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Texas Ghost
Town
DEWVILLE, TEXAS
Gonzales County,
Central Texas S
FM 1117 and an unnamed county road
10 miles NW of Nixon
25 miles SW of Gonzales
Population: 15 (1990 est.)
Area
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History
in a Pecan Shell
Named for two brothers, John and Thomas Dew, the town was once on
the Old San Antonio Road.
It was halfway between the towns of Albuquerque and Sandies Chapel.
A post office opened in 1894 (closing in 1955) and in 1897 the Methodist
Church from Sandies Chapel was moved to Dewville. A two-story school
was built in 1901 and in 1907 the school took in the Sandies Chapel
students.
The population was 50 by 1914 - a figure that it kept into the 1960s.
Nixon slowly siphoned off the towns population and by 1970 there were
only 15 people left.
The population remains estimated at 15 and the Methodist church and
two cemeteries are nearby (Dewville and Sandies Chapel). |
Dewville,
Texas Historical Marker
Marker Title:
Ghost Town of Dewville
Year Marker Erected: 1971
Marker Text
DEWVILLE, TEXAS. Dewville is at the intersection of a country road
and Farm Road 1117, near the southwestern corner of Gonzales County
twenty-five miles southwest of Gonzales. It is on the Old San Antonio
Roadqv between the sites of two defunct communities, Albuquerque and
Sandies Chapel. Dewville is named for two brothers, John Frank and
Thomas M. Dew, who opened a steam-powered gin on the site in 1885.
A Baptist church was organized there about 1890. The community was
granted a post office in 1894, and in 1897 Sandies Chapel Methodist
Church was moved to Dewville. A two-story school building was erected
in the community in 1901, and Sandies Chapel School was consolidated
with Dewville in 1907. In 1914 Dewville had a population of fifty,
a gin, a general store, and telephone service. Its population was
estimated at fifty-five from 1925 until the 1960s. At different times
the community had a blacksmith shop, a meat market, and an Odd Fellows
Hall. In 1940 Dewville comprised a post office, two churches, a school,
a cemetery, and scattered dwellings. The post office closed in 1955.
The community slowly lost population, as the nearby railroad community
of Nixon prospered, and the population of Dewville dropped to forty
in the 1960s and to fifteen by 1970. In 1990 the population was still
estimated at fifteen, and the Methodist church and a cemetery were
at the site.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Gonzales County Historical Commission, History of Gonzales
County (Dallas: Curtis, 1986).
- Gary E. McKee |
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