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HISTORY OF ROSEBUD, TEXAS
Rosebud is on State Highway 77 thirty-eight miles south of Waco in southwestern Falls County. It was developed by the Texas Townsite Company in 1889 and was incorporated on November 7, 1905.
The original settlement, known as Pool's Crossing or Greer's Horsepen, was on the west bank of Pond Creek. In 1884 Albert G. Tarver established a post office there called Mormon, after a group
of Mormons who had settled in the area. The settlement was destroyed by fire in 1887, and Tarver resigned as postmaster. Allin Taylor took up postmaster duties in his home, at a site now in
southwestern Rosebud. Taylor wanted to name the post office Mullins to honor a local family known for their beautiful roses, but a Mullins community already existed in Texas, so he named it
Rosebud instead; the post office officially became Rosebud on April 23, 1887. By 1892 the San Antonio and Aransas Pass Railway had built through Rosebud on its route from Waco to Giddings, and
thereafter the town grew rapidly. The rich blackland soil of the area produced abundant cotton and grain, and by the 1920s the town had seven cotton gins and a cottonseed mill. Rosebud
declined, however, during the Great Depression,qv and local farmers turned to ranching and raising wheat and small grain. The railroad was discontinued in 1968, and the tracks and
the station were removed. In the late 1980s Rosebud had 2,076 residents, a hospital, a nursing home, a consolidated high school, thirteen churches-and a rosebush in every yard, a tradition
initiated by an editor of the town paper. Many residents commuted to work in other cities. The population in 1990 was 1,638.
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ralph Kilgore, Rosebud-A Good Town to Live In (Rosebud, Texas: Rosebud News, 1939). Lillian S. St. Romain, Western Falls County, Texas (Austin: Texas State
Historical Association, 1951). Rosebud Chamber of Commerce and Agriculture, Rosebud: Where the Past and Future Meet (Rosebud, Texas: Rosebud News, 1939).
Evelyn Clark Longwell
- The following, adapted from the Chicago Manual of Style, 15th edition, is the preferred citation for this article.
- Handbook of Texas Online, s.v. "," http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/online/articles/RR/hjr14.html
(accessed May 17, 2007).
(NOTE: "s.v." stands for sub verbo, "under the word.")
The Handbook of Texas Online is a joint project of The General Libraries at the University of Texas at Austin (http://www.lib.utexas.edu) and the Texas State
Historical Association (http://www.tsha.utexas.edu).
Copyright ©, The Texas State Historical Association, 1997-2002
Last Updated: June 6, 2001
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