City of Pasadena

Pasadena voted to incorporate on December 22, 1923, voted to disincorporate on November 29, 1924, and incorporated for good in 1928. Joseph Stephen Cullinan, founder of Texaco, bought 200 acres there after moving his company to Houston in 1906 and ran an experimental farm for twenty years, and the Sinclair, Texaco and Crown companies had refineries in the area by 1920. The real change from farming to industry came in the late 1930s with the war in Europe, and the city grew from 3,436 people in 1940 to 22,483 in 1950 and 112,560 in 1980.

What the plaque says

City of Pasadena This area has progressed from Indian territory to pioneer ranch land to space-age Pasadena. Known at one time for its strawberry patches, it is now acclaimed for its oil and chemical industries. The Vince brothers, members of Stephen F. Austin's original 300 settlers, developed area as ranch land. The armies of both Sam Houston and Santa Anna traveled through what is now Pasadena in 1836, to San Jacinto to decide the future of Texas. "Deaf" Smith destroyed a bridge on the Vince ranch to block possible escape by the Mexican army. After the brief battle, Santa Anna eluded the victorious Texas army on a horse stolen from Allen Vince. He was captured approximately one mile from this marker. Site of the bridge and capture may be seen by following signs to the north. In 1850, surveyors of the Galveston, Harrisburg and San Antonio Railroad called the area "Land of Flowers." Col. J. H. Burnet, a land developer from Galveston, founded Pasadena in 1895. He said, "Pasadena will be the hub of a vast rich agricultural area." The area fully justified his vision, for by 1908, "delicious strawberries, figs, oranges and vegetables" were the boast of Pasadena. Recorded Texas Historic Landmark - 1967

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• San Jacinto Battleground State Historic Site — 8.2 mi
  The 1,200 acres of coastal prairie and marsh where the Texas Revolution ended in eighteen minutes, and the 567-foot shaft of fossil-studded limestone that has stood over them since 1939.
• Emancipation Park — 9.5 mi
  The Third Ward park that freedpeople bought for Juneteenth in 1872, rebuilt in 2017 on Emancipation Avenue and still the center of the city's June 19 celebration.
• Buffalo Soldiers National Museum — 10 mi
  A museum in Houston's 1925 Light Guard Armory that tells the service of Black soldiers from the Revolutionary War onward, built from one veteran's thirty years of collecting.
• Sam Houston Park and the Heritage Society — 10 mi
  Ten historic buildings gathered in a downtown park below the skyscrapers, among them the 1870 house of the Reverend Jack Yates, built five years after emancipation.

More markers nearby

• Allen Ranch — 0.6 mi
• Crown Hill Cemetery — 0.9 mi
• Near Site of Isaac Batterson Home — 2.4 mi
• First Airplane Flight Over Texas — 3.5 mi