country Arts Foundation. It began in 1989 as a lark: neighbor Doug Hill offered Al…

  • Texas Theater Under the Stars · 0.7 mi

    On the banks of the Guadalupe River in Ingram sits the Point Theatre, an outdoor stage that has run every summer since 1959, making it the longest-running outdoor theater in Texas. It grew out of the Hill Country Arts…

  • Stonehenge II · 0.7 mi · Local history

    Stonehenge II started in 1989 when Doug Hill had a leftover limestone slab from a patio job and offered it to his neighbor Al Shepperd. Shepperd, a Hill Country Arts Foundation patron, decided to use it as the keystone…

  • An Outdoor Stage on the Guadalupe · 0.8 mi

    You're on the banks of the Guadalupe River, at the Hill Country Arts Foundation in Ingram, home of the Smith-Ritch Point Theatre. This is an open-air stage that's been putting on shows here since the summer of 1959, the…

  • The Journey of Stonehenge II · 1.9 mi

    One of Ingram's most distinct landmarks isn't historic - it's a massive piece of folk art. Just off the highway, you'll find Stonehenge II, a scale replica of the famous prehistoric monument in England. It was conceived…

  • Ingram, TX · 1.9 mi

    Ingram's got that Hill Country charm, you know? That laid-back feel you can't quite put your finger on. Seems like it's always been a place where folks could catch their breath and maybe even find a little inspiration.

  • The Little Town with the Big Arts Scene · 1.9 mi

    For a town its size, Ingram has an arts scene that punches way above its weight, and it's all thanks to the Hill Country Arts Foundation. Founded way back in 1959, the HCAF was the dream of local visionaries who wanted…

Show all 169 nearby places
  • The Summer Camp Capital of Texas · 1.9 mi

    As you travel the Guadalupe River near Ingram, you're in the middle of Texas camp country. For more than a century this stretch of river has been the epicenter of a summer camp industry. It started in 1921, when Herbert…

  • The Science of Flash Flood Alley · 1.9 mi

    The Guadalupe through Ingram looks peaceful, but this is 'Flash Flood Alley,' one of the most flood-prone regions in North America. The science is geology plus meteorology. The ground here is thin soil over hard…

  • Henderson Cemetery · 2.2 mi · Historical Marker

    Howard Henderson (1842-1908) came to Texas in 1857. He was a survivor of the Civil War Battle of the Nueces in 1862, in which he and other Unionists were ambushed by a Confederate force near the Nueces River. He later…

  • Sherman's Mill · 3.3 mi · Historical Marker

    A pioneer Kerr County water-powered mill located near Kelly Creek-Guadalupe River confluence. It ground corn, sawed lumber, ginned cotton. Built in 1870s by John Sherman, it was in use until destroyed by flood in 1932.…

  • Gatlin Site · 3.5 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Gatlin Site. The construction of the new Spur 98 bridge across the Guadalupe River in Kerrville in 2004 was the catalyst for an archeological investigation yielding an extensive ancient Native…

  • Kerrville Lodge No. 697, A.F. & A.M. · 4.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the Kerrville Masonic Lodge, chartered in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1890</say-as>. The lodge used a stone building from Charles Schreiner until acquiring a second structure…

  • Starkey Cemetery · 4.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Starkey Cemetery, the final resting place for some of Kerr County's earliest vital contributors. It began as a simple family plot for James Monroe Starkey, who arrived in 1854 and became the county's…

  • First Christian Church · 4.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Kerrville's First Christian Church. In the early 1880s, local women raised funds for a Union church, completed in 1885, which was shared by several denominations. By 1925, the Christian…

  • Why the First Industry Here Was Roofs · 4.5 mi

    Before ranching, before wool, before tourists, Kerrville ran on shingles. The bald cypress lining the Guadalupe River is rot-resistant and splits cleanly, which made it ideal for hand-rived roof shingles in a frontier…

  • Old Spanish Trail · 4.6 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through the heart of the Old Spanish Trail, a route that connected San Antonio all the way through Bandera Pass and right here through Kerrville. For centuries, this path was used by Native Americans,…

  • Kerrville · 4.8 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerrville, a town that owes its name to a Republic of Texas soldier, James Kerr. The county was officially created in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1856</say-as>, and the county seat,…

  • Schumacher Crossing on the Guadalupe River · 5.1 mi

    You're driving past Schumacher Crossing on the Guadalupe River. Christian Schumacher arrived in Texas from Germany in 1845, the same year he was born. He settled in Kerr County in 1880, eventually building his home near…

  • Hunt · 5.7 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Hunt, Texas, a community that started as two settlements, Japonica and Pebble, back in the late 1850s. The area really took shape in 1912 when Alva and Lizzie Joy bought land right here at the…

