Hood County Texas Genealogical Society

 

HOOD COUNTY HISTORICAL FACTS

Hood County News Centennial Edition Sept. 23, 1971

 

 The entire townsite of Granbury was once a forest of post oak and other growth, and the river bottoms nearby produced burr oak, elm, pecan, and cottonwood.

 Thorp Spring had some reputation as a health resort even among the Indians.

 The Acton Masonic Institute, begun in 1866, was the first lodge and hall organized in Hood County.

 Sept. 11, 1869 was reportedly the date of the last Indian raid in Hood County.

 The first Sunday School in Hood County was organized in Granbury 100 years ago in 1871.

 The Methodists were the first to erect a House of Worship in Granbury.

 Baptists, Methodists, Reformed Christians, and Cumberland Presbyterians built the first churches in Granbury.

 Four or five saloons were located in Granbury in 1871-72.

 A wooden jail, Granbury's first, was built in about 1873.

 In 1873, the mails arrived and departed Granbury three times weekly from Weatherford and twice from Cleburne.

 The town of Lipan was laid out in 1873, later having five or six mercantile stores, two blacksmith shops, two gins, and an academy.

 In 1874, Hood County had a population of approximately 5,000.

 March 5, 1875, Hood County's original courthouse was burned to the ground. All of the county's records, and numerous private deeds and papers, were lost.

 The Odd Fellow Lodge was organized in Granbury in 1877.

 A "magnificent tubular bridge, spanning the Brazos at Granbury," was constructed by private capital in 1878 at the cost of $25,000. P.H. Thrash, the Nutt brothers, E.A. Hannaford, and J.D. Baker were the principal stockholders.

 In 1887 the Fort Worth and Rio Grande Railroad entered Hood County. It was pushed to completion in Granbury, but it was two years later before it was extended beyond to Brownwood. The present Hood County Courthouse, completed in 1891, was built at a cost of $40,000.

Web Page by Virginia Hale


© 1999 HOOD COUNTY TEXAS GENEALOGICAL SOCIETY - ALL RIGHTS RESERVED