Brush Country Museum

Cotulla was founded in 1881 when Joseph Cotulla gave land to bring the railroad to La Salle County. The Brush Country Museum, run by the La Salle County Historical Commission, began in a one-room schoolhouse the school district donated. It now fills a small white house with period rooms, a parlor, bedroom, kitchen and doctor's office, plus a school building with education displays and hundreds of ranch photographs.

The schoolroom's most important material concerns segregation. Cotulla ran separate schools for Mexican American and Anglo children, and in 1896 and 1906 its records show a separate school for fifteen Black children as well. In 1928 Lyndon Johnson, 20 and paying for college, came here to teach at the Welhausen School, known as the Mexican school. He taught 29 fifth, sixth and seventh graders, became principal, bought sports equipment with his first pay, coached debate and set up a meal program for hungry children. Returning as president on November 7, 1966, he said he had learned his first lessons in poverty here.

The Welhausen School building, completed in 1926 and named for County Judge G. A. Welhausen, stands about half a mile away at 204 NE Lane Street with a 1990 state marker. Cotulla also sits where the Winter Garden began: the first Bermuda onion crop was raised nearby in 1896. Call (830) 879-6429 for hours before visiting.