  • Mount Olive Baptist Church · 5.7 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Mount Olive Baptist Church. Organized in September 1902 by Reverend G. W. Merriweather, the congregation first met in a small schoolhouse. The church has served the Kerrville community…

  • Schreiner, A. C., Jr. · 5.8 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the former home of A. C. Schreiner, Jr., a significant figure in Kerrville's business and ranching history. His father, Charles A. Schreiner, built the original section of this house in 1897 as a…

  • Schreiner, Captain Charles · 5.9 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerrville, and you're passing the site of a true Texas empire builder: Captain Charles Schreiner. Born in France, he came to the U.S. in 1852 and served with distinction in the Texas Rangers from…

  • Great Western Cattle Trail · 5.9 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerrville, a town that was once a vital hub for one of America's most famous cattle drives. Back in 1874, rancher John T. Lytle blazed the Great Western Cattle Trail. This massive route,…

  • H-E-B · 5.9 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerrville, passing the birthplace of a Texas giant: H-E-B. It all started in 1905 when Florence Butt, with just $60, opened a tiny grocery store on Main Street. Her youngest son, Howard, took over…

  • Barnett Chapel Methodist Church · 5.9 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Barnett Chapel, the oldest African American church in Kerr County. In 1896, Jim and Josephine Barnett helped start the first religious services for Black residents here, and the church…

  • Scott and Josephine Carr Schreiner · 5.9 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the former home of Scott and Josephine Schreiner, influential Kerrville residents. Scott led the Chamber of Commerce and his name graces the municipal golf course. Josephine, a trained musician,…

  • Kerrville Daily Times · 6.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerrville, home to a newspaper with a long and evolving history: The Kerrville Daily Times. It started life way back in 1910 as the Center Point News. Imagine, a weekly paper that eventually…

  • Kerrville Mountain Sun · 6.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerrville, and right here is the birthplace of a newspaper that's been serving this town for over a century. It all started in the 1870s as 'The Frontiersman.' Over the years, it went through…

  • How Kerrville Became the Mohair Center of the World · 6.1 mi

    Captain Charles Schreiner arrived in Kerrville in 1869 and built a frontier empire out of a general store. Alsace-born and a former Texas Ranger, Schreiner figured out something nobody else in America had: that the…

  • Pampell Opera House · 6.1 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerrville, and right here is the site of the Pampell Opera House. Built around 1895 as a hotel and store, local merchant John Pampell bought it in 1901. He transformed the second floor into a…

  • Education in Hunt · 6.1 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Hunt, where education for local children began around 1915. The Hunt School combined earlier rural schools, and the community built a new one away from the river in 1926. After incorporating the…

  • The Father of Country Music Chased Clean Air to Kerrville · 6.2 mi

    Kerrville was once a place sick people came to breathe, and in 1929 the most famous of them was Jimmie Rodgers, the Singing Brakeman and the man country music calls its father. Diagnosed with tuberculosis in 1924, when…

  • Kerrville, TX · 6.2 mi

    Kerrville wouldn't be Kerrville without James Avery Jewelry. It's more than just a business here; it's woven into the fabric of the town. Founded in 1954, in a small workshop, the company started with the simple idea of…

  • The Limestone Mansion the Schreiner Family Built · 6.2 mi

    At 226 Earl Garrett Street stands the house that put a face on Kerrville's most powerful family. Captain Charles Schreiner built this limestone mansion in 1879, the first limestone building in Kerr County, and hired the…

  • The Airplane With the Backward Tail, Built in Kerrville · 6.2 mi

    Kerrville is one of the few small towns in America with its own line of airplanes, and they wear an aerodynamic signature you can spot from across a ramp. Mooney Aircraft moved to Kerrville in early 1953, and here…

  • James Kerr · 6.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through the heart of the Texas Hill Country, near the town that bears his name. James Kerr, a veteran of the War of 1812 and a former Missouri legislator, arrived in Texas in 1825. He was tasked with…

  • The Kerrville Axe · 6.2 mi

    Step outside in Kerrville and you'll see it everywhere — Ashe juniper, the scrubby "cedar" that blankets the Texas Hill Country, drinks the water table dry, and chokes out grass. In the 1920s, two Kerrville men, Henry…

  • The Shinglemaker's Town Named for a Man Who Never Saw It · 6.2 mi

    The town you're rolling into started as a cypress camp, not a townsite. In 1846 Joshua Brown, a shinglemaker and veteran of the Battle of San Jacinto, led about ten men up the Guadalupe River hunting the giant bald…

  • The Diagonal Dam That Powered a Town · 6.2 mi

    On the bluff above the Guadalupe, German miller Christian Dietert and millwright Balthasar Lich built the machine that turned a cypress camp into a real town. Arriving in 1857, the two designed a grist and saw mill,…

