An Arm of The Chisholm Cattle Trail

Burleson County had cattle long before it had a trail to Kansas. Its ranges held 12,117 head in 1850 and 42,469 in 1860, a total not matched again until the 1950s. By 1870 the herd stood at 16,308. Drovers coming north from Columbus passed through the Deanville area toward Waco, paralleling the Brazos, and camped near the settlement. Local stockmen rebuilt to 30,765 head by 1890, fell to a low in 1930, and reached 65,137 in 1974 after cotton land turned to pasture.

What the plaque says

An Arm of The Chisholm Cattle Trail The Chisholm Trail, which was developed following the Civil War, allowed Texas cattle to be driven to railheads in Kansas for shipment to eastern markets. An arm of the celebrated route, reaching from Matagorda County to the main trail near present McGregor, passed through this area. With the establishment of James L. Dean's store, later the site of Deanville, and the White Inn, the trail became a significant commercial road. Vital to the development of Burleson County's cattle industry, it declined in use after rail lines reached the area in the late 1870s. (1981)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Lake Somerville State Park and Trailway — 12 mi
  Two park units on an 11,000-acre lake between Austin and College Station, joined by a thirteen-mile trailway for hikers, cyclists and riders with primitive camps along the way.
• Texas Wendish Heritage Museum — 25 mi
  A museum at Serbin of the Wends, a Slavic people from Lusatia whose congregation of nearly 600 crossed on the Ben Nevis in 1854, losing seventy-three to cholera on the way.
• Independence and Old Baylor Park — 28 mi
  A crossroads north of Brenham that was the richest town in Texas when it won Baylor University in 1845, refused the railroad, and lost the college to Waco and Belton in 1886.
• George H.W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum — 29 mi
  The library of the forty-first president on the Texas A&M campus, opened in 1997, where George and Barbara Bush and their daughter Robin are buried in a family plot on the grounds.

More markers nearby

• Site of Camino Real — 1.7 mi
• King's Highway - Camino Real - Old San Antonio Road — 2.5 mi
• Deanville — 2.7 mi
• Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church — 4.9 mi