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The
newly restored Kenedy County Courthouse
Photo courtesy Terry
Jeanson, November 2010 |
History
in a Pecan Shell
Sarita was once part of the
Kenedy Ranch and John G. Kenedy named the town after his daughter
when it was established in 1904 as a center for the ranch and the Kenedy Pasture
Company.
Sarita became a stop on the St. Louis, Brownsville and
Mexico Railroad.
The town moved one mile east in 1905, when the
railroad was resurveyed and tracks had to be relaid. Midwestern land companies
promoted Sarita to northerners and ran excursion trains into the area for prospective
buyers. Those that were smitten by the landscape could buy lots right then and
there from the Kenedy Town and Improvement Company.
Sarita was
granted a post office (in the company store) in 1904 and three years later the
town had a depot, a one-room school and a cotton gin. The railroad maintained
a section house and water tank for the trains.
Many settlers worked
for the Kenedy Ranch, while others purchased or leased pasture from the
Kenedy Pasture Company to raise cotton. The Pfau store, one of two in Sarita
at the time, was bought by John G. Kenedy and served as a courthouse until
it burned.
Sarita had originally been in Cameron County and became the
county seat of the newly formed Willacy County in 1911.Then in 1921 when Kenedy
County was formed, it served as county seat again.
A hurricane struck
the coast in 1916 and many residents abandoned their farms. The land then reverted
back to the Kenedy Pasture Company.
The road from the north ended
abruptly (and rudely according to other sources) at Sarita and it wasn't until
the 40s that highway 77 was
completed to Brownsville.
Sarita Kenedy East died in 1961. |
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Top:
Sarita Kenedy East
Photo Courtesy Kenedy Ranch Museum
Left: Flora near
Sarita
TE Photo |
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The Kenedy Pasture Building, now the Kenedy Ranch Museum
TE Photo October
2003 | |
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The water tower and an early building
TE Photo October 2003 |
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A sign in Sarita
TE Photo October 2003 | |
| Texas
Escapes, in its purpose to preserve historic, endangered and vanishing
Texas, asks that anyone wishing to share their local history and vintage/historic
photos of their town, please contact
us. | |
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