A twentieth century history and biographical record of north and west Texas, Volume I, Part 42

Author: Paddock, B. B. (Buckley B.), 1844-1922; Lewis Publishing Co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing co.
Number of Pages: 968

USA > Texas > A twentieth century history and biographical record of north and west Texas, Volume I > Part 42

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It was the completion of trunk lines of rail- road through Texas that did more than any- thing else to afford the outside world a proper understanding of its actual resources and its social and civic development ; more than that, as already shown, the railroads have been and continue to be the biggest factors in the prog- ress of North Texas. Lord Bacon, two hundred years before the railroad era, said: "There be three things which make a nation great and prosperous-a fertile soil, busy workshops, and easy conveyance for man and goods from place to place." Texas had the fertile soil, the "busy workshops" were the vast territory given over to cattle and agricultural farming, and railroad communication supplied the last

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factor for its greatness and prosperity and, from the point of view of Texas history, was the factor upon which the other two depended.

In a preceding chapter we left Fort Worth, Denton, Sherman and Denison as the four western termini of the North Texas railroad system. Of these, the T. & P. at Fort Worth, was the westernmost and most convenient rail- road shipping point for the great territory cov- ered by our historical inquiry. There the transfer was made from the steel highway to the stage coach of the transcontinental line of communication, which, from the time of the Butterfield route, was maintained across Texas to the Pacific coast. The stage line from Fort Worth to Fort Yuma, a distance of 1,700 miles, was regularly installed on July 1, 1878, and the route was in four divisions-Fort Worth to Fort Concho, thence to Messilla, N. M., thence to Tucson, and from Tucson to Fort Yuma. The story of the brief existence of this trans- portation line, until it was superseded by the railroad, is told by a newspaper writer under date of April, 1881 :

"A little incident occurred at Comanche the other day which serves as an illustration of the great changes that are taking place in North- west Texas, as the tide of civilization, preceded by the locomotives of the T. & P. construction trains, surges with resistless force to the west. We refer to the departure of the old coaches of the Arkansas, Texas and Pacific Mail Com- pany, that had been standing idle under the company's sheds at Comanche for a year or more. In the early part of 1878 Col. John T. Chidester, a veteran stage man, at the head of this company, inaugurated what was then the longest stage line in the world. When the coaches came here in 1878, drawn by four horses each, the citizens were on the qui vive to wit- ness the grand triumphal entry. When they went out, six oxen drew the coach and all that was said was 'There she goes, boys!' This stage line originally connected with the T. & J'. at Fort Worth and with Huntington and Crocker's great Southern Pacific at Fort Yuma. Since then the T. & P. has pushed west to the east bank of the Colorado and is graded a hun-

dred miles beyond; the Huntington road has progressed east from Yuma until its trains are now in El Paso, and within a short time the two roads will unite, forming a great trunk line across the continent and opening up to railway travel and civilization hundreds of miles of territory in Texas that were erewhile traversed by the Chidester coaches."

The Texas and Pacific was the pioneer line of North and West Texas. The line was ex- tended to Weatherford in 1879, and in the same year the surveyors re-located the route clear to El Paso. In the following year construction began in earnest and was pushed with remark- able rapidity. By October, 1880, the construc- tion trains had reached Eastland City, a hun- dred miles west of Fort Worth. The building of the road meant the establishment of stations, and around the latter clustered the population which was the embryo of a town. At the date mentioned the first station west of Weather- ford was Millsap, with its depot, three stores and a cotton gin. Then a mere site for a town named Cresco. Grand Ranche, dating from the pre-railroad days, had its depot. Gordon, also in Palo Pinto, was known as the town that was born and attained its growth in a single night, having a depot, three or four plank houses and some tents. Further on, also born of the railroad, was Strawn, with stores, schools and other enterprises. And the last station was Ranger.

