Small Town Stories Around Austin

By David W. Crump

Introduction

Some of the towns have faded away. Others have blossomed into new suburban communities. Many have faded and only remain as street names. Each name on the map around Austin has its own story. Here are some of these stories:

Bee Cave

Bee Cave is named after the Mexican Honeybees that flourished along Barton Creek and tributaries. A crossroads in Western Travis County, the Village of Bee Cave was incorporated in 1987 to avoid City of Austin annexation. Bee Cave is home to The Backyard open-air live music venue.

Buda

Buda started as a station on the new railroad in 1881. The depot name was change to Buda after the original name didn’t meet post office requirements. A small hotel was locally known as “The Buda House” named after the widows who worked there as cooks (Buda being a corruption of the Spanish word “viuda” or widow). Buda was a small agricultural center for many years and is now growing into a large bedroom community south of Austin. Buda is the host of Budafest and the annual Wiener Dog races.

Cedar Park

Attracted by the spring on Brushy Creek, Native Americans inhabited the area around what is now Cedar Park for thousands of years. The original Anglo settlement was called Running Brushy after the spring. The railroad initially called the station stop Bruggerhoff when it arrived in 1882 but the local residents didn’t like it. The community was renamed Cedar Park in 1887. Cedar Park has had long connections to the cattle industry with the founding family settling in the area with land purchased after a successful cattle drive on the Chisholm Trail.

Creedmoor

The town was renamed from Creekmoor to Creedmoor as an expression of faith. Creedmoor was home to cotton gins for many years to support the local cotton farmers. Creedmoor is home to the famous Wilhite’s BBQ that has recently relocated at the intersection of FM 1327 & FM 1625, but still locally known for good food. The Texas Disposal System landfill is located just west of Creedmoor and includes an exotic game ranch.

Del Valle

Del Valle’s history goes back to a Mexican land grant to Santiago Del Valle in 1812. The community and post office was named after this land grant. The area’s farming focused changed when World War II requirements brought Del Valle Army Air Field in 1942. The airbase was renamed Bergstrom Field in 1943 in honor of an Austinite, Captain John Bergstrom, killed in the Philippines at Clark Field, December 8, 1941. In 1993, the airbase was repurposed to become Austin-Bergstrom Airport.

Driftwood

Best known now for the location of The Salt Lick BBQ, Driftwood was started in the 1880's as a small community centered around a church, post office and an iconic general store. Driftwood almost disappeared with a population of 10 in the 1920's and another low point in the 1970's of 25.

Dripping Springs

Dripping Springs, “The Gateway to the Texas Hill Country,” was started by three pioneer families in 1854. Dripping Springs was located along the military supply and stage road between Austin and Fredericksburg. The community was named in 1857 by Indiana “Nannie” Moss, wife of John Moss, the first postmaster. The “dripping springs” are an outlet of the Edward’s Aquifer at Milk House Branch that drips inside the limestone caves along this creek.

Elgin

Elgin, the “Sausage Capital of Texas,” is home to famous Elgin Hot Sausage. The farmland in the area was part of Stephen Austin’s Little Colony founded prior to Texas independence. Elgin was named after the Houston & Texas Central railroad land official, Robert Morris Elgin, in 1872 and became a thriving depot town. The historic 1903 passenger depot at the rail junction now is a museum. Local clay deposits still support two large brick factories. The historic main street of Elgin has been used as movie sets, including 1974’s, “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre.”

Elroy

The first Formula One raceway will soon completely transform this small unincorporated community in Southeast Travis County. Elroy is named after a local storeowner’s son Leroy. The community was founded in 1892 and had a post office briefly from1899 to 1902. The Elroy school house building still exists just off FM 812. It was closed in 1961 when the area schools were consolidated into what became the Del Valle ISD.

Kyle

The town name comes from the founder, Captain Fergus Kyle, of the Terry Texas Rangers of Civil War fame who donated land for the townsite. A descendant, Edwin Kyle, legendary Dean of the Texas A&M School of Agriculture is a famous former resident and namesake of Texas A&M’s Kyle Field football stadium. Kyle is home to Thunderhill Stockcar raceway.

