| A
recent caller from Bowie County had an intriguing question: “Does East
Texas have a town named Twin Groceries?”
The answer is yes and no..
Around
1850, John Arthur helped settle the town of Saltillo
on the Old Jefferson wagon road sixteen miles east of Sulphur
Springs in Hopkins County.
It soon became a popular place for teamsters,
leading to the establishment of a post office in 1860 with Moses Russell as the
postmaster.
The town also had a gristmill, a cotton gin and a store. A
second store was opened on the opposite side of the road from Arthur’s grocery
store and, for a time, the community was known as “Twin Groceries” for obvious
reasons. But
the name didn’t last long and Saltillo
soon reemerged, By 1885, Saltillo
had a water-powered gristmill, two churches, a school and a population of about
sixty. But what about Saltillo’s
name?
Admittedly, it’s not as colorful as Twin Groceries, but it does
have an interesting history. Saltillo,
Mexico, the namesake of the one in Hopkins County, and Austin
share a unique place in Texas history.
Both were Texas capitals.
Saltillo was the capital of Texas when its territory
was part of the Mexican state of Coahulia before Texas won its independence and
Austin became the capital of the Republic
of Texas.
In 1989, while I was serving on the Texas Sesquicentennial Commission,
a delegation from Saltillo, Mexico, journeyed to Austin
to help Texas celebrate its 150th birthday. In
1887, the St. Louis Southwestern Railroad built a line a few miles north of Saltillo,
Texas, and one of the town’s two grocery stores moved to the train station
site. Twin Groceries had no good reason to use its name anymore.
Saltillo
opened a school in 1905 with an enrollment of eighty-four. And in 1909 the Gulf
Pipe Line was laid through Hopkins County near Saltillo,
further spurring its growth.
The town kept growing and by 1904 it had a population of about 350, a number of
stores, several barber shops, a bank, a printing shop, and a newspaper known as
the Saltillo Signal.
The town continued to grow during the l920s, but
the Depression years reduced its prosperity and its population fell to 250.
Today,
Saltillo is still an active
settlement of about 200 folks and a few stores at the intersection of U.S. Highway
67, Farm Road 900, and the railroad. The town is also less than a mile from Interstate
Highway 30.
Sadly, there is nothing left of Twin Groceries, but a colorful
old name.
Bob
Bowman's East Texas
July 18, 2009 Column, Modified 6-18-12
A weekly column syndicated in 109 East
Texas newspapers
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