Track-laying went on at the rate of a mile a day, and in the summer of 1881 it averaged two miles a day. In describing this "advance guard of civilization in the new Texas that is being re- claimed from solitude and savageism," there were said to be, in addition to the track-laying force of 350, a U. S. commissioner and deputy marshals to apprehend violators of revenue laws ; a squad of mounted Texas Rangers to ex- ercise restraint on the festive and restive spirits of cowboys who flocked to the new towns in pursuit of pleasure ; and a company of Tenth U. S. Cavalry (colored) to protect the trackmen from Indians. It required a general to control and direct such a force as that, and the credit for building the Texas and Pacific through

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West Texas cheaply and rapidly belongs to Major D. W. Washburne, who met death in a railroad accident in February, 1882. He was known throughout Texas for his ability as a railroad builder. He came to the state in 1872 and became identified with the California and Texas Railway Construction Co. that built the T. & P. from Longview to Dallas. As the lieutenant of Gen. G. M. Dodge he was resi- dent engineer and actively connected with the construction of the T. & P. forward to its junc- tion with the Southern Pacific at Sierra Blanco. He also held offices as chief engineer of the Pacific Railway Improvement Co., chief en- gineer of the Texas and Colorado Railway Im- provement Co., and succeeded Col. J. M. Eddy as superintendent of construction for the In- ternational Railroad Improvement Co.

The first train from the east over the Texas and Pacific entered El Paso in January, 1882. What this road has done for the development of the country through which it passes cannot be overestimated. It was, and still remains, the great transportation line for an immense tributary cattle country. Abilene, Colorado City and Midland, three of the best known live- stock shipping points in West Texas, are situ- ated on this route and these fine towns, not to mention others, had their origin in a depot and cattle pens. The history of Abilene is typical. "Three months ago," to use the language of one who saw Abilene in May, 1881, "Simpson's ranch was the only house in this country where the weary cowboy could find shelter. Not a tent had been stretched, and nothing but the bark of the prairie dog and the lowing of cattle disturbed the stillness. Now a city of fifteen hundred people adorns the broad level prairie. There are wholesale and retail stores, commis- sion houses, hotels, churches and schools, a fine water supply, and this is a distributing and trading point for Buffalo Gap, Phantom Hill, Fort Concho and other government posts. The railroad depot was found to be inadequate to hold the goods brought for shipment, and tents had to be stretched to shelter them. This is a cattle-shipping point, but the farmers are al- ready beginning to encroach." Some of the

business men and institutions of that date were: W. T. Berry & Co., Cameron & Phillips, Robinson Bros. & Co., Theo. Heyck, El Paso Hotel, Avenue Hotel, Charles Goldburg, J. D. Merchant & Co., Smith & Steffens, Border & Holland, G. W. Featherston. The boom which : Abilene experienced while the railroad terminal was largely substantial. With a population at the present time of six thousand it is the largest town in central West Texas, and its banks, wholesale, retail and manufacturing insti- tutions, its postoffice and federal court building "recently constructed at a cost of $125,000 are in keeping with the spirit of commercial enter- prise and business push that has dominated the town since its beginning.

Across the state, over five hundred miles from Fort Worth, a distance comprising every variety of soil, climate, and altitude, the semi- arid plateaus of the Staked Plains, the fertile valleys of the Pecos, and the cattle and cotton raising regions of the Colorado and the Brazos, is situated the old and historic, as well as the new and commercially and industrially progress- ivé town of El Paso. The vicinity of El Paso (meaning "the ford" over the Rio Grande) had been of strategic and commercial importance since the days of Coronado, who passed the river at that point in 1540 on his expedition to the north. But the Texas town of that name, on the American side of the river, was a strug- gling village till the railroads dowered it with magic powers of growth and development. Here is a description of the place as it appears in a gazetteer of 1880: "El Paso, a post-village, capital of El Paso county, Texas, is on the Rio Grande, about 50 miles below Mesilla, N. M .; population 764." A citizen of El Paso would now consider it an affront to the size and dignity of his city if one should endeavor to describe its location by referring to it as a cer- tain number of miles from Mesilla.

The beginning of the era of modern history and progress for El Paso finds description in the following quotation from the San Antonio Express of January, 1881: "The scene at El Paso just now beggars description. The fact that three railroads are practically there has

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caused a world of people of all classes, nations and colors to rush to this new center. A large number of Celestials are employed as house servants. Speculators have come to invest their money with firm faith in the future greatness of the city, while the mines of Chihuahua will soon pour their wealth into this center. All things await the approach of the railroads. The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe from the north, the Texas and Pacific from the east, and the Southern Pacific from the southeast, are all so near the town that they draw their provisions from El Paso. All the land along the Rio Grande from Hart's Mill, one mile above to five miles below, has been bought for town purposes, depot sites have been selected, and there are evidences of progress and expansion on every hand. The Mexican Central will soon run to the Mexican side of the river, giving four railroad connections. The Santa Fe is al- ready delivering freight within six miles of the town. Adobe buildings will soon be a thing of the past, for a company is already manufac- turing bricks."

