Ritson Morris and Elmwood Plantation

Seabrook grew on the Ritson Morris league that became Elmwood. John Sydnor of the Clear Creek Development Company and E. S. Nicholson platted and promoted the town in 1900 and named it for Sydnor's son, Seabrook. Its first residents came for the summer on the Suburban, a commuter train that ran twice a day. The 1900 hurricane wrecked the school, and after 1947 the Fay shipyard, able to handle 150 boats, brought workers and new growth. Seabrook incorporated on October 23, 1961, and by 1968 it had 6,000 people.

What the plaque says

Ritson Morris and Elmwood Plantation Virginia native Ritson Morris (1798-1849) came to Texas about 1827. He settled first in Nacogdoches, where he married Minerva Edwards in 1829. One year later, following the birth of their first child, the Morrises moved to this area, where Minerva's father, Amos Edwards, had settled in Stephen F. Austin's colony. Morris received a Mexican land grant and established a 3,000-acre plantation he named Elmwood. He raised livestock and crops, and the family lived in a modest log house. It was later replaced by a large two-story structure that remained on the site until about 1885. Minerva Morris' brother, Ashmore Edwards, built a home nearby. In 1832 and 1835, Morris participated in skirmishes against the Mexican army at Anahuac, precedents to the Texas Revolution of 1836. Morris sent his family to New Orleans for safety during the revolution, but they later returned and continued to live on the plantation for many years. Ritson Morris contracted tuberculosis and died on September 21, 1849. He was buried in the family cemetery on Elmwood Plantation. Many of his descendants continue to live in southeast Harris County. (1991)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Space Center Houston — 5.0 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.
• San Jacinto Battleground State Historic Site — 13 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.
• Texas Seaport Museum and the Elissa — 23 mi
  An iron barque launched in Aberdeen in 1877 that called at Galveston twice, ended up smuggling in the Adriatic, and was bought back from a Greek scrapyard to sail again from Pier 22.
• The Strand — 23 mi
  Five blocks of iron-front brick buildings near the harbor that were once called the Wall Street of the Southwest, emptied after 1900 and brought back by preservationists from the 1960s.

More markers nearby

• Prehistoric Indian Campsite — 2.0 mi
• Captain William Plunkett Harris — 2.7 mi
• Houston Yacht Club — 3.4 mi
• La Porte — 5.7 mi