Angelina County, Texas
Lufkin is home to 36 official Texas Historical Commission markers — each one telling a piece of the city’s story. Browse the markers below, then find them on the map and discover more nearby with RoadHistorical.
Created and organized in 1846. Originally a part of Nacogdoches County. Bears the name of the river traversing the region. The following towns have served as the county seat: Marion, 1846-1854; Jonesville, 1854-1858;…
View on map ↗Also known as Angelina, third county seat of Angelina County, 1858 - 1890. (6 mi. SE Lufkin, US Hwy. 69)
View on map ↗RTHL medallion only
View on map ↗First plant to turn southern pines into newsprint. Mill here revolutionized paper industry in the southern United States. Seeking local paper rather than foreign supplies, Southland was incorporated in 1938 and began…
View on map ↗Founded 1882. Soon became a thriving sawmill community. Named for E. P. Lufkin, chief of crew that surveyed railroad through town. Has been county seat of Angelina County since 1892. Now a regional manufacturing and…
View on map ↗Born here, in now-razed house, Oct. 5, 1907, to Robert A. and Easter C. Shivers, pioneer East Texas family. As youth, worked at odd jobs to earn own pocket money. Was State Senator 12 years; Lieutenant Governor for two.…
View on map ↗City's hub, 1882- early 1900s, teeming with cotton buying, horse trades, band concerts, political rallies, switching railroad trains. Site of fire station, standpipe, 1933 memorial library named for lumberman J. H.…
View on map ↗One of last ox-drawn or mule-drawn carts skidding logs to railroad from the forests. Built 1950 for W. T. Carter & Brother, a lumber firm, and replaced 1951 by tractor-powered equipment, this slip-tongue, high wheel…
View on map ↗Steam locomotive and tender No. 3 were bought 1908 by Carter-Kelley Lumber Co., for use in building a sawmill at Manning (about 18 mi. south); then in railroad building, logging, and passenger and freight hauling…
View on map ↗Daniel Webster Martin (d. 1916) and his two sons opened a small wagon shop here in 1908. An inventor and designer, Martin developed various wagons for use in the lumber industry. In partnership with B. L. Zeagler, he…
View on map ↗Regarded as the oldest Angelina County business in continuous operation, Kerr's began in 1870 as a general store in the early county seat of Homer (5 mi. SE). It was started by Civil War veteran Capt. Joseph Kerr (B.…
View on map ↗On the evening of March 2, 1913, an explosion destroyed the Houston, East & West Texas Railroad depot at this site, disrupting the town's vital source of transportation and trade. Although a body was not discovered, it…
View on map ↗At the turn of the century, a group of Lufkin men organized a town brass band. It later became known as the Hoo Hoo Band after representing Texas at a national convention of the Order of Hoo Hoo, an organization of…
View on map ↗Chartered in 1902 as a repair shop and parts supply house for local sawmills, Lufkin Foundry & Machine Company was begun by J. H. Kurth, Frank Kavanaugh, Sr., Frank Kavanaugh, Jr., Eli Wiener and Simon Henderson. Later,…
View on map ↗The first Episcopal service in Lufkin was held in 1893 by the Rev. George L. Crocket for the W. G. Garron and R. B. Shearer families. St. Mary's Mission was established in 1895 by the Rev. C. M. Beckwith, but the…
View on map ↗Created by President Franklin Roosevelt and approved by an Act of Congress in 1933, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) provided youth employment programs during the Great Depression. The Lufkin CCC Camp, located near…
View on map ↗Chartered with nine members, the Lufkin Baptist Church began conducting worship services soon after rail lines reached the townsite in the early 1880s. The Houston, East & West Texas Railroad donated land at this site…
View on map ↗Attorney Chester B. Collins (1888-1960) built this house in the early 1920s with lumber provided by Lillian Knox whom he had successfully defended in a murder case. The 2-story bungalow features corbeled brick piers,…
