DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker says about Los Preseños, out there in Jim Wells County. Now settle in, because this one's got roots that go deep — all the way back to 1831, when a man named Marcelino Lopez, out of Camargo, Tamaulipas, Mexico, applied for a land grant from the Mexican State of Tamaulipas. And he didn't just apply — he was awarded it.
Right then and there, the settlement of Los Preseños began to take shape on the bank of San Fernando Creek, sitting roughly two miles east of what we now call Alice, Texas. Two miles. Close enough to touch, far enough to be its own world.
And what a world it became. Los Preseños thrived — and I do mean thrived — along a trade route that ran from Corpus Christi all the way out to San Diego, Laredo, and Eagle Pass. Think about that ribbon of road, the boots and hooves and wagon wheels working that ground, connecting ports to border towns, linking the coast to the frontier.
Los Preseños sat right along that lifeline. The settlement was officially mapped starting in 1832, and it stayed on those maps all the way until 1878. Now, why 1878?
Well, here's where the ground shifts beneath your feet. A railroad line was being constructed — Corpus Christi to Laredo — and that line came cutting right through the Los Preseños Land Grant. Then, in 1877, a man by the name of N.G.
Collins purchased the property from the Lopez family. He founded a town there — called it Collins — and Collins soon replaced Los Preseños. Just like that.
A settlement born from one man's petition, nurtured along a trade route for decades, mapped and known and lived in — quietly folded into a new name, a new town, a new chapter. The land remained. The story just changed hands.
What the marker says
In 1831, Marcelino Lopez of Camargo, Tamaulipas, Mexico, applied for and was awarded a land grant by the Mexican State of Tamaulipas. The settlement of Los Prese��os thus began on the Bank of San Fernando Creek approximately two miles east of present-day Alice. The settlement thrived along a trade route that ran from Corpus Christi to San Diego, Laredo and Eagle Pass. Los Prese��os was officially mapped from 1832 until 1878 as a railroad line was being constructed from Corpus Christi to Laredo, passing through the Los Prese��os Land Grant. N.G. Collins purchased the property from the Lopez family in 1877. He founded the town of Collins which soon replaced Los Prese��os. (2017)