Tuesday, October 29 – Today, we decided to do a walk about of the downtown area of Bay City, Texas.
Bay City, the county seat of Matagorda County, was established in 1894. In August 1894, before a single building had been erected, the first issue of the Bay City Breeze was published. It promoted the new community. Distributed countywide, the newspaper, coupled with the promoters' promise to build a new courthouse if the county government were moved, succeeded in convincing county residents to support the new town. On September 18, 1894, Matagorda County voters elected to make Bay City the new county seat. We think that was a pretty fast turn around.
Bay City is a very typical Texas "old" town. The town is in a square with the courthouse in the middle. The new courthouse was built in 1965. This is one of the few small Texas towns we've visited that did not have a beautifully remodeled older courthouse.
The population as of 2012 is 17,476. For a town this size, we didn't see too many out on a Tuesday.
Homestead built in 1906 for Matagorda Pharmacy. Still the pharmacy today.
The site of the original post office built in 1918 now serves at the Matagorda County Museum. The Museum was closed on Tuesday…darn the bad luck.
The downtown area has some really nice sidewalk areas.
After taking a leisurely walk around town, we visited the South Side Historic District. It is a National Registry Neighborhood.
Boney House, 1910, named after the mayor of Bay City from 1905-1906
Hawkins-Furse House, 1914
Kilbride-Barkley House, 1910, prominent ranchers and civic leaders.
Ditch-Miller House, 1908.
There are many many more beautiful homes on this driving tour. These homes are so different, we were amazed that they were all built around the same time.
Bay City is an nice town, but too far from Houston to meet our needs.
Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y'all back real soon. Have a great day!
What a quaint town! Thanks for the tour.
ReplyDeleteIt is amazing how many small towns there are in this country. I love how many of them in TX are keeping the old town facade. Sure does make for a cute Main St.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful homes with great design.
We found the same thing in Hawthorne - they built an ugly new courthouse instead of remodeling the beautiful old one. I love looking at the homes on historic registers. Sometimes I wonder why they get picked but others are just wonderful.
ReplyDeleteI really like visiting the small towns of Texas. It's fun to walk the streets and see the old hitching posts too.
ReplyDeleteIt looks like a nice little town.
ReplyDeleteWe love checking out all the small towns that we come across, have fun there and good luck with a campsite.
ReplyDeleteBay City looks like a nice little town that we never heard of. Hope you can find a place closer to Houston.
ReplyDeleteGreat photos of all those beautiful old homes and buildings. Sure looks like a clean little town.
ReplyDeleteI love visiting these kinds of towns. I always wonder what people do for employment in places like this. Great photos of the historic homes.
ReplyDeleteOh my gosh, what a cool town.
ReplyDeleteGreat tour, I have not been in that area in over 40 years-guess I need to go back:)
ReplyDeleteIt upsets me to see so many small towns with empty or boarded up business districts. Always nice to see one that has managed to hold on the that small town flavor.
ReplyDeleteHow cool that you spent time at the COE we left this morning. Wish we could have stayed a bit longer. The place was PACKED!
Looks like the perfect little town to kick back and relax. Hope you are finding a suitable place to settle close to Houston.
ReplyDeleteNice tour of a neat small town
ReplyDeleteThanks for the great review/tour of our little town! Sorry to hear there weren't many people out and about on your visit... Be sure to come back and see us!! :)
ReplyDeleteAlisha
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