View on map ↗R. D. Holland, Sydney Hackney, and S. D. Long, trustees of an Angelina County African American cemetery group, acquired one acre here from the Lufkin Land & Timber Co., in 1905. Recorded burials began in 1901. The…
View on map ↗A Christian church was organized in Angelina County about 1884 in Homer, the county seat. When the railroad line from Houston to Shreveport was built about 5 miles from Homer, the town of Lufkin was built around the…
View on map ↗Mount Calvary Baptist Church was founded in 1892 when Ellen Grimes asked her employer for the use of a house as a church for African Americans in Keltys. The church's first pastor was the Rev. J. James. The congregation…
View on map ↗Margaret (Fullerton) Abney, born in Alabama in 1829, joined the Methodist Church with her family at a camp meeting held at nearby McKendree Campground in 1863. Because the nearest Methodist church was ten miles away,…
View on map ↗Telephone service in Lufkin began in 1898 when Dr. Alexander Madison Denman and his friend Judge Edwin James Mantooth strung telephone wires between their offices. The system was so popular that the pair soon formed the…
View on map ↗Chartered in August 1900 and headquartered in the sawmill town of Keltys, the Angelina and Neches River (A&NR) Railroad began as a small short line railroad to move logs from the woods of East Texas to the mills of the…
View on map ↗The son of an early industrial engineer, W.C. Trout (1874-1947) came to Lufkin in 1905 and joined Lufkin Foundry & Machine Co. as a shareholder and company secretary. Already a successful inventor, Trout led the…
View on map ↗This part of Angelina County has long been called Red Land, or Redland, for the red soil ridge that forms the center of the community. In 1846, Thomas R. Walker moved into the area from North Carolina. In 1851, he wed…
View on map ↗The U.S. Army began building POW camps in the United States in early 1942 for captured Axis prisoners. During World War II, the Army shipped almost 425,000 military prisoners to 511 camps in the U.S. Approximately…
View on map ↗In 1850, Samuel and Elizabeth Berry brought their family and slaves here from Limestone Co., Alabama. Samuel's plantation covered hundreds of acres and included a cotton gin and gristmill. Berry Cemetery began in 1863…
View on map ↗Continuing efforts started in the 1920s by the Texas Forest Service (TFS), the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), established through the Emergency Conservation Work Act (1933) during the Great Depression, aided in…
View on map ↗By the 1930s, radio had become an established medium for commercial advertising. In 1938, commercial radio came to Angelina County when Redland Broadcasting Association received the first license in the area. Station…
View on map ↗THE FIRST NOTICE FOUND OF THE DAILY NEWSPAPER IN LUFKIN IS IN THE FEB. 14, 1907 NACOGDOCHES SENTINEL: “LUFKIN HAS AN AFTERNOON DAILY PAPER, THE NEWS. WHILE A COPY OF THE NEWSPAPER HAS NEVER REACHED THIS OFFICE, IT IS…
View on map ↗Members of the Mantooth family came to Angelina County in 1858. Albert Edwin (Eddie) Mantooth (1874-1969) was born in Homer, Angelina County, to Albert and Mary Richard Hall Mantooth. In 1897, Eddie married Sarah Annie…
View on map ↗The Masonic Hall of North Lufkin was completed in 1900 by the African American Community’s architect, Will Engram. Engram moved to Lufkin in 1896 and, with just a third grade education, he became a master architect and…
View on map ↗Italian-born Vicente Micheli (c.1755-1848) came to North America around 1770 via New Orleans and moved to the Spanish territory of Texas by 1793. He settled first in Nacogdoches and later received a grant of land near…
View on map ↗In April 1846, local engineer William Gordon Lang was assigned to survey Angelina County. He and his wife, Nancy Martin (Bonner) Lang, settled this area in 1854, and other settlers soon followed, including William…
View on map ↗Established 1867. Historic Texas Cemetery - 2020
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