Gideon Lincecum
Burton, Washington County, Texas
Marker Inscription
(1793 - 1874) As a boy Gideon Lincecum moved with his father to various frontier sites in his native Georgia and in Mississippi. It was during this time that he developed insights about natural habitats and cultivated an understanding of Indian culture which later characterized his various scientific and social achievements. He participated in the War of 1812, and in 1814 married Sarah Bryan. After settling near here in 1848 the self-taught Lincecum opened a medical practice. He gained a reputation for rejecting commonly-used contemporary medicines and dispensing herbal remedies instead. As a naturalist Lincecum recorded detailed observations of a variety of flora and fauna in Texas and achieved international recognition for a long-term study of an agricultural ant common to the state. He conducted scientific research in numerous fields and for many years maintained records of the weather in Washington County for the Smithsonian Institution. Except for a 5-year stay in Mexico during Reconstruction Lincecum lived and worked in Washington County where he completed his autobiography. Initially buried in nearby Mt. Zion Cemetery, his remains were later removed and reinterred in the Stephen F. Austin lot in the State Cemetery in Austin in 1936. (1993)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Gideon Lincecum (1793–1874) grew up on the southern frontier, absorbing the natural world and Native cultures before settling in Washington County in 1848. A self-taught physician who favored herbal remedies, he became a naturalist of international reputation, celebrated for his long study of a Texas harvester ant and for keeping weather records for the Smithsonian Institution. He completed his autobiography here after a Reconstruction-era sojourn in Mexico.
Why it matters
Lincecum represents the amateur, self-made American scientist of the 19th century, whose careful backcountry observations fed the great national institutions of learning.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · Gideon Lincecum
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Gideon Lincecum
Brenham, TX
Gideon Lincecum grew up on the moving edge of the southern frontier, in Georgia and Mississippi, where he absorbed both the natural world around him and the cultures of the Native peoples he lived near. A veteran of the War of 1812, he settled in Texas in 1848 and opened a medical practice built on herbal remedies rather than the harsh medicines of his day. As a self-taught naturalist he won international notice for his patient study of Texas harvester ants and kept weather records for the Smithsonian, working from a cabin later moved here to preserve it.
Site of Rees Sanitarium
Brenham, TX
In 1897 Dr. H. Clay Rees built Brenham's first hospital here, a two-story sanitarium with a separate dispensary and surgery that was, by the standards of the day, an unusually advanced medical complex. Though overwork forced Rees to leave, his pioneering effort set Brenham on a path of continuous hospital care from 1910 onward. The building itself was later remodeled into a family home occupied for generations.
Waul's Texas Legion Campsite
Brenham, TX
In the spring of 1862 Thomas N. Waul recruited some two thousand men from Washington and surrounding counties into a legion of infantry, cavalry, and artillery for Confederate service, drilling them here along New Year's Creek before they departed for active duty that August. Part of the legion was caught up in the defense of Vicksburg and surrendered after the siege, while other units served in Arkansas, Louisiana, and along the Texas Gulf Coast through the end of the war.
Mt. Zion Cemetery
Burton, TX
This five-acre burial ground lies on land granted in 1831 to Robert Clokey, a colonist in one of Stephen F. Austin's colonies. Its first grave, an infant's, dates to 1852, and some unmarked graves may hold victims of the yellow fever epidemic that swept the area in 1867. Named for the Mt. Zion Baptist Church that stood here from 1857 to 1882, the cemetery holds 132 marked graves representing 55 pioneer families.