Garwood

Five years after its founding, Garwood was caught up in a land promotion fraud. In 1906 agents showed buyers photographs of crops, even orange groves, taken elsewhere but passed off as Colorado County land; people bought tracts unseen, and most left once they saw them. The town grew anyway. Ed R. Frnka moved the first building there in 1901. Garwood had two newspapers from 1909 to 1912, a bank and 500 people by 1910, and 750 residents and the Santa Fe railroad by 1915. A 1922 fire destroyed most of Main Street's east side.

What the plaque says

Garwood Founded in 1901, the town of Garwood is located on land once occupied by Preston Gilbert, one of Stephen F. Austin's "Old 300" colonists, who acquired the acreage in 1827. In 1896, Marcus Hervy Townsend, Thomas A. Hill, and William Thomas Burford bought part of Gilbert's original league of land as a farming and ranching investment. By 1901, they had begun rice production, developed a canal and irrigation system, and platted a townsite on their land. Towsend was a lawyer and Texas legislator. Hill was a prominent merchant and banker, while Burford was a druggist and planter who served as Colorado County sheriff from 1898-1902. They named their town for Judge Hiram Morgan Garwood, a friend of Townsend who never lived in Garwood or in Colorado County. Streets and avenues were named for early area settlers, other friends of the founders, and for the founders themselves. From the town's inception, its economy has been based on rice production. The gravel industry, oil and gas production, and duck and goose hunting are also important businesses here. Throughout its history, the small community has been an important part of Colorado County's heritage. (1985)

Where it stands

More markers nearby

• Nada — 3.0 mi
• Lakeside Sugar Refinery — 9.0 mi
• Navigation of the Colorado River — 9.8 mi
• Rice Culture in Colorado County — 10 mi