The Cedars

The Cedars has faced Aransas Bay from South Water Street since 1928, and in August 2017 that shore took the worst of Hurricane Harvey. The storm came ashore about 10 p.m. on August 25 at the north end of San Jose Island, five miles east of Rockport, as a Category 4 near 130 mph, then reached the mainland by Copano Bay three hours later. Its strongest eyewall winds crossed ground no instrument covered. The back bays rose six to ten feet above ground, and 5,276 Rockport-area structures had major damage or were destroyed.

What the plaque says

The Cedars Tourism has been a major part of the Rockport economy for generations, but in the 1920s and 1930s with the rise of the automobile, more visitors began to travel to the area. The Cedars, built in 1928 by Dr. Joe and Mabel Bryant, became a popular tourist destination with seven "resort houses" on the property. The property was sold to H.M. Daggett in 1929. Stanley Daggett, his son, and his wife, Flossie, gained the property in 1930 and added two cottages. Annual gatherings of fishing and birding organizations and groups of families were a common practice and brought in many visitors to the cedars. Originally there were outhouses, iceboxes, hot plates and a windmill but soon small bathrooms were attached to each cottage. By the late 1940s, the cottages offered hot and cold running water, gas stoves, refrigerators and clothes lines. In 1946 Miss Ethel Jones who lived in San Antonio purchased the property and hired an on-site manager. After retiring to the property in 1964, she sold The Cedars to her nephew, Charles Stevens, in 1971. Guests from Texas and out of state continued to visit The Cedars. In 1973, Stevens sold the property to a group of eight families, organized by the Robertsons, known as the Rockport Cedars Association (RCA). Each family retained a cottage and the center space became common ground. Traditions at The Cedars continued as these families and others enjoyed the coast and worked together for the annual "pier review," an event when the pier and t-head are repaired. This cultural landmark represents economic growth and tourism in Rockport, and continues to attract families to the beautiful texas coast. (2011)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Fulton Mansion State Historic Site — 3.4 mi
  A French Second Empire house of 1874-77 on Aransas Bay, paid for with hides and tallow, with gas lights, central heat and hot running water no other house nearby had.
• Goose Island State Park — 9.5 mi
  A bayside park between St. Charles and Aransas bays, home of the Big Tree, the state champion coastal live oak, thought to be more than a thousand years old.
• Port Aransas — 12 mi
  The fishing town at the north end of Mustang Island, reached by a free state ferry that crosses the ship channel day and night, with a university marine lab begun in a one-room shack.
• USS Lexington Museum on the Bay — 24 mi
  An Essex-class carrier of 1943 moored off North Beach, the Blue Ghost that Tokyo Rose kept reporting sunk, and the Navy's training carrier for nearly three decades after.

More markers nearby

• Simon Michael Gallery — 0.4 mi
• Baylor-Norvell House — 0.5 mi
• Site of Heldenfels Shipyard — 0.6 mi
• First Methodist Church of Rockport — 0.7 mi