City of Grapeland

Before the railroad, Grapeland was a crossroads on the route from Crockett to Palestine, and an early resident's home near the intersection served as a mail drop. The settlement was called Grapevine for the wild fruit until 1873, when a post office application changed it to Grapeland. In 1872 the Houston and Great Northern turned over a 640-acre tract to the New York and Texas Land Company for the townsite. After World War II peanuts replaced cotton, and since 1945 the town has held a Peanut Festival, whose fiddler's contest grew into a Labor Day bluegrass festival.

What the plaque says

City of Grapeland In area settled about 1850. Founded 1872 by International & Great Northern Railway investors. Named for rank wild grapevines. Post office opened May 26, 1873. Log schoolhouse, used also for church services, was first public building. Disciples of Christ and Methodists erected first church buildings. Business section was rebuilt of brick after 1913 fire. Town was incorporated 1924. Oil and gas, produced since 1936, enrich and economy based on peanuts, ranching, truck crops, cotton, and manufacturing. Town is now know as gateway to the 1500-acre Houston County Lake. (1972)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Texas State Railroad Excursion Train — 18 mi
  A round trip of about 25 miles of track between the Palestine and Rusk depots through the Piney Woods, on a line built by prison labor and reopened as a tourist railroad in 1976.
• Caddo Mounds State Historic Site — 21 mi
  Three earthen mounds of an ancestral Caddo village and ceremonial center on the old El Camino Real, settled about A.D. 800 and still sacred to Caddo people, with a grass house and visitor center.

More markers nearby

• Jane Dotson Lively — 4.2 mi
• Joseph T. Bowman — 5.2 mi
• Guiceland Cemetery — 5.2 mi
• San Pedro Community — 6.0 mi