Crosby County

Stephen Crosby was born in South Carolina in 1808 and captained a steamboat on the Alabama River before settling in Texas in 1845. He became chief clerk of the General Land Office in 1848 and was elected commissioner in 1851 as a Democrat, serving until 1858; much of the credit for clear land titles in Texas is his. He lost the next election after joining the Know-Nothings, returned to the Democrats and the office in 1862, and was removed by the Reconstruction military government in 1867. He died in Austin in 1869.

What the plaque says

Crosby County Formed from Young and Bexar Territories. Created August 21, 1876. Organized September 20, 1886. Named in honor of Stephen Crosby 1800-1869. Came to Texas in 1845. Commissioner of the General Land Office. County seat, Estacado, 1886. Emma, 1890. Crosbyton, since 1911.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Crosby County Pioneer Memorial Museum — steps away
  Crosbyton's museum of Blanco Canyon, built in 1958 as a copy of Hank Smith's Rock House, and the place to learn the canyon's 1871 fight between Mackenzie's cavalry and Quanah's Quahadi Comanche.
• Spur-Dickens County Museum — 25 mi
  Dickens County's museum on the main block of Spur, a town born on November 1, 1909, when the first train reached the land a New York syndicate was selling off from the Spur Ranch.
• Slaton Harvey House — 27 mi
  A 1912 Santa Fe Harvey House in the railroad town of Slaton, restored as a museum, event hall and five-room inn overlooking a working BNSF yard.
• Motley County Historical Museum — 34 mi
  Matador's museum in the 1928 Traweek Hospital, in the county seat a Scottish-owned ranch created by having its cowboys open one-day businesses to pass a state rule.

More markers nearby

• Crosbyton — steps away
• High Plains Pioneer Henry Clay Smith — steps away
• Crosby County — steps away
• Citizens National Bank — steps away