ZIPPERLANDVILLE, TEXAS

Falls County, Central Texas North

State Highway 53
SW of Marlin the county seat
5 Miles W of Rosebud
E of Barclay
20 Miles E of Temple
S of Waco
Population: 22 (2000)

Book Hotel Here › Temple Hotels

History in a Pecan Shell

From "Zipperlandville, and Other Places"
By Clay Coppedge

Towns like Zipperlandville may take their notoriety where they can find it, but that doesn't mean you can find the town if you go looking for it.

Zipperlandville

If Zipperlandville isn't part of your personal or family history, you can find it in the title of a book from Republic of Texas Press, Texas Towns: From Abner to Zipperlandville by Don Blevins.

Not only is the community mentioned in the book but the cover shows a picture of the Zipperlandville City Limits sign.

People who go looking for the sign and the picturesque building behind it might notice that the book's cover photo looks a little, well, superimposed. The assumption here is that someone must have stolen the real city limits sign.

Zipperlandville is (was) about five miles west of Rosebud on State Highway 53 in southern Falls County. The Handbook of Texas tells us the town was settled in the 1870s by German, Yugoslavian and Czech immigrants, including the industrious Zipperlen family, owners of a gin and store that became the focal point of the community. The Zipperlandville school district lasted until 1950, when it was consolidated with the Rosebud school district.

The town was sometimes called Zipperlen or Zipperlenville. Both are a lot closer to the family name than what the post office handed down as official. Zipperlen - not Zipperland -descendants still live in Falls County.

The postal service named towns when it located a post office in a particular area. Residents submitted the name they wanted and the government at that point either approved, rejected, misread, mangled or simply changed proposed names.

Zipperlandville is just one example.

© Clay Coppedge

[See "Zipperlandville, and Other Places"]

Zipperlandville, Texas Forum

Subject: Zipperlandville

Read your interesting article on Zipperlandville. You're right - many Texas towns have names that are distorted from what they should be. Often that was due to the postal system - via an application for a post office in which the prospective postmaster provided a mistaken spelling, or via a misreading of the name applied for by the postal official who reviewed the application.

I do need to share, however, that the Zipperlandville community never had a post office, under any name. - John J. Germann, July 11, 2020

Take a road trip

Texas Escapes, in its purpose to preserve historic, endangered and vanishing Texas, asks that anyone wishing to share their local history, stories, landmarks and recent or vintage photos, please contact us.