Graydon

The post office took the name of a grandson, Graydon Elton Barrow. The community's economy broke in sequence. The 1915 hurricane filled the canals with salt water and ruined the rice, a freeze the next winter killed most of the few citrus trees that had survived, and farm prices fell sharply after World War I. Settlers had come, many of them from Kansas, for mild winters and good farmland, and school attendance peaked at 64 in 1898. By 1929 it was down to sixteen, and in 1938 the district was folded into Anahuac's.

What the plaque says

Graydon The farming community of Graydon flourished along the west fork of Double Bayou at the turn of the century. Benjamin F. Sterling (1831-1917), one of the earliest settlers in the area, brought his family here in 1869. He is credited with starting a school as early as 1877. A one-room schoolhouse was erected in 1893 on land provided by Jacob Carl Johnson. In 1895 Sterling opened a post office in his general store and named it "Graydon" for his grandson. His son Ross Sterling (1874-1949)a native of Graydon, served as governor of Texas, 1931-33. In the late 1890s, real estate developers divided much of this fertile area into small farms to sell to families in the north and east. Rice, vegetables, and other crops were sent by boat down Double Bayou, the community's principal transportation artery, and across the bay to Galveston. Marion Stines (1850-1916) became postmaster in 1912 and moved the post office to his store. The second Graydon schoolhouse, built in 1915 on land given by George Banks was the site of worship services and social events. Graydon's population declined because of reverses in the farm economy, destructive hurricanes, and the rise of motor travel which isolated the community. the post office closed in 1919 and the school in 1935. (1977)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• San Jacinto Battleground State Historic Site — 25 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.
• Space Center Houston — 27 mi
  The visitor center of NASA's Johnson Space Center at Clear Lake, with flown capsules, a shuttle replica riding a 747, and tram tours to Mission Control and a Saturn V.

More markers nearby

• Birthplace of Governor Ross Shaw Sterling — 1.4 mi
• St. Paul United Methodist Church — 2.6 mi
• Round Point — 3.2 mi
• Juan Davis Bradburn — 4.5 mi