LEXINGTON

WHEN A LEE COUNTY settlement got its first post office in 1848 it called itself Shaw after the local DIME BOX? MULDOON? postmaster and school teacher James Shaw. Inside Two years later the residents had a grander New York Public Library name in mind when they changed the name Digital Collection THE BEHIND BLUEBONNET-AREA to honor the first battle of the American THIS MONTH SOLVING MYSTERY Revolution in 1775, which was in Massachusetts ABOVE: A stylized 1815 at Lexington (and hours later at nearby engraving depicts the Concord). YOUTH OPPORTUNITIES HISTORICAL AND UNUSUAL TOWN NAMES Battle of Lexington Apply now for scholarship, youth tour in Massachusetts on 26 April 19, 1775. LEFT: CO-OP BOARD ELECTIONS The R.M. Dickson Information, deadlines for 2017 available 26 store supplied groceries and clothing THANK YOU! in Lexington, Texas, in Sponsors of scholarship golf tourney 27 the early 1900s. MONTHLY MEETING By Ed Crowell Lexington Bluebonnet’s Board of Directors will meet at 9 a.m. Nov. 15, ust like people, towns have names that carry origin stories. Log Cabins at the Grand Hyatt San Antonio, 600 E. Market Street, San Some town names honor a person, celebrate a landscape and Heritage Antonio. Find the agenda and last-minute updates Nov. 11 Society at bluebonnet.coop. Hover your cursor over ‘next board feature or commemorate an event. Others, however, meeting’ on our home page. involve surprising twists of fate. A state as big as Texas Jhas plenty of odd, whimsical and intriguing place names. Here’s a OFFICE CLOSINGS sampling of noteworthy town names declared more than a century Bluebonnet’s offices will be closed Dec. 23 and Dec. 26 for ago in and near what is now Bluebonnet Electric Cooperative’s the Christmas holiday and Jan. 2 for the New Year’s Day 14-county service area. holiday.

IN THE 1870S, settlers of an area north of Giddings included THE NAMESAKE of this growing town (and county) is Philip Hendrik Nering Bogel, born CONTACT US Joseph S. Brown, who opened a sawmill. A box at the mill in 1759 in Paramaribo, in what was then Dutch Guiana. His family moved to Holland when was used for mail sent out under the name of Brown’s Mill. he was 5 and he grew up to become a tax collector and a supporter of the aristocracy. Bluebonnet Electric Cooperative Residents would put a dime in the box with their letters to He also may have been a thief. In 1793, he was accused of embezzlement and fled from P.O. Box 729 cover the delivery cost. Europe to Louisiana. Bastrop, TX 78602 Trouble was that return Bogel proceeded to Member services: 800-842-7708, Monday through mail sometimes was call himself Felipe Friday, 7 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. misdirected all the way to Enrique Neri, the DIME BOX the similarly named Rio BASTROP Baron de Bastrop, and Email: [email protected] Grande Valley border town represented himself of Brownsville, 350 miles as a Dutch nobleman. OUTAGES to the south. He persuaded the Spanish governor of Louisiana to give him 12 leagues of land in northern Louisiana, promising to Call 800-949-4414 if you have a power outage. Keep OLD DIME BOX The solution was to name attract 500 settlers. He called his settlement Bastrop. up with outages 24/7 at bluebonnet.coop. Hover your the town something else cursor over ‘outage report’ on our home page. You — so why not Dime Box? Following the United States’ purchase of Louisiana in 1803, the Baron headed for Texas to start a colony there. can also send us a text message. To get started, text That worked fine until 1913 when the Southern Pacific Rail- First, he went to San Antonio, established a freight BBOUTAGE to 85700 and follow the prompts. Save road built a line three miles away and much of the community business and cozied up to officials. that number in your contacts, perhaps as “Bluebonnet moved closer to the railroad station. Those who stayed in the Joe Stafford photo Among his contacts was the Mexican governor. When Outages.” If your power goes out, text OUT to that original settlement referred to their ABOVE: A monument at the location as Old Dime Box. Moses Austin, the father of Stephen F. Austin, sought a number. Download our free mobile app for iPhone land grant to start the first Anglo-American colony in Bastrop County Courthouse or Android and you can report an outage on your Texas, the Baron interceded with the governor on Austin’s in Bastrop honors the town’s Dime Box received national smartphone. publicity in 1944 when the March behalf. namesake, born Philip Hendrik of Dimes health-care campaign Jay Godwin photo Moses Austin died in 1821, just months after getting the Nering Bogel, who dubbed seized on the name for its an- land grant, but the Baron then supported Moses’ son in himself ‘Baron de Bastrop.’ ABOUT THIS ISSUE nual fundraising kickoff and Life ABOVE: A giant dime in a transparent box in front of his efforts to grow the colony. Three hundred families magazine photographed the settled the huge grant area encompassing the lower Colorado and Brazos rivers. Bluebonnet Electric Cooperative produced the blue- town. And the 1982 best-selling Prosperity Bank commemorates the bordered pages 20-27 in this issue of the magazine book, Blue Highways, included a town of Dime Box. LEFT: In 1918, Stephen F. Austin honored the Baron in 1827, the year the Dutch expatriate died, when he with content that is of specific interest or relevance to few pages on visiting Dime Box, Noah Albers installed the town’s established his “Little Colony” for 100 families to the northwest of the original colony. He Bluebonnet members. The rest of the magazine’s content where author William Least water system. called the principal town site Bastrop. is distributed statewide to any member of an electric Heat Moon received an expla- The Mexican government promptly renamed nation of the funny town name it Mina for one of its heroes. But in 1837, the cooperative in Texas. For information about the magazine, as well as what he described Republic of Texas incorporated the town and contact Janet Wilson at 512-750-5483 or email janet. as his best haircut ever. restored the name Bastrop. [email protected].