A quarter of a century has elapsed since then. El Paso has become the terminal center of nine railroad systems, six of which are trunk lines, running into a magnificent new union depot. The six great interests which are at the founda- tion of the city's prosperity are, mining, trade, transportation, live stock, agriculture and man- ufacturing.

What Fort Worth is to the cattle interests of Texas, El Paso is to the mining and smelt- ing interests. The El Paso mining district produces $150,000,000 yearly. It includes great coal deposits, copper deposits, iron deposits, silver and gold mines, and quicksilver deposits ; all the mining interests of the southwest, in- cluding New Mexico, southeastern Arizona and northern Mexico.

Then El Paso is the chief border city and cen- ter of the international trade between the two republics, as a port of entry ranking eleventh in the United States in value of exports and imports. The large irrigation works projected by the federal government, for which over seven million dollars will be expended, and

which, when completed, will irrigate thousands of acres of the finest fruit land in the world, are another important feature of the modern El Paso. Its altitude of nearly five thousand feet and dry bracing atmosphere make it one of the ideal health resorts of the country. The city has over a hundred jobbing houses, its wholesale trade in mining machinery, hardware and general supplies rivaling that of any west- ern city. Considering all these evidences of wealth and increasing prosperity, it seems that the faith of those who settled in the village in 1880, believing they would live to see and to help make a large city, has been well justi- fied.

In the foregoing we have indicated several different and contrasting stages in the growth of El Paso. The following review of the his- torical and general features of the city has been contributed to this work by Mr. C. R. Morehead, president of the State National Bank of El Paso.

The CITY OF EL PASO, in the county of the same name, is situated on a gently sloping plain or valley on the left or north bank of the Rio Grande, opposite the city of Juarez ( for- merly known as El Paso del Norte) in the state of Chihuahua, Mexico. The first occupation of the present site of the city was early in 1827, when Don Juan Maria Ponce de Leon, an in- habitant of Paso del Norte (Pass of the North), made application to his government for a grant of land, and the application being granted by the Mexican government, the settlement of El Paso began. Ponce de Leon was one of the wealthiest, most enterprising and influential gentlemen of this section during his lifetime. He was a man of means, was the great master of transporta- tion of the country in his day, and had a mo- nopoly as a public carrier with his wagon trains. His wife was named Dolores Zozaza, and they had but one child, Maria Josefa Anastacia, born in May, 1827. Ponce raised large fields of corn and wheat on the site of the present city, and cultivated an extensive vineyard where El Paso's magnificent court house and city hall now stand and to the north of those stately buildings. He had adobe round houses built

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on the plain, in which he kept watchmen to pre- vent surprise from the Indians, and to which his workmen might repair during Indian in- cursions. Ponce de Leon died July 1, 1852.

Outside of an occasional raid of Indians there was little to mar the quiet of these little inland settlements, so far removed from the scenes of conflict during the struggle of Texas for independence-until the war between the United States and Mexico. On Sunday, the 27th of December, 1846, two days after winning the battle of Brazito, 25 miles to the northward, Colonel Alexander W. Doniphan, in command of the 900 Missouri volunteer cavalry, took pos- session of El Paso, in the Department of Chi- huahua. Colonel Doniphan remained in El Paso several weeks unaware that General Wool, with whom he was to form a junction at this important strategical point, had been or- dered back to join General Taylor, On the 8th of February, 1847, he set out with his men to capture the city of Chihuahua, with the full knowledge that he might have to encounter the combined forces of the states of Chihuahua and Durango. On Sunday, February 25, with 924 men, including teamsters and sutlers, and with six pieces of artillery, he boldly attacked and speedily defeated and routed 4,224 Mexican troops with ten pieces of artillery and six cul- verins, driving them pell-mell from a strongly fortified position on a high rocky hill, rising in a sheer clift from the south bank of the Sac- ramento river-Colonel Doniphan having but one man killed and eleven wounded (three mor- tally), while the Mexicans lost 320 killed, 560 wounded, and 72 prisoners, or four more men than Colonel Doniphan had under his com- mand. The defeated Mexican army fled pre- cipitately through the city of Chihuahua, and did not stop until it reached the city of Dur- ango. Colonel Doniphan occupied the city of Chihuahua for forty-nine days, and then with his small force marched 675 miles through the enemy's country to Saltillo, in the state of Coa- huila, where he joined Generals Taylor and Wool.

