A County Divided
In 1914, the leaders of the young town of Wadsworth ambitiously decided that they would propose the division of Matagorda county into two and establish their town as the county seat of the eastern portion. They enlisted the support of the citizens of Blessing suggesting that Blessing could become the county seat for the western county.
The coalition began visiting with leaders in other towns such as Palacios, pitching their proposal hinting that it might be possible that Palacios could become the western county seat.
We the news reached the citizens of Bay City, they hatched a counter-attack knowing if an election was called, there was a five year wait before another one could take place. Bay City’s counter proposal was that they wanted to move the county seat to Chalmers.
Chalmers, formerly called Hook’s Switch, then Harrows, was situated about six miles north of Bay City as a shipping point on the Gulf, Colorado, and Santa Fe Railroad (GC&SF) in the early 1900’s.
By 1910 Chalmers had a store, a rice storehouse, and a population of fifty. By 1912 a post office was established and by 1913 there was a new schoolhouse which also served as a church with 50 members in Sunday School.
The story is told through the following newspaper articles.
New County Seat Offered
Palacios was given a little thriller Friday night of last week when a phone call from Matagorda was received by the President of the Board of Trade, asking for a meeting with the board by a delegation representing Matagorda and Wadsworth, who would arrive late that evening by boat with a proposition to the west side to move the county-seat from Bay City to Wadsworth, and then divide the county, giving the west side a county-seat—presumably Palacios.
This looked like there might be something doing that would at least be interesting.
The delegation arrived as stated at 9 o’clock Friday evening and laid their plans before a few members of the Board of Trade, which at first glance looked like it might be developed into something tangible.
The visitors went to Blessing Saturday to lay their proposition before the people of that place, and were met with the counter-proposition from Mr. Pierce, that if the new county originators would furnish a free site and the money to build a court house and jail at Wadsworth, that Blessing would do the same thing if given the location for the county-seat of the new county; and that if the Wadsworth promoters were prepared to meet this offer including the condition that Blessing be made the new county-seat, they might give this move favorable consideration.
This brought on a thinking spell by the new town boomers, but who later stated they were sure they could raise the money and furnish the site as stipulated.
The party visited Collegeport in the afternoon, where we understand they didn’t meet much encouragement, possibly because it was not proposed to locate the new county seat at that town.
The party came back to Palacios in the evening when their plans were explained in detail to a well attended meeting of citizens at Wildman & Campbell’s office.
The purpose of this visit by the Wadsworth promoters at this time was to secure the required number of signatures to a petition for an election to move the county seat.
It was plain to see that if the plans…went through without any block and the west side united solidly in support of Wadsworth the county-seat might be moved from Bay City.
But when it came to considering how or by what means the further design of dividing the county seat, these didn’t appear to be anything binding or positively assuring that it could or would be done. Interest waned very rapidly in Palacios and our information is that none of our citizens signed the petition to move the county seat.
It was a sort of “getting the cart before the horse” movement.
Our Wadsworth boomers should first build a town, and then show it to the people of the country, and if it looks good enough to them for a county seat, they may some time in the future look upon their pretensions with some degree of favor.
We understand that when Bay City heard of this move, they at once circulated a petition and secured the required number of signers calling for an election to move the county seat to Chalmers, thus check-mating the Wadsworth real estate boosters, and putting the removal question on the shelf for five years, according to the “statoots.”
Palacios Beacon, July 3, 1914
County Seat and the Fourth
In the last issue of the News-Farmer was noted a rumor that Wadsworth and Blessing were combining to move the county-seat to Wadsworth and later creating a new county across the river with Blessing the county seat of the new county
Well, of course this proposition did not find any enthusiastic supporters in Bay City. But on Saturday it was reported in town that Wadsworth would be in that night or Monday morning with her petition for the election; so Bay City got a move on and proceeded to checkmate the enterprising town on the south.
A petition was circulated asking the county judge to order an election on a proposition to move the county seat to Chalmers, on the north.
Well, as the French would say that was a coup d’état. The law provides that when one election has been ordered another cannot be held for five years. So there will be a term of five years of peace and rest.
The movement was inopportune, because Bay City has been overflowed with misfortune, engulfed so to speak with disasters, and could ill-afford to spare the time or money for such a contest, with Wadsworth on the one side and Blessing on the other, and most of the people of the county will sympathize with this view and agree that it was inopportune.
Wadsworth is an enterprising and plucky town. The News Farmer has said as much many times before; and her good people are deserving of the best that’s going in the way of the benefits to the just and hustling, Blessing, too, we have been led to believe is a beautiful and progressive place with a most promising future.
As for Chalmers, it’s too near Magnet.
Let all unite in defeating the move to disturb the present happy conditions. Economy demands it.
Peace and harmony demands it. In future years we may hope to witness developments which will make Bay City a great commercial and manufacturing city on the navigable Colorado, (the new channel of the river being on the edge of the city), with plucky Wadsworth a city of 5,000 people — all so prosperous that they wouldn’t deign to scrap over so insignificant an advantage as a county seat.
That is not merely a dream, but is within the range of possibilities, if our people all have the proper ambition and the right ideals.
Matagorda County News and Midcoast Farmer, July 3, 1914
The County Seat Election
The county seat election last Saturday passed off quietly, with a result so decidedly in favor of Bay City that the proponents of Wadsworth were much taken aback, while Chalmers wondered what became of the 360 Bay City admirers who put her in the race.
The Wadsworth people say the result might have been otherwise had the tickets been different, so as to give their town a reasonable show; that the tickets they had printed were refused entry in to the ring, and at Palacios for instance it was one o’clock before a Wadsworth vote could be polled, the management during the forenoon ruling that the special Wadsworth tickets could not be used, nor could Wadsworth be written in instead of Chalmers; however, there’ll be no contest, and all will be forgotten in a few days.
Only a few men were unreasonable in this matter, some seeming to think Wadsworth did not have a perfect right to ask for the honor, fully as much right as Chalmers.
There was even some criticism of the News-Farmer for printing the Wadsworth circulars and advertisement, and the editor had occasion to tell one gentleman that “While it was true the paper was published in Bay City, it was a county paper, and this was a county question and Wadsworth had a right to be heard.”
All parts of the county are entitled to equal rights in a county paper.
The vote was a follows, by precincts.
