JEFFERSON, TEXAS

Jefferson, Texas History

From The Lake That Wasn't and Was and Wasn't and Is by C. F. Eckhardt

The story of Caddo Lake and Jefferson
"... In 1861 Jefferson was one of the most prosperous towns in Texas, shipping tons of cotton down Caddo Lake to the logjam, where they were transported overland a short distance to the Red River and then shipped down the Red to the Mississippi, loaded onto seagoing ships at New Orleans, and then shipped to Europe to be sold. Jefferson even had a railroad. Ambitiously named Southern Pacific, Jefferson's railroad was all of seven miles long, leading from the wharfs in Jefferson back into the pines. It existed to supply cordwood for the boilers of the Caddo Lake steamboats.

Everything went fine until 1874. Jefferson became a tourist destination, and among the signatures in the Excelsior House registration book is that of Roscoe Conklin. Though little remembered today, Conklin was considered the finest orator of the second half of the 19th Century. It was in that fateful year, so the story goes, that diminutive railroad robber baron Jay Gould visited Jefferson. He proposed to build a railroad in Jefferson - and, or so the story goes, it was his intention to lay tracks directly in the middle of the town's main commercial street.

Jefferson told the miniature billionaire - Gould only stood about five feet tall - that there was no way in the name of Perdition he was going to mar their beautiful town by running trains down its main street. Gould wrote "The end of Jefferson!" in the Excelsior House's registration book and left.

Those who study Gould's career insist he never set foot in Jefferson, Texas, in his life. Be that as it may, somebody wrote "The end of Jefferson!" in the Excelsior House's book, and shortly afterward Jefferson almost did end. For reasons unexplained to this day, the US Army's Corps of Engineers dynamited the logjam at the end of Caddo Lake, and in less than a week Jefferson was left-well, hardly high and more soggy than dry, but without its main source of commerce. Jefferson very nearly did die..."

"Jefferson is still where it was, though the remains of the wharfs that once docked steamboats are a long way from the shore of the present Caddo Lake. It does have a railroad - the Kansas City Southern - though the rails don't run down Main Street. Jefferson exploits its past, and has acquired Atalanta, Jay Gould's private railroad car named for a Greek goddess. It, along with Excelsior House and much else, is exploited for tourism." ...more


Reflections
Reflections on Jefferson, a Historic Town by Robert G. Cowser
I first heard my father mention the town of Jefferson when I was quite young. Jefferson is located approximately forty miles southeast of the farm in Hopkins County where I grew up... more


Folklore
The Poison Spring by Mike Cox
On the road leading from Jefferson to Daingerfield there is a spring known by the old settlers as ‘the poison spring,’” the Texas Republican reported on June 12, 1852...


Ghost
Diamond Bessie's Ghost by Bob Bowman

Jefferson, Texas
Landmarks / Attractions

Jefferson Annual Events Include:

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