  • The Road Goes On Forever, and It Runs Through Kerrville · 6.2 mi

    Texas songwriter Robert Earl Keen has called the Kerrville area home for decades, working from a ranch in these hills outside town. Keen built one of the most loyal followings in Texas music writing literate,…

  • The Town That Promised to Cure You · 6.2 mi

    In the early twentieth century, before antibiotics, a tuberculosis diagnosis was often a death sentence, and the only prescription doctors trusted was dry, mild air. Kerrville's Hill Country climate gave the town a…

  • Africa in Texas and the Longhorns Brought Back From the Brink · 6.2 mi

    Out toward Mountain Home in Kerr County sprawls the YO Ranch, bought by Captain Charles Schreiner in 1880 with profits from trailing longhorns to Dodge City. The ranch did two genuinely remarkable things. First, when…

  • Shopping and Eating Where the Camels Once Camped · 6.2 mi

    Down State Highway 173 between Kerrville and Bandera, at the crossroads by old Camp Verde, the Camp Verde General Store has been selling to travelers since 1857, when it opened as the Williams Community Store to trade…

  • Early Settlers of Kerr County · 6.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the first industry in what would become Kerrville. Back in 1846, Joshua D. Brown, a veteran of the Republic of Texas, led ten shingle makers to this spot on the Guadalupe River. He'd…

  • San Antonio & Aransas Pass Passenger Train Depot · 6.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past San Antonio & Aransas Pass Passenger Train Depot. In 1887, Kerrville was chosen as the last stop on the SA&AP Railroad. A wood depot was erected four blocks west of here to accommodate the large…

  • The Saluting Cadet of Delaney Hall · 6.2 mi

    Schreiner University began life in 1917 as the Schreiner Institute, and for decades it ran as a military-style school, which is the backdrop for the campus legend students still trade after dark. The stories center on…

  • Kerr County · 6.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerr County, named for James Kerr, a true Texas pioneer. He was the first American settler on the Guadalupe River and played a key role in early Texas government, even signing the Declaration of…

  • Kerrville Telephone Company · 6.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerrville, where the telephone first rang in this area back in 1896. It all started with a handshake and a thousand dollars between A.C. Schriner and D.H. Comparette, Sr., connecting two wool…

  • Beitel Lumberyard · 6.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerrville, and right here is where Frank Beitel set up shop back in 1889. When the railroad made this its last stop, Beitel saw opportunity. His lumberyard, with its warehouses and sheds, became a…

  • The Man Who Built Kerrville · 6.3 mi

    You can't talk about Kerrville without talking about Captain Charles Schreiner. He arrived in 1869, a young Confederate veteran and former Texas Ranger, and saw a future here that no one else did. He started with a…

  • The U.S. Army's Camel Corps · 6.3 mi

    Just a short drive south of Kerrville lies the site of one of the strangest experiments in U.S. military history. In the 1850s, the War Department decided that camels were the solution for transporting supplies across…

  • The Climate Cure: Kerrville's Sanitariums · 6.3 mi

    In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, before the discovery of antibiotics, a diagnosis of tuberculosis was often a death sentence. Doctors had only one prescription: rest and clean, dry air. This medical theory,…

  • The Songwriter's Mecca · 6.3 mi

    Just south of town, at a place called the Quiet Valley Ranch, something magical happens every year. Since 1972, it has been home to the Kerrville Folk Festival. What started as a three-day event is now the…

  • The Parkway That Erased a Town · 6.3 mi

    The road you're on, or one just like it, is the most powerful force in modern Houston. State Highway 249, the Tomball Parkway, is a work of transportation engineering that redefined Kohrville right out of existence. And…

  • Kohrville, TX · 6.3 mi

    Kohrville, Texas, has a rich history that dates back to before 1870 when it was founded by freed slaves from Alabama. The town was named after Paul Kohrmann, a German immigrant who served as the first postmaster. The…

  • A National Brand from a Two-Car Garage · 6.3 mi

    You've probably seen the distinctive jewelry in stores across the country, but the James Avery story starts right here in Kerrville. In 1954, James Avery, a former Air Force pilot and instructor, started his business in…

  • Berryville, TX · 6.3 mi · Local history

    The recent controversy over the Berryville Creek development continues to be a central topic of discussion at the weekly farmers market and the diner counter. For years, the creek, a tributary of the Neches River, has…

  • Guthrie Building · 6.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Guthrie Building, a stone structure that's been a fixture in Kerrville since 1887. It started as the newspaper office for Robert Guthrie, a Scottish immigrant whose family had been publishing…

  • Notre Dame Catholic School · 6.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Notre Dame Catholic School in Kerrville. Founded in 1912 by Father Henry Kemper, a priest who came to Kerrville seeking recovery from tuberculosis, this school offered education for a…

