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2007, 2008,2009, & 2010
by the Texas Historical Commission
Mission Statement
The commissioner’s court of a county may appoint a county historical commission for the purpose of initiating and conducting programs suggested by the commissioner’s court and the Texas Historical Commission for the preservation of the county’s historic cultural resources. Programs suggested by the Texas Historical Commission must be consistent with the statewide preservation plan. The commission should institute and carry out a continuing survey of the county to determine the existence of historic buildings and other historical and archeological sites, private archeological collections, important endangered properties, or other historical features within the county.
The commission should develop and maintain its inventory of surveyed individual properties and districts in accordance with standards established by the Texas Historical Commission.
The commission should establish a system for the periodic review and assessment of the condition of designated properties in the county, including Recorded Texas Historic Landmarks, State Archeological Landmarks, and individual historic properties or districts listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
The commission should strive to create countywide awareness and appreciation of historic preservation and its benefits and uses. It should promote historic and cultural sites in the county and sustain heritage tourism.
The commission shall review applications for Official Texas Historical Markers to determine the accuracy, appropriateness, and completeness of the application. It should establish a system for the periodic review, assessment, and maintenance of Official Texas Historical Markers in the county.
The History
Located a few miles south of San Antonio de Bexar and the old Spanish missions, Atascosa County is interlaced by a number of historic trails. The southwestern corner of the county, where Frio, LaSalle, McMullen and Atascosa Counties meet, is only some eighty miles away from the Rio Grande River and the Mexican Border. The southeastern corner of the county is only about eighty miles from the Gulf of Mexico.
Atascosa County was named for the Atascosa River, which was named by the Spaniards. In Spanish, the word “Atascoso” means “boggy”. The name was validated when, in 1842, men in the Somervell Expedition under the command of General Alexander Somervell, seeking revenge on the Mexican Army after their attack and capture of San Antonio, found the area impassable after a heavy rain. It is said that the horses sank in the sand to their girth. This three-day delay gave the Mexican general a chance to escape back into Mexico.
Mission San Jose y San Miguel de Aguayo was one of five missions established in the San Antonio area during the early eighteenth century, El Atascoso Rancho, one of San Jose’s mission ranchers, was located along both sides of the Atascosa Creek in central western Atascosa County. San Jose’s El Atascoso Ranch went to Jose Antonio Navarro, whose father, Angel, was owed 745 pesos by that mission at the time of secularization. Jose Antonio Navarro lived on this ranch in the 1850’s and 1860’s. Out of this four league, colonial grant the first Atascosa County seat was donated in 1856 and named Navatasco by Navarro. This was near the present day community of Amphion.
The county seat was moved to the new town of Pleasanton in 1858. The town was named by John Bowen for his friend John Pleasants. In March of 1862, the 32ndTexas Volunteer Cavalry mustered in Pleasanton under a large live oak tree in front of the picket walled courthouse. Captain Lewis Maverick enlisted men from Atascosa and surrounding counties for Confederate duty. The group soon became part of the 36th Woods Regiment.
After the Civil War Pleasanton became headquarters for the Stock Raiser’s Association of Western Texas, organized in 1867, possibly the first Texas group of cowmen or ranchers coming together to discuss and work out problems of the cow business. The Western Stock Journal was published in Pleasanton throughout the 1860’s and 1870’s and kept records of all cattle drives from Atascosa and surrounding counties during the trail driving days. That is why Pleasanton claims to be the “birth place of the cowboy”. Pleasanton remained the county seat until 1910 when, by a majority vote, the seat was moved to the new town of Jourdanton. By 1912 the San Antonio, Uvalde & Gulf Rail Road had come through Pleasanton.
Jourdanton was founded in 1909 by Jourdan Campbell and T.H. Zanderson. Campbell and Zanderson purchased the near 38,000-acre Tobey Ranch with the idea of subdividing it into farm and ranch tracts. A $50,000 bonus was raised to insure that the railroad would come through, and a town was laid out. Promotion began across the country and a huge three-day barbecue, rodeo and land auction was planned for September 23, 24 and 25 of 1909. The new Artesian Belt Railroad, named for the many artesian wells in the area, brought people in daily. The auction was a huge success and within a short time, the town had doubled. Jourdanton remains the county seat of Atascosa County. Jourdan Campbell was the son of John Campbell, founder of Campbellton.
John Campbell emigrated from Ireland and moved to Texas in the 1850’s. After serving in the Confederacy, he bought land in Atascosa County and discovered a need for a store between Pleasanton and the Live Oak County town of Oakville. Others moved into the area and Campbellton was born. In 1879, Campbell’s Store became the first post office; John Campbell was the first postmaster. He then built a school and an alter in his home so mass could be held.
The town of Charlotte, also located on part of the Tobey Ranch, was laid out by railroad developer, J. F. Edwards. It was designed in the shape of a wagon wheel with the streets representing the spokes of the wheel, starting at the hub or the center of the town. The town experienced growth when the San Antonio, Uvalde and Gulf Railroad came through in 1910.
Settlers from the Castro Colony first owned the site of the town of Lytle. The town had its beginning in 1882 when the International and Great Northern Railroad established a station there, the first railroad in Atascosa County. The town was named for Captain John T. Lytle. The first post office was established September 10, 1883, with William J. Garnand as the first postmaster.
The town of Poteet was named for Francis Marion Poteet, a blacksmith. The first post office was established in Mr. Poteet’s blacksmith shop April 9, 1886 with Mr. Poteet as postmaster. In 1904, a deep water well into the Carrizo strata hit and Poteet’s first artesian well came in. Irrigation across the area began and the area soon became a center for raising fruits and vegetables. Today, Poteet is known as the strawberry capital of Texas.
Christine was first to be named “New Artesia”, by Dr. Charles Franklin Simmons. He had come, first to Live Oak County, from Missouri, and became a land speculator. He purchased the almost 95,000-acre Oppenheimer Ranch, divided into smaller farm and ranch tracts and town lots. Most of this spanned into Atascosa County. The land was auctioned from the new town, buyers coming on the new Artesian Belt Railroad, which came to the town in October of 1910.
Today, Atascosa County is traversed by Interstate 37. About 50 percent of the county is considered prime farmland, with peanuts, strawberries, corn and milo as the chief agricultural products. Cattle ranching remains a profitable industry. Mineral resources include clay, uranium, sand and gravel, oil and gas, caliche, lignite coal, construction and industrial sand and sulfur.
The climate is subtropical, humid. Winters are mild and summers are hot.
Porter, Norman F. Sr., History of Atascosa County Through 1912, Galvan Creek Publishing, 2007
Peterson, Linda, Handbook of Texas Online, Texas State Historical Association