20 Texas Co-op Power BLUEBONNET ELECTRIC COOPERATIVE December 2016 bluebonnet.coop bluebonnet.coop December 2016 BLUEBONNET ELECTRIC COOPERATIVE ­­Texas Co-op Power 21 RIGHT: A quarry in Muldoon THE FIRST PERMANENT German settlement and was granted the league of land from developing cigar industry. in Texas was on a league of land (4,428 acres) in the Mexican government in 1831. Ernst provided Austin County granted to Johann Friedrich Ernst. built a house and called it Ernst’s Place, In a letter to friends in Germany, he extolled TOP 10 TOWN NAMES ‘Muldoon Blue’ welcoming immigrants and travelers on the virtues of Industry: “Each settler builds...a sandstone used In 1829, Ernst, the main 90-mile road from Bastrop to blockhouse. The more children the better The U.S. Postal Service reported these on buildings his wife and San Felipe along the Brazos River. for...field labor. Scarcely three months work town names as the most common in throughout the INDUSTRY five children a year. No need for money, free exercise of the United States in 2012: region. At one fled Oldenburg, One of the first crops Ernst planted was religion and the best markets for all products 1) Clinton 6) Marion time the quarry, Germany. tobacco and he made cigars to be sold in at the Mexican harbors.” Rightly or Houston and Galveston. 2) Madison 7) Greenville shown in this wrongly, he had been charged with embezzling The economy of the area moved on from undated photo, money from the post office he operated there. Ernst began selling lots on his land in 1838 tobacco to cotton crops to ranching. The 3) Franklin 8) Springfield was operated by Fayette County Heritage and a post office was established. The town now claims fewer than 400 residents, 4) Washington 9) Georgetown convict labor. Museum and Archives After running a boarding house in New York City town name was declared Industry as a but it proudly boasts of its place in Texas 5) Chester 10) Salem for a couple of years, the family sailed to Texas nod to the industrious residents and the history where Germans first settled. THE SMALL BURG in southwestern Fayette County began as part of an 1831 Mexican land grant to the Rev. Michael (Miguel) Muldoon, an Irish Catholic priest who ministered to Stephen F. Austin’s Texas colony in 1831- 32. Muldoon immigrated to Mexico a decade earlier and became the only priest appointed to serve non-Hispanic and largely Protestant Texans.