  • The Slow Disappearance of Kohrville · 6.3 mi

    Towns can die in many ways. Some are flooded, some are abandoned, but Kohrville simply faded — and what faded here is not what most people assume. In the 1870s, freed slaves from Alabama came to this stretch of Harris…

  • Dietert, Christian · 6.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Christian Dietert's mill, built right here in 1857. This German millwright, who'd already built mills elsewhere in Texas, partnered with Balthasar Lich to construct this mill and dam. It…

  • First Presbyterian Church of Kerrville · 6.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the First Presbyterian Church of Kerrville. Presbyterians here organized their congregation in 1888, initially sharing a Union Church. They built a small wooden church that same year, which was later…

  • Zion Lutheran Church · 6.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Zion Lutheran Church. This congregation began with worship services in family homes as early as 1898 and was officially organized in 1901 with seven families. They built their first…

  • Notre Dame Catholic Church · 6.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Notre Dame Catholic Church in Kerrville. It began in 1892 as a mission called St. Mary of the Assumption. The church became a parish in 1911, moved to its current location, and later changed its name…

  • Kennedy-Peterson House · 6.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Kennedy-Peterson House, built in 1914 for Austin Milton Kennedy, a seven-term Texas State Representative and Speaker of the House. He moved here seeking treatment for tuberculosis, but lived only…

  • Saint Peter's Episcopal Church · 6.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Saint Peter's Episcopal Church in Kerrville. Episcopalians here first gathered in the county courthouse way back in 1881. They built their first small church in the late 1880s. But here’s a cool bit…

  • First Baptist Church of Kerrville · 6.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the First Baptist Church of Kerrville. Organized in 1887 with eleven members, the congregation officially became the First Baptist Church of Kerrville seven years later. They built their…

  • Comparette Home · 6.5 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Comparette Home, a Victorian beauty built back in 1890. It saw a few owners, including Dr. R. H. P. Wright, a local physician whose daughter Fay would go on to marry Texas Governor Coke…

  • Hunt Japonica Cemetery · 6.5 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Hunt Japonica Cemetery, a quiet resting place for Kerr County pioneers. The oldest stone you can see here belongs to George T. Henry, and it’s dated all the way back to 1872. That was sixteen…

  • Tivy School · 6.6 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the historic Tivy School in Kerrville. Captain Joseph Tivy, a Canadian who became Kerrville's first mayor and a Texas legislator, donated 16 acres right here in 1890 for a school. He also…

  • Butt, Howard Edward · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    Howard Edward Butt, businessman, was born April 9, 1895, in Memphis, Tennessee, the son of Charles Clarence and Florence (Thornton) Butt . His father, a pharmacist, suffered from tuberculosis, so the family moved to…

  • H-E-B · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    H-E-B, a Texas-based supermarket chain, began in 1905 when Florence Thornton Butt moved her family to Kerrville, Texas. With a sixty-dollar loan, she established Mrs. C. C. Butt's Staple and Fancy Grocery, a one-room…

  • Butt, Florence Thornton · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    Florence Thornton Butt, whose grocery store was the first link in the H-E-B chain founded by her son Howard Edward Butt , was born in Buena Vista, Mississippi, on September 19, 1864, the daughter of John and Mary…

  • Schreiner, Charles Armand · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the Texas Hill Country, near Kerrville. Right here, Charles Armand Schreiner built an empire. He arrived in the area after the Civil War, a poor rancher, but by 1869, he'd opened a general store.…

  • Dietert, Christian · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerrville, a town that owes much of its early success to Christian Dietert. This German master miller arrived in Texas in 1854 and, after a couple of early setbacks with floods and droughts, he…

  • Reid, Asa Elmer, Jr. [Ace] · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the Texas Hill Country, maybe near Kerrville, and you might just be passing by the legacy of Ace Reid. Born in Lelia Lake in 1925, Reid grew up with the dust of the Depression and the life of a…

  • Schreiner, Gustave Frederick · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the Texas Hill Country, near Kerrville, the town known as the "father of Kerrville" helped build. That was Gustave Frederick Schreiner, a rancher and philanthropist who managed the Schreiner Land…

  • Tivy, Joseph Albert · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the Texas Hill Country, perhaps near Kerrville. Right here, Joseph Albert Tivy wasn't just a surveyor, rancher, or even a state representative. He was a visionary who believed in education for…

  • Kerrville, TX · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerrville, a town that owes its start to shinglemakers and a river bluff. It began as Brownsborough in the early 1850s, founded by pioneers like Joshua D. Brown, a veteran of the Battle of San…

  • Kerr County · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerr County, a place that's seen thousands of years of human history, but it wasn't until the mid-1800s that Anglo settlers tried to make a permanent home here. In 1846, a group tried to establish…

