Telegraph Store and Post Office

The canyon's poles served a network still new to Texas. The Texas and Red River Telegraph Company, chartered on January 5, 1854, opened the state's first office at Marshall that February 14, its wires first strung from treetop to treetop. Western Union began operating in Texas in 1866, and by 1870 the state had an estimated 1,500 miles of wire; in 1874 Western Union owned eighty-nine of the 105 offices, and a telegram under twenty-five miles cost a quarter. A military telegraph linking the San Antonio posts with other army reservations was completed in 1876.

What the plaque says

Telegraph Store and Post Office This Kimble County landmark was named for a nearby canyon from which trees were cut for telegraph poles in the Mid-19th century. The store and post office were built about 1890-1900. The first commissioned postmistress was Ruth Holmes in 1900. For many years this has been the stopover place for vacationers along nearby south Llano River and travelers enroute to points south. The telegraph post office was the Kimble County address of Texas Governor Coke R. Stevenson. The site retains the rustic charm of its early years, and has served the community for a century. (1996)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Kimble County Historical Museum — 14 mi
  A free county museum in Junction, the town at the meeting of the North and South Llano, with the papers, photographs and tools of a ranching county.
• Devil's Sinkhole State Natural Area — 28 mi
  A 140-foot shaft into a cavern outside Rocksprings, seen only on guided tours from a platform at the rim as some three million bats spiral out on summer evenings.

More markers nearby

• Wooten Cemetery — 3.3 mi
• Doom of the Outlaws of Pegleg Station — 4.6 mi
• R. M. Turner Family — 5.6 mi
• Site of Four Mile Dam — 11 mi