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Indigent Care in Texas: a Study of Poor Farms and Outdoor Relief

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Indigent Care in Texas: a Study of Poor Farms and Outdoor Relief Volume 2008 Article 20 2008 Indigent Care in Texas: A Study of Poor Farms and Outdoor Relief Martha Doty Freeman Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/ita Part of the American Material Culture Commons, Archaeological Anthropology Commons, Environmental Studies Commons, Other American Studies Commons, Other Arts and Humanities Commons, Other History of Art, Architecture, and Archaeology Commons, and the United States History Commons Tell us how this article helped you. Cite this Record Freeman, Martha Doty (2008) "Indigent Care in Texas: A Study of Poor Farms and Outdoor Relief," Index of Texas Archaeology: Open Access Gray Literature from the Lone Star State: Vol. 2008, Article 20. https://doi.org/10.21112/ita.2008.1.20 ISSN: 2475-9333 Available at: https://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/ita/vol2008/iss1/20 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Center for Regional Heritage Research at SFA ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in Index of Texas Archaeology: Open Access Gray Literature from the Lone Star State by an authorized editor of SFA ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Indigent Care in Texas: A Study of Poor Farms and Outdoor Relief Licensing Statement This is a work for hire produced for the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT), which owns all rights, title, and interest in and to all data and other information developed for this project under its contract with the report producer. The report may be cited and brief passages from this publication may be reproduced without permission provided that credit is given to TxDOT and the firm that produced it. Permission to reprint an entire chapter, section, figures or tables must be obtained in advance from the Supervisor of the Archeological Studies Branch, Environmental Affairs Division, Texas Department of Transportation, 125 East 11th Street, Austin, Texas, 78701. This article is available in Index of Texas Archaeology: Open Access Gray Literature from the Lone Star State: https://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/ita/vol2008/iss1/20 INDIGENT CARE IN TEXAS: A STUDY OF POOR FARMS AND OUTDOOR RELIEF by Martha Doty Freeman Principal Investigator: Douglas K. Boyd TECHNICAL REPORTS NO. 79 Prewitt and Associates, Inc. Cultural Resources Services Austin, Texas ARCHEOLOGICAL STUDIES PROGRAM, REPORT NO. 111 Archeological Studies Program Environmental Affairs Division Texas Department of Transportation Austin, Texas CSJ No. 0015-14-109 August 2008 INDIGENT CARE IN TEXAS: A STUDY OF POOR FARMS AND OUTDOOR RELIEF COPYRIGHT © 2008 Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) and Prewitt and Associates, Inc. (PAI) TxDOT and PAI jointly own all rights, title, and interest in and to all data and other information developed for this project under Contract 577XXSA001, Work Authorization 57704SA001. Brief passages from this publication may be reproduced without permission provided that credit is given to TxDOT and PAI. Permission to reprint an entire chapter, section, figures or tables must be obtained in advance from the Supervisor of the Archeological Studies Program, Environmental Affairs Division, Texas Department of Transportation, 125 East 11th Street, Austin, Texas, 78701. jointly published by the Texas Department of Transportation Environmental Affairs Division Archeological Studies Program Scott Pletka, Ph.D., Supervisor, Archeological Studies Program Archeological Studies Program, Report No. 111 CSJ No. 0015-14-109 Al McGraw, Series Editor and Prewitt and Associates, Inc. Cultural Resources Services Austin, Texas PAI Project No. 207020 Technical Reports, Number 79 Printed by Morgan Printing in Austin, Texas ISBN 1-930788-80-0 TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT .................................................................................................................................. vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS............................................................................................................ vii PROJECT BACKGROUND AND SCOPE OF WORK ................................................................ 1 METHODOLOGY ......................................................................................................................... 1 HISTORICAL LANGUAGE ASSOCIATED WITH PAUPER CARE ......................................... 2 REVIEW OF CONTEXTUAL LITERATURE ABOUT PAUPER CARE .................................... 4 PAUPER CARE IN EUROPE AND THE AMERICAS ................................................................ 17 PAUPER CARE IN TEXAS .......................................................................................................... 30 PAUPER CARE IN BELL COUNTY, TEXAS, 1850S–1969 ........................................................ 49 CONCLUSIONS ............................................................................................................................ 56 PRELIMINARY INVENTORY AND ASSESSMENT OF THE 1898–1912 BELL COUNTY POOR FARM ........................................................................................ 58 REFERENCES CITED ................................................................................................................. 61 iii LIST OF FIGURES 1. Numbers of native- and foreign-born paupers supported by counties, 1850 ....................... 31 2. Counties offering monetary support for paupers, 1850 ........................................................ 32 3. Numbers of native- and foreign-born paupers supported by counties, 1860 ....................... 33 4. Counties offering monetary support for paupers, 1860 ........................................................ 34 5. Numbers of native- and foreign-born paupers supported by counties, 1870 ....................... 37 6. Counties offering monetary support for paupers or levying a special tax for lunatics and paupers, 1870 ............................................................................................... 38 7. Counties with poorhouses and numbers of paupers and indigents in institutions, poorhouses, and asylums or in private homes, 1880 ............................................................. 39 8. Counties with poor farms and numbers of paupers, 1887–1888 .......................................... 42 9. Counties having a county poorhouse, city poorhouse, almshouse, or poor farm and numbers of paupers in almshouses, 1890 ...................................................................... 43 10. Counties having a county poorhouse, city poorhouse, almshouse, or pauper farm, 1903–1904 ......................................................................................................... 45 11. Counties having poor farms or other institutions for housing paupers, 1910 ..................... 46 12. Counties having poor farms or poorhouses, numbers of insane on poor farms, and numbers of feebleminded in jails and on poor farms,1911–1912 .................................. 49 13. Modern aerial photograph showing Interstate Highway 35, the Bell County Pauper Cemetery on Pepper Creek, and the complex of historic buildings and features on the 1898–1912 Bell County Poor Farm property ............................................... 63 14. Map of historic resources located on the 1898–1912 Bell County Poor Farm property west of Interstate Highway 35 ................................................................................ 65 iv LIST OF taBLES 1. Summary of Texas Department of Transportation work authorizations issued to Prewitt and Associates, Inc., for historical research and archeological investigations pertaining to the Bell County Pauper Cemetery on Pepper Creek (41BL1201) and the 1898–1912 Bell County Poor Farm ...................................................... 2 2. Inventory of existing and possible historical resources on the 1898–1912 Bell County Poor Farm property ............................................................................................ 66 v ABSTRACT Indigent Care in Texas: A Study of Poor Farms and Outdoor Relief was prepared by Prewitt & Associates, Inc., for the Archeological Studies Program, Environmental Affairs Division, Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT), as one of a series of investigations concerning pauper cemeteries and poor farms. The investigations are an outgrowth of planning for road improvements to Interstate Highway 35 between Belton and Temple that has been ongoing since 2002. The purpose of this most recent investigation has been to provide context for properties associated with pauper care in Texas and to present the findings of a preliminary field investigation of one such property in Bell County. The author concluded that indigent care in Bell County occurred most frequently outside of institutions, but that the poor farm model was an important one in the history of pauper care in Texas and the United States. Standing structures and the records associated with poor care in Texas are rare, making the surviving examples of both unusually noteworthy. vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS The rarity of physical remains associated with poor farms in Bell County and Texas meant that the authors were particularly dependent on firsthand accounts and individuals who had taken on the subject of pauper care as something of interest. Joy Worley, granddaughter of the owners of the Bell County Poor Farm property, and her husband, Carl, met the principal investigator and the author at the poor farm site and generously spent several hours pointing out site features. Her childhood memories of the property were helpful in
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