  • Kerrville State Hospital · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerrville, and right here on this hill overlooking the Guadalupe River, you're passing the site of the Kerrville State Hospital. It started in 1937 as the Kerrville State Sanatorium for Negroes,…

  • Kerrville-Schreiner Park · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving south of Kerrville on the Guadalupe River, and right here is Kerrville-Schreiner Park. Back in the late 1930s, this park was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps, Company 1823. These were Black…

  • Schreiner, Louis Albert · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerrville, the heart of the Texas Hill Country. Right here, Louis Albert Schreiner, a man dedicated to his community, was encouraging local ranchers during the Great Depression. He urged them to…

  • Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Kerrville · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerrville, and right here, on the southeastern edge of town, stands a testament to Texas grit and generosity. It started in 1919 with a dream to build a hospital for World War I veterans, funded…

  • Westminster Encampment · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerrville, and right here, on the southeastern edge of town, operated the Westminster Encampment from 1906 to 1950. This Presbyterian conference center was a summer haven for families seeking…

  • Burney, Hance McCain · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerrville, Texas, a town that owes its start to a pioneer named Hance McCain Burney. Back in 1858, Burney became the very first postmaster here. He wasn't just a mailman, though. He also built one…

  • Burney, Robert Hance · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerr County, Texas, and right here in Kerrville, Robert Hance Burney built a career that touched many parts of Texas life. After a stint with the Texas Rangers in the 1870s, Burney studied law at…

  • Disabled American Veterans · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're rolling through Kerrville, Texas, where in May of <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1923</say-as>, a significant organization for veterans took root. Right here, the Department of Texas of the Disabled…

  • Lacey, Howard George · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the Texas Hill Country, and right here in what is now Kerr County, you're passing the former home of Howard George Lacey. Born to aristocracy in England, Lacey came to Texas in 1882, settling on…

  • Upper Guadalupe River Authority · 6.9 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Kerrville, the heart of the upper Guadalupe River basin. Back in <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1939</say-as>, the Texas Legislature created the Upper Guadalupe River Authority. Its…

  • Camp Mystic · 7.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the beautiful Hill Country near Hunt, and right here on the South Fork of the Guadalupe River is Camp Mystic. Founded in 1926 as a summer camp for girls, it offered everything from roping to…

  • Crider’s Rodeo and Dance Hall · 7.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving past Hunt, Texas, and right here is a place that's been a Texas tradition for generations: Crider's Rodeo and Dance Hall! It started in 1925 as a Fourth of July fundraiser for the local PTA. Soon, dancing…

  • Guadalupe River · 7.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving along the Guadalupe River, a waterway with a name that's stuck for over 300 years. Back in 1689, Spanish explorer Alonso De León first called it the Guadalupe. Though another explorer tried to rename it…

  • Camp Verde, TX · 7.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    Camp Verde is on the north bank of Verde Creek six miles southwest of Center Point in southeastern Kerr County. It grew around the Williams community store, established adjacent to Camp Verde in 1857 in order to serve…

  • Indian Blackbuck Antelope · 7.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the Texas Hill Country, and you might just spot an animal that doesn't quite belong. Right here, in what is now Kerr County, the Indian blackbuck antelope was first introduced in 1932. These…

  • Mo-Ranch · 7.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the beautiful Texas Hill Country, west of Hunt, and right here is the Mo-Ranch. It wasn't always a Presbyterian conference center. Back in the late 1920s, this sprawling property was bought by…

  • Turtle Creek School and Cemetery · 7.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through the Turtle Creek area, just west of Kerrville. Look for the old schoolhouse and cemetery – a testament to the pioneer settlers who carved out a life here. The oldest marked grave belongs to Miles…

  • Glen Rest Cemetery · 7.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Glen Rest Cemetery, established in 1894 by Kerrville citizens as a community burial ground. It started with a ten-acre tract and has grown to hold thousands of interments, with some families having…

  • Cypress Creek, TX · 7.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    The Cypress Creek community, also known as Cypressville, is ten miles southeast of Kerrville in eastern Kerr County. It was named after a tributary of the Guadalupe River and comprises some fifty farms and ranches along…

  • Kerr Wildlife Management Area · 7.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the Texas Hill Country, and right here is the Kerr Wildlife Management Area. Established in August of <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1950</say-as>, this nearly 6,500-acre preserve was…

  • The Divide, TX · 7.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    The Divide is a dispersed rural community located along several miles of State Highway 41 about thirty miles west-northwest of Kerrville in western Kerr County. In the early 1880s settlers homesteaded along this strip…

  • Schreiner College (Schreiner Institute) · 7.1 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Schreiner College, which started as a vision for a boys' school back in the early 1900s. Businessman Charles Schreiner donated land and money in 1914, but World War I delayed things. The…

