Site Planned for a Regional Trade Center: Simmons, Texas

Simmons sold farms, not a railroad. In 1906, according to the Handbook, Dr. Charles F. Simmons divided his 60,000-acre ranch into about 4,200 tracts, and by 1910 the town of Simmons had about 550 people. The railroad he had promised never arrived. He died that year, and soon afterward George W. West began developing 75,000 acres in the center of the county, where the San Antonio, Uvalde and Gulf arrived in 1912. The Simmons school later closed, and in 1954 its salvaged brick went into a George West parsonage.

What the plaque says

Site Planned for a Regional Trade Center: Simmons, Texas Originally ranch land, bought in 1900 by Dr. C.F. Simmons (Wealthy St. Louis manufacturer of "Liver Regulator"), who also built this all-faiths church, 1908. After Simmons' son and heir died of snake bite, he sold 60,000--acre ranch to 4,200 small farmers and provided buildings for this rural community. (1969)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Choke Canyon State Park — 6.9 mi
  A reservoir state park on the Frio River in two units, built after a 1982 dam, with birds, alligators and fishing on land people have crossed for more than 10,000 years.
• Lake Corpus Christi State Park — 34 mi
  A lake park in the South Texas brush country above Mathis, on a reservoir of the Nueces, with a Civilian Conservation Corps refectory and more than 200 bird species.

More markers nearby

• Calliham — 6.6 mi
• First Producing Gas Well in McMullen County and First Gas Pipeline to San Antonio — 6.6 mi
• Site of Three Rivers Glass Factory — 6.8 mi
• Three Rivers — 7.0 mi