El Camino Real

The plaque ends by noting that this highway still follows the old road, and state records show how. In March 1942 the Highway Commission entered State Highway OSR in its designation files, a route already maintained from SH 21 at Midway through Normangee to US 190 at Benchley. A month later it added the stretch west to SH 21 just east of the Brazos River, across Madison, Leon, Robertson and Brazos counties. In June 1944 the commission made the old route a memorial to the Daughters and Sons of the Republic of Texas. TxDOT certified 61.918 miles in 2010.

What the plaque says

El Camino Real Also known as Old San Antonio Road and Old Spanish Trail A trail of adventure, hardships, opportunity and freedom, over which history stalked into Texas. To the Spanish, El Camino Real was a road traveled for the king – to colonize, Christianize, seek adventure or look for riches. This road became the most famous. Its many parts were made, discovered or known hundreds of years before 1691, when Domingo Teran de los Rios, first Texas governor, joined and marked the different trails for the king. It was the route from Monclova (crossing the Rio Grande near Eagle Pass) to the missions of east Texas. Probably its trailblazers were buffalos and Indians, or Aztecs on trading expeditions. It was also probably traveled, described and changed in part by French explorer La Salle; by Alonso de Leon and Father Damian Massanet planting missions in east Texas; and by the French nobleman St. Denis seeking trade along the Rio Grande. As the years wore on, it was traveled in 1820 by Moses Austin, as well as by thousands of settlers who followed him. San Augustine, Nacogdoches and San Antonio were its principal cities; inns sprang up along the way. Soldiers and supply trains used it during the Texas Revolution, Mexican War and Civil War. It is still followed in part by this highway. (1968)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• George H.W. Bush Presidential Library and Museum — 12 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.
• Calvert — 20 mi
  A railroad cotton town of 1868 on State Highway 6 that claimed the largest cotton gin in the world and elected Black men to county and state office during Reconstruction.

More markers nearby

• Staggers Point — steps away
• Alexander Cemetery — 4.4 mi
• Alexander Methodist Chapel — 4.4 mi
• Robert Henry — 5.3 mi