  • Tivy, Captain Joseph A. · 7.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the area where Captain Joseph A. Tivy made his mark on Texas. Born in Canada in 1818, Tivy headed to Texas with his sisters in 1837. He served as a Texas Ranger, then struck gold in California in…

  • Gus F. Schreiner Home · 7.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the former "Cedarcrest," the home of Gus F. Schreiner, built right here in Kerrville. His father, Charles, a wealthy rancher and banker, bought this land back in 1883. Gus took over, and in 1901, he…

  • Site of Animal Health Discovery · 7.5 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Kerrville, where a groundbreaking discovery in animal health happened. Back in the late 1930s, Dr. Edward F. Knipling theorized that releasing sterile male screwworms could break their reproductive…

  • The Ranch That Becomes a Songwriter's Town · 8.2 mi

    You're pulling onto Quiet Valley Ranch, nine miles south of Kerrville on the Medina Highway, home of the Kerrville Folk Festival since Rod Kennedy and Nancylee Davis started it in 1972. For nearly three weeks every late…

  • The Dowdy Tragedy of 1878 · 8.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerr County, near Mountain Home. In 1878, the Dowdy family settled here, moving from Goliad to Johnson Creek. But just after they arrived, tragedy struck. Four of the Dowdy children – Alice,…

  • Sunset Cemetery · 8.7 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Sunset Cemetery, a place that holds stories of both pioneer hardship and community resilience. The earliest marked graves here belong to four children of James and Susan Dowdy, tragically killed by…

  • Brown Cemetery · 8.8 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Brown Cemetery, a resting place with roots stretching back to the late 1840s. Joshua D. Brown himself, who built a shingle mill right here, is buried nearby. But the cemetery officially began in…

  • The Army's Camel Experiment · 8.9 mi

    In eighteen fifty-six, the United States Army imported seventy-five camels from Egypt, Tunisia, and Turkey and brought them to Camp Verde, Texas — roughly forty miles southwest of present-day Kerrville. The experiment…

  • Camp Mystic - The Fourth of July Flood · 9.2 mi

    On the morning of July 4, 2025, the Guadalupe River rose twenty-six feet in less than an hour. Camp Mystic, an all-girls Christian summer camp on 725 acres along the river southwest of Hunt, sat directly in its path.…

  • Texas Lions Camp · 9.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Texas Lions Camp, a place born from a polio epidemic and a vision for kids. Back in 1948, local Lion Jack Roe saw handicapped children turned away from summer camps. He vowed to create a place…

  • Site of Reservation School · 10.8 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerr County, near Mountain Home. The Reservation School started in 1907 as a one-room school that also held Baptist church services. It moved to this site in 1919 and got a bigger building, but…

  • Wharton Cemetery · 11.1 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Center Point, and just off the road is Wharton Cemetery. This isn't just any old graveyard; it's the final resting place of William Watson Wharton, one of Kerr County's earliest settlers. He…

  • Harper, George Franklin · 13.2 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Harper, Texas, a community that owes its existence to George Franklin Harper. He arrived here in Gillespie County in 1880, seeking open rangelands after a life that included ranching, carpentry,…

  • Harper, TX · 14.1 mi

    Harper, Texas. It’s more than just a wide spot in the road, though it certainly has that peaceful, small-town tranquility you hear about.

  • Stoneleigh Ranch · 14.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the historic Stoneleigh Ranch, a place with roots stretching back to 1878. That's when George L. Leigh, seeking better health, arrived in Kerr County. He started a mercantile and even served as…

  • Camp Verde · 14.7 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Camp Verde, a U.S. Army frontier post established way back in July of <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1855</say-as>. This place became the headquarters for a truly bizarre…

  • Camp Verde General Store and Post Office · 14.9 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the Camp Verde General Store, which has a wild story tied to the U.S. Army's bizarre camel experiment. In 1857, this mercantile opened as the Williams Community Store, right near the Army…

  • Camp Verde, C.S.A. · 15.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Kerr County, Texas, where during the Civil War, a frontier regiment outpost was established in 1862, not far from the old U.S. post, Camp Verde. These Confederate troops were tasked with guarding…

  • One Mile to Ruins of Camp Verde · 15.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Camp Verde, a frontier post established by the U.S. Army way back in July of <say-as interpret-as="date" format="y">1855</say-as>.<break time="400ms"/> By <say-as interpret-as="date"…

  • Center Point, TX (Camp County) · 15.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Camp County, heading southeast of Pittsburg. Right here is the site of Center Point, a community founded by formerly enslaved people shortly after emancipation in 1865. It got its name because the…

