Related Collections

Kenedy Family Collection
The Kenedy family contributed in the settling of South Texas and introducing large scale ranching to the coastal plains. Mifflin Kenedy, a Quaker from Pennsylvania, ferried supplies up the Rio Grande in a steamboat to the Texas troops during the Mexican-American and Civil Wars. Captain Mifflin Kenedy and Captain Richard King became friends and partners in acquiring huge tracts of land in South Texas where immense herds of wild horses roamed the plains. In 1875 Kenedy and King became chief supporters and financial backers of Colonel Uriah Lott in building a railroad from Corpus Christi to Laredo which became known as the Corpus Christi, San Diego & Rio Grande Narrow Gauge Railroad Company. During the last half of the 19th century Mifflin Kenedy created a huge fortune and left a legacy to his family and South Texas.

Texas Tropical Trail Region Records
This collection is the Texas Historical Commission’s Project: Texas Heritage Trails Program Records dating from 2002 to 2013. The South Texas Region, Tropical Trail Region, covers 20 counties including the Gulf Coast from South Padre Island to Refugio to the Brush Country from George West to Cotulla and Brownsville, all-encompassing the Wild Horse Desert in the heart of the region which includes Hebbronville and Falfurrias. The records reflect the site visits to this region.

W. L. Wilkinson Papers
This Kleberg County Extension Agent left his personal records covering the period from 1925 through 1949 of his activities in Kenedy County from 1936-1949, and Jackson County from 1919-1925. As the county agent he helped small and large farmers and ranchers in the two counties dominated by the large and famous King and Kenedy Ranches. Materials include correspondence, annual reports, photographs and newspaper clippings that reveal the agricultural endeavors going on in these counties.

John Salisbury House Family Collection
The House family moved to Texas from Illinois in 1905. At first John Salisbury House, his wife Ellen Victoria Comeau, his sons Edmund Walter and Charles Percival and his daughter Clara Comeau settled on a farm near the town of Alfred in South Texas. All three of the House men went to work for the railroad, but each one moved on to enterprises that tied them closely to the growth of Kingsville. J. S. House went on to be postmaster and later the city treasurer. Walter and Percy House both went to work for the R. J. Kleberg and Co. Bank for many years. All three speculated in residential and farm real estate and each of them participated in many civic groups. The members of the House family arrived in Kingsville just after it was first created. As the town grew and prospered so did the House family and the records in the House Family Collection trace the growth and prosperity of the town through that of the House family.

George Otis Coalson Collection
The George O. Coalson Collection consists of 1.5 linear feet of research materials, maps, written articles, newspapers, and books. Most of the materials are copies and notes from sources first printed as early as the mid-1800s up through 1995. Dr. Coalson complies the materials from 1955 up to his death in 1995.

Texas Parks & Wildlife Department
This Small Scale Collection consists of reference materials from Texas Parks & Wildlife Department.