Hood County News
Granbury, Hood County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Successor to "Granbury Vidette" town's first newspaper, founded 1872 by Capt. W.L. Bond and later owned by an 1882 staff recruit, A. W. Crockett (1857-1953), a grandson of the Alamo hero. J.D. Ballard in 1884 started the "Granbury News", later owned by highly regarded Frank Gaston. State Senator A.B. Crawford and wife in 1937 bought from Crockett the last paper he owned, merging it in 1946 with the "Granbury News". In 1964 widowed Mrs. Crawford moved paper into this 1891 building and began to advocate historic preservation--a policy continued by later owners after she retired in 1970.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
Granbury's newspaper lineage reaches back to the 1872 "Granbury Vidette," the town's first paper, later shaped by owners including A. W. Crockett—a grandson of the Alamo's David Crockett—and the well-regarded Frank Gaston. A series of mergers across the decades folded competing titles together, and in 1964 the widowed Mrs. A. B. Crawford moved the paper into an 1891 building and made historic preservation an editorial cause. Later owners carried that policy forward.
Why it matters
A small-town paper's century of continuity shows how the local press knit frontier Texas communities together and, in this case, became an early champion of saving their built heritage.
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Related people
- · A. W. Crockett
- · Frank Gaston
Themes & tags
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