Bell County grew from 20,518 people in 1880 to 33,377 in 1890. The County Seat of Belton was the hub of the county with a population of 3,000. The United States consisted of 44 states in 1890 and had almost 63 million people.
In 1883 the University of Texas was established in Austin, TX and the "Old Main" building started.
The corner stone for the Bell County Courthouse was laid in 1884 in Belton.
Laying of the cornerstone for the Bell County Courthouse in 1884. (2)
Bell County courthouse ca. 1885. (2)
By the mid 1880s Belton had "daily mail and stagecoach service, three newspapers, an opera house, two hotels, thirteen grocery stores, and three banks. During this period Belton also developed into a processing and shipping center for the region's growing cotton crops. In the early 1880s the first railroad reached the town." (3)
Two of the newspapers in Belton are shown below.
The Texas Farmer Jan. 9, 1884. (4)
The Belton Journal, Aug. 15, 1889. (5)
In 1885 the first Dr Pepper was served at Morrison's Old Corner Drug Store in Waco, TX.
The Dr Pepper Museum in Waco, TX. (6)
Also in 1885 Karl Benz introduced the Benz Patent Motorwagen, which is credited as the first automobile.
The Benz Patent Motorwagen.
Picture taken at the Mercedes-Benz Museum in Stuttgart, Germany June 2006.
1886 brought the dedication of the Statue of Liberty in new York Harbor.
Back in Bell County, even with all the progress being made in the county and elsewhere, farming in Texas was still a difficult proposition. My father said in his book "The Meixner family moved to Bell county where they were engaged in farming. Dad said that the crab grass was extremely bad. They had to scrape the rows from one end to the other with a hoe. I imagine that they irrigated their crops with the sweat of their bodies. No one knows what a grueling task this can be unless he has done something similar." (8)
Other families living in this area included the wealthy family of Joseph and Eliza Wallace and their daughter Miriam. My grandfather Harmon worked for the Wallaces. I'll have more on this family in a later post.
Another family, Rev. Early Greathouse and his wife Elizabeth moved to Bell County in 1870 and purchased 1000 acres of land just north of Little River, TX. Rev. Greathouse established at least two churches in the area. He also dedicated a parcel of his land to be used as a family cemetery. It was later opened up for use by others in the area. (9) Possibly Frank Meixner knew or worked for Rev. Greathouse because his land is located in the area where Frank is believed to have lived in Bell County. Below is a map of the area showing Little River, TX at the bottom, the Leon River to the left and the Greathouse Cemetery to the upper right. All these families must have been living in this general area.
Google Earth Maps
The family apparently could not afford a headstone for Frank. This headstone was placed at the grave by some of his grandchildren almost 100 years after his death.
Next time: Frank Meixner's Legacy and What does Theresia Meixner do now?
References:
(1) www.lsjunction.com/schools/ut/ut.asp, accessed Oct. 21, 2012.
(2) Photographs I took of a display at the Bell County Courthouse May 5, 2008.
(3) http://www.beltonclassof60.com/History_of_Belton_Texas.html, accessed Oct. 22, 2012.
(4) Fuller, J.F., editor. Texas Farmer (Belton, TX.), Vol. 4, No. 37, Ed. 1 Wednesday, January 9, 1884, Newspaper; digital images, (http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth181531/ : accessed October 7, 2012), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas history, http://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, Austin, Texas.
(5) The Belton Journal (Belton, TX.), Vol. 23, No. 33, Ed. 1 Thursday, August 9, 1884, Newspaper; digital images, (http://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth233458/ : accessed October 7, 2012), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas history, http://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Dolph Briscoe Center for American History, Austin, Texas.
(6) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr_Pepper accessed Oct 21, 2012
(7) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statue_of_Liberty accessed Oct 21, 2012
(8) Memoirs of Robert Harmon Meixner, Sr., July 10, 1910 - June 13, 1994.
(9) http://files.usgwarchives.net/al/tallapoosa/bios/g6320001.txt accessed Oct 21, 2012
(10) Claudia Brown's account of Frank Meixner's death as told to her by her mother, Alberta (Meixner) Neve.
Claudia Brown had this very interesting comment:
ReplyDeleteI thought you might find this interesting about the grave of Frank Meixner.
When Alynn, Mother (Alberta "Peaches") and I started looking for Frank Meixner's grave, we started in Salado where Theresia is buried. No luck. Then we went cemetery walking all over Bell County looking at Grave Markers. Later, Mother and I went to visit Louise Reid Braun and her husband. When we asked if they knew where Frank was buried, he said "I can take you right to it." He said it was in the Greathouse Cemetery and it was marked with a cedar post that had cement on the top of it to prevent it from rotting out. When we found it, the cement was still there and it had the print of the hand and fingers of the person who placed it there still in the cement. When they set the stone, they probably just removed the post.