Early Schools in Live Oak County
Three Rivers, Live Oak County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Until the 1870s, Live Oak County had private schools taught by clergymen and ranch employees in cabins, brush arbors, dugouts. County Judge G.W. Jones initiated (1876) community schools with tuition set at 7 1/2 cents a day per student. In time there were 43 of these small schools. Oakville in 1881 erected the county's first building for a free school and in 1899 had the first independent district. By 1917 George West and Three Rivers also had independent districts. Consolidations began in 1940, when the county had 9,799 people. By 1970, two consolidated schools served the entire county. (1975) [See school district names on back] Schools absorbed by Three Rivers: Arkansaw, Atasocsa, Benham, Central, Elwell, Fant City, Kitty, Mapes (White Creek), Midway, Mountain View, Nell, North, Oakwood, Ray Point, Salt Creek, Simmons, Toms, Whitsett
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Before the 1870s, children in Live Oak County learned from clergymen and ranch hands in cabins, brush arbors, and dugouts. County Judge G. W. Jones launched community schools in 1876 at seven and a half cents a day per student, and in time forty-three tiny schools dotted the county. Oakville built the first free-school building in 1881, and over the following century waves of consolidation reduced those scattered schoolhouses to just two districts by 1970.
Why it matters
The story maps the whole evolution of rural American public education — from improvised dugout classrooms to consolidated modern districts — in a single ranching county.
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Related people
- · G. W. Jones
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Jessy Franklin Gray
Three Rivers, TX
Jessy Franklin Gray passed the state teachers exam at seventeen and was a school superintendent when the U.S. entered World War I. Commissioned a lieutenant, he fought with the American Expeditionary Force at Saint-Mihiel and the Meuse-Argonne, was gassed and wounded, and won a Silver Star and Purple Heart for taking command of a leaderless company under fire. Returning home, he served in the Texas House from 1945 to 1953, championing the landmark Gilmer-Aikin education reforms and helping spare Three Rivers from reservoir flooding.
Thelma Laura Pugh-Lindholm
George West, TX
Born in 1898 to a fourth-generation Texas ranching family, Thelma Pugh-Lindholm grew up on the original Pugh homestead across the Nueces from George West and turned a childhood love of local history into a lifelong vocation. She earned advanced degrees, taught in ranch schools and George West ISD for 47 years, and tutored many neighbors toward diplomas and U.S. citizenship. She also wrote more than twenty of Live Oak County's official historical marker narratives and chaired its historical commission, earning the title "the mother of Live Oak County history."
Early Schools in Live Oak County
George West, TX
Before the 1870s, children in Live Oak County learned in cabins, brush arbors, and dugouts from clergymen and ranch hands, until County Judge G.W. Jones launched community schools in 1876 at seven and a half cents a day per pupil. In time the county held forty-three of these tiny schools, and Oakville built the first free-school building in 1881. Waves of consolidation shrank that scattered patchwork down to just two schools serving the whole county by 1970.
Gentry Dugat
Mineral, TX
Born on a nearby ranch, Gentry Dugat became a colorful Bee County historian, orator, and journalist who earned a law degree and worked on seven Texas newspapers, editing the Cotton Ginners Journal and writing a biography of the post–Civil War editor Henry W. Grady. A World War I veteran and avid collector of rare books, newspapers, and artifacts, he organized and chaired the Bee County Historical Commission in 1958. The county honored his memory with this marker.