As interesting incidents in the early history of the city of El Paso it may be stated that

Ponce de Leon, its first settler, commanded the Mexican troops defeated and routed by Colonel Doniphan at Brazito, twenty-five miles above the city, on Christmas day, 1846, and that from the arrival of Doniphan's First Regiment of Missouri Cavalry, December 27, 1846, may be dated the occupation of the place by North Americans.

For many years after the hamlet grew into a town it was called Franklin as the great mountain of lime and building stone, rising 2,000 feet above the level of the valley to the northward is still called Mount Franklin. Dur- ing the Civil war, 1861 to 1865, the place was alternately occupied by large commands of Con- federate and Federal troops, and was made a depot of supplies and base of operations by the Confederates against New Mexico and Arizona, while again it was held by the Federals as a key to the control of those territories. From 1846 to 1858, the place was visited by many distin- guished army officers, topographical engineers and strategists, all of whom reported to the government that El Paso's strategical and geo- graphical position was commanding and im- portant-so much so that as early as 1858 a per- manent and important military post was estab- lished and has ever since been maintained, the government of recent years having acquired sufficient land in a body for a 14-company post.

May 26, 1881, the first railroad train to reach the city of El Paso came in over the Southern Pacific railroad from the Pacific coast, and six- teen days later the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe came in from the north. In 1904 El Paso had nine railroads, with another projected and almost certain of early construction directly to the great coal fields at Durango, Colorado. Of those completed, the Southern Pacific and the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe (by its Santa Fe Pacific) give El Paso direct connection with the Pacific; the Galveston, Harrisburg & San Antonio, connects it with all the ports of Gal- veston and New Orleans on the Atlantic sea- board, passing through the entire length of Texas and Louisiana ; the Texas & Pacific, run- ning direct to New Orleans and making close connection with the whole railroad system of

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the Mississippi valley as far north as St. Louis; the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe, running north and connecting with the railroad systems of New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, Ne- braska, Kansas and Missouri; the El Paso & Northeastern, a part of the Rock Island sys- tem, running almost as an air line to St. Louis ; the El Paso & Southwestern gives El Paso di- rect communication with the great copper and other mining regions of New Mexico, Arizona, and the Mexican state of Sonora; the Mexican Central, the great standard gauge highway of our sister republic, with its direct line to the capital of the republic and its numerous branch lines, brings El Paso in close touch with all of the most important mining, manufacturing and mercantile centers of Mexico; and the Rio Grande, Sierra Madre, and Pacific running southwest, makes El Paso not only the great commercial center for supplies, but the great distributing point for the products of the ex- tensive grazing lands, farms, orchards, vine- yards, mines and sawmills of the prolific re- gion of the northern Sierra Madre.

El Paso has not only become the most im- portant railroad center in the West Texas, but the most important commercial and mining cen- ter of the southwest as well. Having three lines of railroad through Texas, northern, central and southern; three lines through New Mexico and Arizona, draining the eastern, western and cen- tral portions of the first named, and the north- ern, central and southern sections of the last named territory, with three branch railroads into the rich state of Sonora, and two lines touching all the important resources of north- ern and central Mexico, El Paso has a vast field of wealth to draw upon, and the prediction of ex-Governor Sayers and others that El Paso will be the first Texas city to reach 100,000 population, is not a hazardous one. There is no more promising place in the United States today for the profitable investment of capital, either in merchandising, manufacturing or city or valley real estate. The population of the city increased from 16,000 in 1890 to 36,000 in 1905. With a large number of commodious school buildings already in use but over-

crowded, in 1903 the city voted $50,000 for ad- ditional school buildings, but these became overcrowded in a single year, and at the be- ginning of 1905 the Board of Education called for $50,000 more for additional school build- ings.

With magnificent public buildings for city, county and federal purposes, an electric street car system second to none, electric light and power plants, gas works, large smelting plants paying out more than $60,000 per day for ores (a large proportion of which money is spent in the city), two great ice plants and other manu- factories, four national banks, conducted on · conservative but liberal principles, an ad- mirable system of public schools that is the pride of the city, many handsome and commodi- ous church buildings, and large congregations of every denomination, public and private hos- pitals, an excellent sewer system and almost perfect sanitary conditions, intelligent and con- servative city and county administrations and low taxation, El Paso is prepared to expand prodigiously.

