Stephen Jackson

The Handbook of Texas calls Sour Lake the oldest extant town in Hardin County, and places it on the 4,428 acres Jackson received around 1835. Its fortunes turned in July 1902, when oil discoveries made it a boomtown that sometimes held 10,000 people and as many as 52 saloons at once. Peak production reached 50,000 barrels a day. The Texas Company, later Texaco, began there in 1902, and the field had produced about 90 million barrels by 1948. By 1914 the town had two railroads, four churches and a bank.

What the plaque says

Stephen Jackson (1803-1860) Born in South Carolina, Stephen Jackson moved to Lorenzo de Zavala's colony in Texas in 1831. He received a labor of land (177 acres) to establish a farm. In 1835 Jackson was granted a league of land (4,428 acres), which included the later community of Sour Lake. In 1836 Jackson served in Captain Logan's company of the Texas army and awarded 320 acres of land in Milam County as bounty. He married Susan Choate (1807-1873) in 1838 and established their home near here. They are buried along with their children-- Ambrose, Sarah, James A., Minerva, Stephen, and W. J.-- in the family cemetery. Texas Sesquicentennial 1836-1986

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Village Creek State Park — 17 mi
  A 2,466-acre state park on one of the few free-flowing creeks in Texas, with a launch for the Village Creek Paddling Trail, boat rentals and sandy-upland trails in the Big Thicket.
• McFaddin-Ward House — 18 mi
  A Beaux-Arts Colonial Revival mansion finished in 1906 and lived in by one family for 75 years, with free guided tours of three furnished floors, the carriage house and gardens.
• Spindletop-Gladys City Boomtown Museum — 21 mi
  A re-created oil boomtown on the Lamar University campus, with a derrick, period shops, a 1941 granite monument and an optional re-enactment of the January 1901 Lucas gusher.
• Sam Houston Regional Library and Research Center — 21 mi
  A state archives and museum north of Liberty with an exhibit on Southeast Texas history and a campus of historic buildings, including an 1848 house and an 1898 church.

More markers nearby

• Sour Lake, C.S.A. — steps away
• Opelousas Trail — 7.3 mi
• Lance Rosier — 12 mi
• Batson Prairie School & Church and Guedry Cemetery — 13 mi