- A Brief History of Indianola, Texas...
In the year 1875 life was good at Indianola, Texas. It was ten years after the Civil War, the Yankee reconstruction government was gone years ago, and ship traffic to the port was growing steadily. In this frontier seaport town, there were travelling baseball teams, 4th of July Celebrations, fire brigades, churches, schools, theatres, billiard parlors, and photography studios. Seafood, was particularly cherished. It was also the year of the first hurricane of two that would devastate the town and lead to its abandonment.
Indianola, Texas 1875
Indianola, Texas, then and now.
- The current (5/06) photo below may not be the same street shown
in the photo above, but it is now the only street
along the bay front.
Incorporated as a town in 1853, Indianola's roots were first set at Indian Point, three miles to the north of Powderhorn Bayou. At Indian Point, an American settlement had sprung up in 1846 a year after Texas had become a state. Two years earlier in 1844, Prince Karl Solms Braunfels had begun to land German immigrants nearby at the settlement of Karlshaven also on the shores of Matagorda Bay. By 1848, Indian Point was the primary entry port for European immigrants and Americans landing here to migrate westward.