Upper Buffalo Bayou in the Mid-1800s

Upper Buffalo Bayou in the Mid-1800s. . , The settlement of upper Buffalo Bayou began in 1824 with John D. Taylor and his wife Maria at Piney Point. A wilderness trail south of the bayou near their log cabin was widened in 1830 by order of the Ayuntamiento (council) of Stephen F. Austin's colony and became the San Felipe-to- Harrisburg wagon road (San Felipe Trail). The road was a commercial lifeline for Harrisburg and early Houston, and settlement increased along its path. Ox wagons loaded with cotton from Brazos River plantations traveled along the road to the bayou port., In 1831, Joel and Elizabeth Wheaton built a roadside inn and farm at a bayou crossing on the road. After Texas won its independence in 1836, more Anglo settlers from the southern United States began to arrive. Buckman and Harriet Canfield started a farm and inn at Piney Point in 1838. Agur Morse began to build a large plantation at this site in 1851, near Thomas McGowen's farm, built in 1847., The area north of Buffalo Bayou was largely settled by immigrating German families, who began arriving in 1834. Most arrived after 1846., Captions , Wheaton's Home and Inn as it looked in the late nineteenth century when owned by W.J. Habermacher. The house burned in 1956. , Courtesy of Marie Neuman Gray, Ox cart and driver , Illustration by J. Wells Champney, From The Great South, a Record of Journeys, Edward King, 1875