  • Penateka Comanches · 15.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through the heart of the Edwards Plateau, a land once dominated by the Penateka Comanches. The 'honey eaters,' they called themselves, and their range stretched from right here all the way to the…

  • Center Point, TX (Kerr County) · 15.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through Center Point, a town with a name that's more descriptive than you might think. It wasn't always called Center Point, though. Back in 1859, early settler Dr. Charles de Ganahl opened a post office…

  • Burney, Jesse Green · 15.0 mi · Tsha Handbook

    You're driving through the Hill Country, maybe near Center Point in Kerr County. Right here, Jesse Green Burney was farming and building a political career. In 1895, he took his seat in the Texas House as one of the…

  • Rising Star Lodge No. 429, A.F. & A.M. · 15.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the Rising Star Lodge No. 429, chartered way back in 1875. Their first meeting hall burned down in 1900, taking all their records with it. The lodge met in another building until moving…

  • Zanzenberg · 15.1 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Center Point, and you're passing the site of Zanzenberg, home of Dr. Charles De Ganahl. He was a key figure here, a signer of the Texas Articles of Secession in 1861 and served as an Army Surgeon…

  • The Town That Named Itself the Middle · 15.1 mi

    Center Point sits on the Guadalupe River about eight miles southeast of Kerrville, and its name is a plain statement of geography. In 1859 Charles de Ganahl opened a post office inside his home on the north bank and…

  • Woolls Building · 15.1 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Woolls Building, one of Center Point's oldest commercial structures. Built between 1873 and 1875, it housed a mercantile business on the first floor and fraternal organizations upstairs. Notably,…

  • Center Point United Methodist Church · 15.1 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the Center Point United Methodist Church. Mrs. Henrietta Rees arranged for Methodist circuit riders to serve this area starting in 1852. Land was purchased for a church in 1872, and the…

  • Cypress Creek Cemetery · 15.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Cypress Creek Cemetery, a quiet link to the 19th-century heritage of this community. The oldest marked grave here is Laura Steves Boerner, who died in 1861. Her husband, Wilhelm, was killed at the…

  • Center Point Christian Church · 15.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the Center Point Christian Church, a community pillar for over 135 years. Founded in 1879 by traveling minister Green L. Surber, the church saw its first building burn down in 1888 but…

  • Center Point Cemetery · 15.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Center Point Cemetery, a resting place for over 1,400 souls. The town of Center Point itself was named Zanzenberg by Dr. Charles Ganahl, who emigrated from Austria, before settling on the name Center…

  • Center Point School · 15.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Center Point's first official school building. Before this limestone structure went up in 1911, classes were held in shacks and homes, and later in a building called the Center Point…

  • Harper Independent School District · 15.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Harper Independent School District. In 1884, Frank Harper, J.A. Rogers, E.C. Hopf, and W.P. Bowers met to organize a school for the growing Harper community.

  • The Rangers' Own Arlington · 15.5 mi

    The land here was bought for a church and cemetery in 1872, expanded in 1881 and again in 1901 to about 5.3 acres. Roughly 1,452 graves have been located, the oldest being Lydia Burney, who was born in 1795. But the…

  • McDonald Massacre · 15.5 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Gillespie County, where a peaceful pioneer settlement turned into a scene of terror in August 1864. Preacher Matthew Taylor had moved his family here for safety, but tragedy struck. Kiowa warriors…

  • N.O. Reynolds · 15.5 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Center Point, and right here is the final resting place of N.O. Reynolds, a lawman who made his mark on Texas history. Born in Pennsylvania and a Civil War veteran, Reynolds enlisted as a Texas…

  • The Bald Conifer Guarding the River · 15.5 mi

    The giant trees leaning over the Guadalupe at Center Point are bald cypress, and they are stranger than they look. Bald cypress is a conifer, a cone-bearing cousin of pines and firs, yet it drops its needles every fall,…

  • Hunt, TX · 15.5 mi

    Hunt, Texas, is nestled in the heart of Texas's Hill Country, characterized by rugged limestone hills that separate the coastal plain from the Edwards Plateau. The community sits at the junction of the north and south…

  • St. Anthony Catholic Parish · 15.5 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Harper, where the St. Anthony Catholic Church was established in 1908. Mass was first held in a private home, and the church itself was built and dedicated by 1909. The parish has served the…

  • St. James Lutheran Church · 15.5 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of St. James Lutheran Church. The first Lutheran congregation here officially organized on March 9, 1913, and chose the name St. James on January 11, 1914. The church building, dedicated on…

  • Mosty Brothers Nursery · 15.6 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Mosty Brothers Nursery. MOSTY BROTHERS NURSERY A son of Belgian immigrants, Leander A. Mosty worked as a cattle driver and broker in Kansas before migrating to Kerr County in 1897. Sensing a market…