Lakeway

Like most of Central Texas, the Lakeway area was Tonkawa Indian country until the tribe was displaced with Anglo settlement in the middle of the 19th century. Two early pioneers left names that are well known today. Lohmann’s Ford Road (now mis-spelled “Lohman’s” and the road was renamed Lohman’s Crossing Road) is from an industrist German immigrant John Henry Lohmann who established a crossing of the Colorado River. James Hudson and family had started a homestead in 1854 on what is now called Hudson Bend. The town of Lakeway started with a resort development including the Lakeway Inn and a marina on Lake Travis that opened in 1963. The Village of Lakeway was incorporated in 1974.

Manor

Manor’s namesake, James Manor, immigrated to Texas with his lifetime friend Sam Houston in 1832. He settled near Gilleland’s creek near what is now downtown Manor in 1836. The railroad between Austin and Houston was built through Manor in 1871 with the town formally established shortly afterwards. Cotton farming was king in Manor until the boll weevil infestation damaged crops. Manor is now a growing residential area.

McNeil

McNeil is located at the junction of the former Austin & Northwestern Railroad (now Cap Metro) and the International Great Northern (now Union Pacific) railroads. Most of the town-site is the Austin White Lime plant; however, the original company store and post office building still exist. The town was named after an Austin & Northwestern railroad official. McNeil Road is a major arterial street connecting North Austin and Round Rock.

Mustang Ridge

Mustang Ridge is a growing community at the junction of Caldwell, Travis County and Bastrop County.  The town is named after a small line of hills in the area. Long known as an area for ranching and cotton farming, it was also a stop on the Austin to Gonzales stage line. The town was incorporated in 1985.

Niederwald

Niederwald was founded along the Austin-San Antonio road after the Civil War by pioneers of German extraction. The name means “brushwood” after the mesquite that grows in the area. Cotton farming supported a cotton gin for many years.

Paige

Paige is a town founded by the Houston & Texas Central Railway in 1872 and was the site of their water tower. It is named after Norman Paige, a civil engineer for the railroad. Many of the inhabitants are of German extraction as the area was originally settled by German immigrants. The building pictured at right is a gas station on the bypassed main street a couple blocks north of US 290.

Pilot Knob

You wouldn’t think of the Austin area as having volcanoes, but millions of years ago it did. The hill near McKinney Falls State Park, known as Pilot Knob, is the remnant of a small cinder cone volcano. It erupted along an ancient sea shore when dinosaurs roamed our area about 79 million years ago.

Pflugerville

Pflugerville was named in honor of Henry Pfluger in 1860, an earlier resident. The rich soil in the area attracted additional German immigrant farmers. Blackland Prairie land supported substantial cotton crops with cotton gins located in town. The settlement grew after the arrival of the MKT railroad in 1904 which built a branchline from Georgetown through Pflugerville to Austin. Growth from nearby Austin caused large housing development to erupt in the 1980’s and transformed this small farming center into a large suburb.  

Round Rock

Yes, there really is a large round anvil-shaped rock in the middle of Brushy Creek and it is the city’s namesake. A small community formed at a crossing of Brushy Creek in 1851. The natural ford of Brushy Creek is on a major feeder trail to the famous Chisholm Trail and many cattle drives passed through the area during the great cattle drive era beginning in the late 1860’s. Notorious Train Robber Sam Bass was shot and captured in Round Rock in 1878 as his gang prepared to rob a Round Rock bank. Round Rock is now a substantial city hosting the headquarters of Dell Computers and the minor league Round Rock Express baseball team.

Webberville

The area was initially settled in 1827 during Texas’s colonial period by farmers taking advantage of the rich blackland prairie and adjacent Colorado River. The settlement was originally named Webber’s Prairie after physician John Ferdinand Webber. It was renamed Webberville in 1853 but not organized as a village until 2003 to avoid annexation by Austin.

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