A look at Palacios Depression-era letters to Santa

Palacios Beacon, December 18, 1930Letters to Santa ClausEast Bay School – December 16, 1930  Dear Santa Claus:   I know thirty-two little boys and girls who all want you to come and see them Christmas.  Santa, they want me to tell you how good they have been.

Matagorda Historical Society’s dual museum ribbon cuttings

‘School House’ in the middle of the prairie

   During the year 1912, Common School District No. 12 was established between the Tres Palacios River and Cash’s Creek.   The two-room schoolhouse was first situated in the Dunbar community by the river and near the church and store.   It was called “The School House.”    A.L.

Palacios Point once hosted town of Portsmouth

PORTSMOUTHBy Mary L. Griffin  About 1902 Burton D. Hurd laid out another town on the Palacios Point site.    He named this town Portsmouth, and the area is still called by that name.

Williams among Bay Prairie men who died at Goliad

   Napoleon Bonaparte Williams, soldier in the Texas Revolution, was born in 1809 to George F. and Lavinia (Hobbs) Williams.   The family moved to Texas from Connecticut.   George Williams, as a member of the Old Three Hundred, received a grant of a sitio of land on Tres Palacios Creek.

Matagorda’s count, countess; A tragic tale

   Picking up from last week’s history page story on the Countess and Count of Matagorda...est daughter of the Genitises.

Henry Thorp became prominent Matagorda legislator and attorney

   Henry Thorp, lawyer and state representative, was born in Greensville County, Virginia, in 1830.   Thorp came to Texas with his older brothers about 1848 and settled in Matagorda County.   Here, he studied law and went into practice with an older brother.

Robert Williams interests went from politics to farming

    Robert Harris Williams, alcalde of the District of Mina and one of Stephen F. Austin’s Old Three Hundred colonists, son of Marmaduke “Duke” and Ede (Harris) Williams, was born in Caswell County, North Carolina, on October 10, 1796.   His siblings included Charles F. Augustus and John Williams.

Ira Lewis active in raising funds for revolution

   Ira Randolph Lewis, government official, was born in Virginia on September 25, 1800, to Dr. Jacob and Deborah (FitzRandolph) Lewis.  He was educated in Cincinnati, Ohio, and lived for several years in Mississippi and Louisiana before moving to Texas in 1831.