Pool-Tibbs House
Valley Mills, Bosque County, Texas
Marker Inscription
S. A. Pool built this residence, a store, and a cotton gin on the river bank in 1870, when the town of Valley Mills stood on the north side of the Bosque. The building stone came from nearby Fitzhugh Hill. Robert A. Tibbs, a Mississippi Civil War veteran, bought the house in 1891. After acquiring it in 1926, Anselm Tibbs (1886-1967) removed the original Greek Revival portico and made other changes. The town of Valley Mills moved south of the river when the Santa Fe Railroad was built. As a consequence, this is the oldest house in the present, or "new" town. (1978)
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
S. A. Pool built this stone house, a store, and a cotton gin on the Bosque River in 1870, using stone from nearby Fitzhugh Hill. When the Santa Fe Railroad prompted Valley Mills to relocate south of the river, this became the oldest house in the "new" town; Mississippi Civil War veteran Robert A. Tibbs bought it in 1891.
Why it matters
The house's survival tells the common Western story of towns picking up and moving to meet the railroad.
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Related people
- · S. A. Pool
- · Robert A. Tibbs
- · Anselm Tibbs
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Original Site of Valley Mills
Valley Mills, TX
In 1868 A. H. Steagall and Dr. E. P. Booth platted a townsite along the Bosque River and named it Valley Mills for the sawmills, flour mills, and grist mills that soon powered its growth. Cotton gins processed hundreds of bales, and the town filled out with stores, a drugstore, a blacksmith, and a stagecoach stop. When the Santa Fe Railroad bypassed the townsite by a mile in 1881, residents simply picked up and moved toward the tracks, leaving the original settlement a ghost town by 1900.
Clifton Whipple Truss Bridge
Clifton, TX
Built in 1884 by the Wrought Iron Bridge Company of Ohio for $6,465, this 150-foot span crosses the North Bosque River. It is a Whipple truss, a design named for its inventor and now rare in Texas. For nearly six decades it carried travelers and trade across the river, weathering repeated floods until a new highway rerouted traffic in 1941.
McGregor
McGregor, TX
McGregor was born of the railroad. In 1882 the Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe and the Texas and St. Louis lines drew statewide crowds to a public auction of town lots, and settlers from nearby hamlets like Banks and Eagle Springs moved in. Named for pioneer physician Dr. Gregor Carmichael McGregor, the town grew as an agricultural shipping hub and boomed again during World War II with a new ordnance plant.
Aquilla Creek Truss Bridge
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Aquilla Creek's crossing was notoriously impassable in wet weather, so in 1887 the county judge contracted for an iron span with a hundred-foot approach on each bank. The first firm failed to finish, and the Missouri Valley Bridge & Iron Works of Leavenworth, Kansas, completed the truss bridge in 1892 for $3,000. Two sister iron bridges over the same creek fell in the 1950s, but strong local support saved this one even after a modern concrete bridge took over the traffic in 1998.