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History in
a Pecan Shell
The
earliest mention of the area comes from the French explorer René Robert
Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, who camped northwest of the site of Dobbin
on February 14, 1687. Noah and Ester Wightman Griffith, natives of
New York state, received a Mexican land grant there in 1831.
In 1878 the Central and Montgomery Railway built a line through the
area from Navasota
to Montgomery. A post office was
established in 1880 under the name Bobbin. In 1885 Bobbin was
a shipping point for cotton and
lumber and had daily mail service, four sawmills, a gristmill, a flour
mill, a church, a district school, two general stores, a physician,
and a population of 100. By the 1890s the settlement had a Baptist
church, a cotton gin, W. G. Post's sawmill, J. M. Stinson's general
store, two livestock dealers, one combination mill and gin, a blacksmith,
and a population of 250. In 1903-04 the town had three one-teacher
schools; one had thirty-seven white students, a second had eighteen
white students, and the third had forty-three black students. By this
time the population had declined to 168.
In 1906 or 1907 the Trinity and Brazos Valley Railway built through
Bobbin on its way from Mexia
to Houston, making the
town a railroad junction. In 1909 the town's name was changed to Dobbin.
By 1915 the population was 100, and local businesses included three
general stores, two blacksmith shops, a drugstore, and a grocery.
In 1926 Dobbin School was established. By the late 1940s the community
had three churches, two schools, two sawmills, two factories, nine
businesses, the railroad station, several dwellings, and a population
of 175. In 1965 Dobbin had a post-peeling plant. In the late 1960s
the population was 106, and in the early 1970s it was 170. |
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Escapes, in its purpose to preserve historic, endangered and vanishing
Texas, asks that anyone wishing to share their local history, stories,
landmarks and recent or vintage photos, please contact
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