Hammel's Branch

A likely misspelling named this town. The Handbook of Texas says the school honored its first teacher, Emma Himmel, but when the federal government opened a post office in 1903 it recorded the name as Hammel's Branch, possibly through a spelling error. The post office closed after 1907. Before 1920 the depot had a pump house and public scales for weighing livestock, alongside three general stores, a gin, a grain and coal warehouse, a blacksmith and a barbershop. After the depot closed in 1919 trains stopped only when flagged, and in 1925 the school joined Midway's.

What the plaque says

Hammel's Branch In 1876 a family of German descent, the John Henry Himmels, settled in this area of Hill County. Seven years later, Miss Emma B. Himmel became the first teacher of the Himmel Branch School. The school was the beginning of a town that, through a misspelling, came to be called Hammel's Branch. Other prominent names of early settlers were the Clinkscales, Elkins, Giles, Hall, Haskins, Jennings, Kuykendall, Lynch, McClure, Snow, Thompson, Watson, Wells, White, and Williams families. The Missouri, Kansas and Texas Railroad laid a line through the settlement in 1893-94, and the community began to flourish. Eight business establishments, including a general store, gin, and blacksmith shop, opened along the rail line. In 1903 a post office was established in the depot, and the town legally became known as Hammel's Branch. After World War I, the town began to decline. In 1920, the last store closed. The school held its last classes in 1925. Evidence of the community can still be found upon close examination. (1985)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Hill County Courthouse — 10 mi
  Wesley C. Dodson's limestone Second Empire courthouse of 1890 on the Hillsboro square, gutted by fire on New Year's Day 1993 and rededicated in 1999 after a rebuilding that two Willie Nelson concerts helped pay for.
• Ellis County Courthouse — 22 mi
  J. Riely Gordon's courthouse of 1897 in Pecos red sandstone and pink granite, with twenty-one carved stone faces and two cornerstones left by a quarrel over its building.

More markers nearby

• Old Brandon Mill — 2.8 mi
• Milford Presbyterian Church — 3.2 mi
• First Baptist Church of Milford — 3.4 mi
• Milford Cemetery — 3.6 mi