James Stephen Hogg

In 1872, soon after moving to Quitman as a newspaper editor, Hogg took on the Texas and Pacific Railway. The Handbook of Texas says the railroad wanted $100,000 in county bonds to help build west from Longview, and that Hogg led the opposition that defeated the subsidy. The company put its depot at Sodom instead, the town later renamed Mineola. The same Handbook entry says his papers at Longview and Quitman opposed railroad subsidies, Grant administration corruption and local lawlessness, so the bond fight fit the line he had already taken in print.

What the plaque says

James Stephen Hogg (March 24, 1851-March 3, 1906) Texas statesman whose nationally-acclaimed public career began at this site. The third son of Gen. Joseph L. and Lucanda (McMath) Hogg was born near Rusk. Orphaned during troubled Civil War era, he began at age 14 to earn his own way as a farmhand, clerk, printer's devil, typesetter, country editor. At 22, he was elected Justice of the Peace, Precinct 1, and headed Commissioners Court of Wood County, 1874-75. He was admitted to the bar in 1875 and soon held higher offices: county attorney (1879-81), district attorney (1881-85), Texas Attorney General, (1887-90). Inaugurated on Jan. 20, 1891, he was the first native Texan to become Governor of the state. He championed the common people. An intellectual and physical giant, personally fearless, he saw Texas as victim of Wall Street greed, and corrected many injustices. To equalize business opportunities among great and small, he led in creating Texas Railroad Commission, hailed as a model throughout the world. Public office left him financially insecure. Later came wealth, which has been invested by his heirs in Texas mental health and culture. His wife was Sallie Stinson of Wood County. Their children -- Will, Ima, Mike and Tom -- were all philanthropists. (1971)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Governor Hogg Shrine — 0.4 mi
  Quitman's 27-acre city park, once a state historical park, where two houses tied to James Stephen Hogg's marriage stand beside an arboretum, a nature walk and the grounds of the Old Settlers Reunion.
• Tyler State Park — 24 mi
  A 985-acre park eight miles north of Tyler, built by the Civilian Conservation Corps from 1935 to 1941 around a 64-acre spring-fed lake, with more than 13 miles of trails.
• Lake Bob Sandlin State Park — 27 mi
  A 1987 state park on a 9,000-acre reservoir, where a Republic of Texas stockade called Fort Sherman stood in 1838 and the Caddo lived from A.D. 800 to 1860, now with fishing piers, trails and cabins.

More markers nearby

• J. H. Jones and the Old Settlers Reunion Grounds — 0.3 mi
• Col. James A. Stinson Home — 0.4 mi
• Wood County — 2.2 mi
• Rock Hill Baptist Church — 7.3 mi