  • Indian Sites on Cypress Creek · 15.7 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Center Point, and just off the road here is a place that's been important to humans for a very, very long time. This property, known as Sturdy Oak Farm, has been owned by the Lich family since…

  • Camp Verde - U.S. Camel Corps · 15.9 mi · Historical Marker

    In 1856, the U.S. Army did something genuinely bizarre: it imported 66 camels from Egypt, Turkey, and Tunisia to this outpost in the Texas Hill Country. The idea came from Secretary of War Jefferson Davis, who believed…

  • The Cypress Creek School · 16.2 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the Cypress Creek School, a testament to the German settlers who shaped this community. They formed their own school district way back in 1879. The first little frame building was…

  • Hill Crest Cemetery · 16.5 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past Hill Crest Cemetery near Fredericksburg, a place tied to a unique Texas ranch. This isn't just any graveyard; it's closely linked to the Morris Ranch, an early international racehorse breeding and…

  • Highway One Seventy Three and Westmoreland's Fire Brigade · 16.6 mi

    State Highway One Seventy Three, from near Kerrville down to near Jourdanton, is the One Seventy Third Airborne Brigade Memorial Highway. The highway and the brigade share a number. Texas lawmakers passed the…

  • Morris Ranch Schoolhouse · 16.6 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the Morris Ranch Schoolhouse, a building with a dual purpose. Constructed in 1893, it wasn't just for students; this native limestone structure also served as a place of worship for local…

  • Spanish fought Apaches in the 1730s · 16.7 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Bandera Pass, a natural cut through the hills that's been a vital corridor for centuries. Spanish soldiers fought Apaches here in the 1730s, and later, Texas Rangers and Comanche warriors clashed…

  • Bandera Pass · 16.7 mi · Historical Marker

    The prominent feature known as Bandera Pass is a notable landmark in the topography and history of the region. The pass is a narrow natural cut through a chain of hills which run roughly east and west and divide the…

  • Bandera Pass · 17.0 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Bandera Pass, a name that echoes with the clash of cultures on the Texas frontier. For centuries, this was a vital corridor through the mountains, known from the earliest days of Spanish…

  • The Lights and the Headless Rider of Bandera Pass · 17.0 mi

    After dark, the legend of Bandera Pass takes over from the history. The same rocky gap north of town that gave Bandera its name has long been the subject of ghost stories told around Hill Country campfires. Drivers…

  • First Baptist Church of Harper · 17.3 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of Harper's First Baptist Church. Organized in 1887 with just nine members, the congregation met in a schoolhouse and a brush arbor before building their first sanctuary in 1897. The current…

  • Newcomer, Joe H. · 18.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through Medina, and you might be passing the final resting place of Joe H. Newcomer. Newcomer wasn't just one thing; he wore many hats across Texas. He served as a Special Texas Ranger and Deputy Sheriff…

  • The Nineteen Thirty Seven Road From Texline to Orange · 19.0 mi

    On May eighteenth, nineteen thirty seven, a Texas highway minute order gave the name Veterans of Foreign Wars Memorial Highway to a chain of roads. The route started at the New Mexico state line at Texline and ran to…

  • Battle of Bandera Pass · 19.3 mi

    Bandera Pass is a narrow gap through the hills on what is now State Highway 173, and in 1842 it became the site of a fight that changed frontier warfare forever. Captain Jack Coffee Hays and forty Texas Rangers rode…

  • Historic Log Cribs · 19.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through the Texas Hill Country near Medina, and you might spot these historic log cribs. Built by the Walker family starting in 1897, they were used to store feed for livestock. The craftsmanship shows…

  • Old Stanard Home · 19.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Old Stanard Home in Medina. Land here was once owned by Confederate General John Bell Hood, but hostile Indians kept folks from building until 1878. The Standard family has owned this property…

  • Pedernales Rural School · 19.4 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of the Pedernales Rural School, a testament to the German immigrant farmers who settled this area in the 1840s. In 1854, their community joined with Live Oak to form a school district. By…

  • Hix Ranch House · 19.7 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the Hix Ranch House, a testament to frontier life in Bandera County. Built for Fabian L. Hicks, a Texas Ranger and local official, this stone and cypress home was styled after his family's place back…

  • Old Buck Ranch · 19.7 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving through the Texas Hill Country, near Bandera, where you might just pass the Old Buck Ranch. It was settled in 1867 by Judge Edward M. Ross, a New Yorker who'd fought in the Mexican War and even served at…

  • Apelt Armadillo Farm · 19.8 mi · Historical Marker

    You're driving past the site of a truly unique Texas business: the Apelt Armadillo Farm. In the late 1890s, German immigrant Charles Apelt discovered a use for the armadillo's shell. He started the Armadillo Basket…

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