History

   EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the 125th anniversary of Bay City’s founding in 1894.
   Since several events occurred in September that year, the Bay City Sentinel will feature the history of Bay City written the late Matagorda County historian Mary Belle Ingram throughout September.
   This is the second installment of Bay City’s history.
By Mary B. Ingram
From last week on History
   This stuffy little building first served as a county clerk’s office. At an early date Judge T.J. Hamilton erected a two-story building across from the northwest corner of the square, on lots now occupied by Badouh’s big store.
   This structure was used as a temporary court house and became the focus of the community’s religious life, as a union church and Sunday school held forth there.

   EDITOR’S NOTE: This is the 125th anniversary of Bay City’s founding in 1894.
   Since several events occurred in September that year, the Bay City Sentinel will feature the history of Bay City written the late Matagorda County historian Mary Belle Ingram throughout September.
By Mary B. Ingram
   “Bay City,” a name often misleading to strangers, is twenty-five miles from the beach and the Gulf of Mexico. 
   It is so named because the town lies in the center of the vast area of prairie land which has been known as Bay Prairie since the days of Stephen F. Austin in the early 1820s.
   J.A. Allhand’s 1931 book, Gringo Builders, tells the beginning of Bay City as follows:   
   You only have to go back to a summer day in 1894 to get the eginning of Bay City. 
   Out of the raw material of rich Bay prairie, whfrom whence Bay City receives its name, and the facile minds of G.M. Magill and N.M. Vogelsang, was this city born. 

From Historic Matagorda County and Wikipedia

Handbook of Texas Online

   EDITOR’S NOTE: Much of the following article and personal remembrance was given after Dr. J.E. Simons and his wife Annie died with an hour of each other June 30, 1935 in Bay City.
   Simons began his practice actually before Bay City existed - he was there at the beginning in 1894.
   Simons also began a legacy of descendants following him in the medical professional through the present.
   We’ll have more from the Matagorda County TXGenWeb from the Simons family of doctors in future editions.

  Members of the Bay City Historic Commission committee expressed concerns about businesses that don’t file Certificates of Appropriateness before making changes to historic buildings – or to those in the city’s historic district - during their regular meeting Aug. 5.
   Certificates of Appropriateness (COA) are required by the city’s historic commission for projects that would alter the exterior appearance of a designated historic property. 
   That includes alterations, additions, demolition or relocation of a landmark or structure within a historic district or new construction within a historic district.
   “We’ve got a lot of new businesses coming in downtown,” said committee chairman Michael George
   “I’m really excited to see what they are offering our community. But, they need to know to reach out before they make changes to the building,” George said.

Mary Belle McAllister Ingram of Bay City, passed away on April 23, 2010 at her home, the Legacy Assisted Living, after fighting a valiant battle against Hodgkin’s Lymphoma and heart disease.
   Mary Belle was born in Mankins, Texas, July 9, 1916, to Vera Frazier Richeson (from Bomerton, Texas) and Watkins L. Richeson (from Cherry Hill, Ala.). 
   After graduating from high school in Mankins, she attended North Texas State Teacher’s College in Denton graduating in 1936 with a Bachelor of Science Degree. 
   In later years she also obtained her Master’s Degree in Education from Denton. 
   She taught for one year at South Lockett in West Texas. 
   In the fall of 1937 she moved to Bay City and taught at Bay City High School. 
   In subsequent years she taught fifth grade at Tenie Holmes Elementary and was librarian at Cherry Junior High School and McAllister Junior High School.  

   Harmon Jerome McAllister was born in Quitman, Wood County, n Aug. 5, 1909. His parents were Hugh Hunter McAllister (1876-1964) and June Kendrick (1878-1914). 
   At the age of four, Harmon’s mother died and he and a younger sister lived with an aunt, Goldie Kendrick Cartwright. 
   He and four brothers and three sisters. His mother and father were born in Wood County, Texas; their parents had come from Georgia via Alabama in 1869.
   Harmon graduated from Mineola High School and completed his education at North Texas University at Denton. 
   He began teaching at Carlton, Texas, in 1934, and came to Matagorda County as a teacher and tennis coach in the Bay City High School in 1936.
   Mary Belle Richeson came to Bay City as a teacher in the high school in 1938. She was born on July 9, 1916, in Mankins, Archer County, Texas, the daughter of Watkins L. Richeson (1887-1950) and Vera Frazier (1892-1960). 

Matagorda County TXGenWeb