Many colonists simply accepted the WHEN IT WAS FOUNDED along a large bend MULDOON Catholic faith because the Mexican of the Colorado River in 1837, La Grange could government made it a requirement for just as easily have been dubbed The Meadows. securing their land. Those “converts” came to be called Muldoon Catholics. That’s because The Meadows is the English translation for La Grange, the name of an estate Father Muldoon remained a confidant of Austin’s even after Muldoon in France owned by the Marquis de Lafayette, returned to Mexico. He visited Austin when the future “Father of Texas” a nobleman and military hero of both the French and was imprisoned in Mexico City for a year and a half and tried to get him American revolutions. released. ABOVE: A detail from a stock certificate of the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway Co., which The Republic of Sarah Beal photo Muldoon never moved back to Texas after it won independence from arrived in what would become Somerville in 1880. Texas government Mexico in the Texas Revolution that ended in 1836, and his land was ABOVE: Like some other towns in the region, thought so much Giddings’ name is closely linked to the railroad — sold through Austin. RAIL LINES BECAME the lifeblood of many new LA GRANGE of Lafayette that communities in the late 1800s, so it’s no surprise in this case, the Houston & Texas Central Railroad. The town of Muldoon grew slowly after a railway reached it in 1888. it named Fayette that several towns wound up named for railroad County in his honor Local quarries produced rock for the jetties built in Galveston. But the executives. JABEZ D. GIDDINGS was one of four broth- community peaked in the 1940s at about 200 people and today is home and La Grange as the county seat three years after Lafayette’s death. ers from Pennsylvania who were Texas railroad to half that many. The Gulf, pioneers and business leaders. The town of Gid- Colorado Lafayette was revered because he left his comfortable dings was founded in 1871 as a shipping point by SOMERVILLE and Santa Fe estate in France to serve as a general in George the Houston & Railway Co. Washington’s army, helping to win several key battles Texas Cen- BELOW: This aerial view depicts was chartered of the Revolutionary War. He also persuaded the king ABOVE: This 1791 portrait tral Railroad Brenham some 30 years after its in 1873 to build a railroad from Galveston to Santa of France to send more war aid to the Americans and depicts Gilbert du Motier, (in which J. namesake, Dr. Richard Fox Brenham, Fe, N.M. In 1880, one spur passed through the GIDDINGS later organized trade agreements between France and the Marquis de Lafayette, D. Giddings, died during an attempted escape from area that would become Somerville. Three years a Brenham the United States. as a lieutenant general. captivity in Mexico. later a second spur ran there from Navasota. A lawyer, was a surveyed town site, train depot and railroad yard Although Lafayette never visited Texas, the young A decade earlier the stockholder). Most historians say the town was soon followed. The town was named for the first republic’s leaders greatly respected his heroism and Frenchman helped George named for him. Others, however, say his brother president of the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe — willingness to lead fights against tyranny. Their own Washington defeat the Dewitt C. Giddings, also a railroad investor and U.S. Albert Somerville, a former mayor of Galveston. revolution against Mexican rule was not so different. British. congressman from Brenham, was the namesake.

HAD THE NAMESAKE of this town proved suc- control of Mexico. They expected a friendly reception, cessful on a Republic of Texas expedition into New but instead were met with a hostile governor and Mexico in 1841 it is possible there would have been a a bigger army. The Texans surrendered and were Brenham, N.M. named in his honor. marched off to prison, where they spent several months MCDADE before being released. Dr. Richard Fox Brenham But that was not the last ill-fated expedition for was born in Brenham. Soon he joined yet another expedition, this TO THE WEST OF BRENHAM Kentucky in 1810 Giddings, settlers of the one a raiding incursion into Mexico at Ciudad Mier, community that be- and moved to across the Rio Grande between Laredo and McAllen. Texas to join came McDade wanted its war for independence as a surgeon. Later, as a The Mier Expedition resulted in the capture of Brenham the railroad, too. So doctor in Austin, he was befriended by Republic of and 175 other Texans. They were being taken to Mexico in 1869 they named Texas President Mirabeau B. Lamar. In 1841, Lamar their town for James W. City when an escape attempt at Salado, Mexico, on Feb. McDade Historical Museum chose Brenham as a civil commissioner for Lamar’s 11, 1843, left Brenham dead. McDade, a major stockholder in the Houston & Texas attempt to persuade northern New Mexico to join — Townspeople show off or at least trade with — the Republic of Texas. The Washington County town of Hickory Grove decided Central Railroad who lived ABOVE: the following year to rename itself Brenham to honor in Brenham. He never lived their finery in this 1907 photo of Brenham was among 321 soldiers and diplomats this hero of the Texas revolution and republic. He never in McDade, but two years downtown McDade. The 2010 U.S. called the “Santa Fe pioneers” who set out on an got a chance to enjoy peacetime amid the town’s after the town’s founding the Census put the town’s population expedition to Santa Fe and other towns under the bountiful trees and bluebonnets. railroad reached there. n at 685.

22 Texas Co-op Power BLUEBONNET ELECTRIC COOPERATIVE December 2016 bluebonnet.coop bluebonnet.coop December 2016 BLUEBONNET ELECTRIC COOPERATIVE ­­Texas Co-op Power 23