Jasper, Texas, Jasper County seat. (original) (raw)

History in a Pecan Shell

Settled in the mid 1820s, it was first known as Bevil�s Settlement (after John Bevil). In 1835 it joined a host of other southern states naming the county after William Jasper, of American Revolution fame. In 1844 the town of Jasper became the county seat.

A post office was granted in 1846 when the population was only 40. In the next ten years the population reached 400.

A Confederate quartermaster depot was located here during the Civil War and following the war, several educational institutions opened before they were absorbed in a public school system in 1908.

A weekly newspaper, the Jasper News-boy, has been published continuously since 1865. The 1870 population declined from the 400 residents of 1858 to to 360. By the mid 1880s it had grown to 1,000. By the mid 1890s it reported 1,200 residents.

The arrival of the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railroad made Jasper an important lumber exporter. The population grew from 1,500 in the mid 1920s to 6,500 in the late 1960s.

Jasper reached a new high during the 1990 census with 7,267 residents and over 200 businesses. By 2000 the population surpassed 8,000 with over 700 businesses.

Jasper, Texas Landmarks/Attractions

• Jasper County Museum
• East Texas Reginal Arts Center - 364 N Austin. 409-384-2404
• Jasper' Fireman's Museum - 205 Water St. 409-383-6168

Belle-Jimm Hotel Historical Marker
Photo courtesy Gerald Massey, May 2009

Jasper Chronicles

• Jasper and Newton Counties, Beyond the Sabine
• Remembering two doctors by Bob Bowman
  When doctors W.D. Thames of Lufkin and Joe Dickerson of Jasper died recently, East Texas lost two unique physicians--men who made house calls, kept up with the babies they delivered, and cared for whole families....
• Courtroom Storytellers by Bob Bowman
  Because they've seen the best and worst of humanity, lawyers are among our best storytellers. Courtroom stories of Jasper's Joe Tonahill and Lufkin's J.J. Collins...
• Joe Tonahill of Jasper by Bob Bowman
  When Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated President John F. Kennedy in 1963, an East Texas lawyer soon found himself thrust into history.
• A well-used phone book by Bob Bowman
  I�ve received a telephone book adorned with telephone numbers from the 1980�s scribbled all over the cover, the back, and dozens of inside pages. It came from Joel Towers of Lufkin with a note that it was his mother�s telephone book from Jasper...

Area Destinations

• Angelina National Forest - Entrance Hwy 63 NW 13 miles
• Martin Dies, Jr. State Park
  RR 4 Box 274 Jasper, Texas 75951
  (409) 384-5231
• Siecke State Forest - US 96, 25 miles S
  Lakes
• Toledo Bend
• B. A. Steinhagen
• Sam RayburnBook Hotel Here › Jasper Hotels

Jasper Tourist Information
Jasper Chamber of Commerce
246 E Milam Jasper, Texas 75951
(409) 384-2762

Jasper County C.S.A. Historical Marker
Photo courtesy Gerald Massey, May 2009

Historical Marker:

Jasper County, C. S. A.

Communication, transportation, supply and military center in Civil War Texas. Voted 315 to 25 in favor of secession. Crossed by Texas troops in the 1862-64 Louisiana campaigns to prevent split of the South and invasion of Texas. Confederate Army ran Houston-to-Alexandria, La., military horseback courier route through here. In last years of the war, Abel Adams, a local 14-year-old, rode this in a high lope, for Gen. John B. Magruder, commander of the Department of Texas. Beef was driven to troops in the Old South by way of 1823 trail across the county.

Had a Confederate Quartermaster Depot and 9-county headquarters, 2nd Brigade, Texas State Troops, under Gen. W. M. Neyland, local citizen.

County men in service on various war fronts of the South included Co. G, 13th Texas Cavalry; Co. C, 25th Texas Cavalry, Dismounted; Co. E, 27th Texas Cavalry, in Whitfield's Legion.

In 1865, as survivors were returning home, Union occupation troops bivouacked in the Jasper Town Square. Commander was Gen. George Custer, later to go down in history for his "last stand" at the Little Big Horn, 1876. Driving her beautiful horse and carriage, his young bride called on the Jasper ladies.

Jasper, Texas Forum

• JASPER, William. c.1750-1779.
  Rev. hero. S.C. Of obscure parentage, but apparently from the vicinity of Georgetown, S. C., he enlisted on 7 July '75 in Francis Marion's Co. for service in Wm. Moultrie's Regt. During the defense of Charleston in 1776 he braved enemy artillery to replace the flag that had been shot from the parapet of Ft. Sullivan (later Ft. Moultrie). Given a sword by Gov. Rutledge, he declined a commission on the ground of being ignorant. As a roving scout under Moultrie, Marion and Lincoln, successively, he gathered valuable information of British activities. He was killed while planting the colors of the 2nd S.C. on the Spring Hill redoubt in the assault on Savannah, 9 Oct. '79. An impressive monument has been erected at Savannah in his honor, and one of the redoubts at Ft. Moultrie was named "Jasper Battery." (James W. Patton in Dictionary of American Biography, quoted in Boatner's Encyclopedia of the American Revolution.)
  I have found that it is much easier to find information on Sgt. Jasper than it is on Sgt. John Newton. - Regards, R. Keith Young Fairfax, VA

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