And, with all her other advantages, El Paso has a climate as equable and as nearly perfect as can be found anywhere. It has an altitude of 3,723 feet above sea level. Its mean tempera- ture, taken at 7 a. m., 3 p. m. and II p. m., respectively, is as follows : January, 36, 53 and 44; February, 41, 60 and 56; March, 45, 67 and 56; April, 51, 75 and 63; May, 60, 85 and 73; June 69, 92 and 80; July, 73, 93 and 81 ; August, 70, 89 and 78: September, 62, 83 and 72; Octo- ber, 53, 75 and 62; November, 41, 61 and 49; December, 38, 56 and 46. It has an average of but 53 days per annum when the temperature falls below 32 degrees, the freezing point. On only five days in the twenty years has the mer- cury failed to rise above 32 degrees in the shade. In the classification of the signal service bu- reau El Paso is shown as in "extreme dryness" in every season of the year. In the same classi- fication El Paso is shown in the region of low- est percentage of cloudiness, under 30 per cent. Of the rainfall 5.08 inches fall in July and Au- gust, and 2.58 inches in September and Oc- tober, leaving only about 4 inches for the other

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eight months. At this altitude and in so dry a climate neither heat nor cold is felt as in low altitudes and damp climates. For, an all-the- year climate there is none superior to that of the great health resort of El Paso.

Among the old settlers prior to the advent of the railways are the following: Judge J. F. Crosby, Judge Joseph Magoffin, Col. Simeon Hart, Capt. J. S. Hart, Benjamin Dowell, W. W. Mills, Allen Blacker, William Coldwell, James P. Hague, Samuel Schutz, Joseph Schutz, John Gillett and J. D. Ochoa.

Among the so-called newcomers are: C. R. Morehead and C. T. Bassett, who came to El Paso by stage from Fort Worth, February, 1880, and were the first to invest in real estate. In the following year came Judge B. H. Davis, Capt. Charles Davis, Calhoun Davis, Capt. Thomas J. Beall, Judge Wyndham Kemp, Judge J. A. Buckler, Millard Patterson, R. C. Lightbody, M. C. Edwards, Noyes Rand, C. C. Coffin, O. G. Seaton, J. C. Lackland, Leigh Clark, J. H. Russell, W. R. Martin, Judge J. R. Harper, Capt. John I. Ginn, Hon. John M. Dean, W. J. Fewell, Dr. Alexander, Judge Fal- vey, Dr. W. N. Vilas, Dr. Justice.

The following sketch of El Paso county was contributed by Park W. Pitman, county clerk, El Paso.

EL PASO COUNTY is the extreme western county of the state, cornering on New Mexico and Mexico. It was created from Bexar county in 1850 and occupies an extensive terri- tory fronting on the Rio Grande river over one hundred miles. It was organized with its pres- ent boundaries in 1871 and contains an area of 8,460 square miles. It is the largest county in the largest state in the greatest republic on earth. The land bordering on the Rio Grande is susceptible of irrigation and when irrigated its productive qualities are unsurpassed- growing almost everything in the agricultural and fruit line. Of late years the waters of the Rio Grande have so deteriorated that the farm- ers of the valley have had very poor crops- some few have put in gasoline engines for pumping, water from below the surface and have demonstrated that such pumping plants

are a success. The coming years will see a vast increase in the output of farm products from the Rio Grande valley. The soil of the Rio Grande valley is a sandy loam, enriched by the alluvial deposits from the waters of the Rio Grande river, and is as rich as any soil that lies ,outdoors.

Improved lands in the valley sell for from $10.00 to $150.00 per acre-and unimproved for from $2.00 to $25.00 per acre.

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A twentieth century history and biographical record of north and west Texas, Volume I, Part 42

Author: Paddock, B. B. (Buckley B.), 1844-1922; Lewis Publishing Co., Chicago, pub Publication date: 1906 Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing co. Number of Pages: 968

Author: Paddock, B. B. (Buckley B.), 1844-1922; Lewis Publishing Co., Chicago, pub
Publication date: 1906
Publisher: Chicago, New York, The Lewis publishing co.
Number of Pages: 968