Mission Santissimo Nombre de Maria

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Way out here in Houston County, there's a story that reaches back further than most folks think to look. We're talking the summer of 1690.

Summer. Not spring, not fall. Summer, when the Texas heat was just as unforgiving as it is today, and a mission was founded in this very vicinity.

They called it Mission Santissimo Nombre de Maria, and they planted it on the banks of what the old records describe as the Arcangel San Miguel River, the one we know today as the Neches. Now that name, Santissimo Nombre de Maria, means the Most Holy Name of Mary, and that alone tells you something about the weight and intention these founders carried with them into this wilderness. This wasn't a casual undertaking.

This was a declaration, staked into the earth on a riverbank in the summer of sixteen ninety. Centuries passed. The land changed hands and changed names and changed again.

But here's where the story gets its second wind. In 1934, the De Zavala Chapter of the Texas Historical and Landmarks Association erected a marker right here to make sure nobody forgot. And the people who tracked this place down deserve their names spoken aloud.

Dr. Albert Woldert of Tyler, Texas, and Miss Adina De Zavala of San Antonio, Texas, they were the ones who located it. Mr.

J.M. Lovell of Augusta, Texas, lent his assistance to the effort. Three names, one mission, and a summer from 1690 that refused to stay buried.

Some stories just won't let the land keep their secrets.

What the marker says

Was founded in this vicinity summer 1690 "on the banks of the Arcangel San Miguel" (Neches) River. Erected A.D. 1934 by De Zavala Chapter, Texas Historical and Landmarks Association. Located by: Dr. Albert Woldert, Tyler, Texas; Miss Adina De Zavala, San Antonio, Texas. Assisted by Mr. J.M. Lovell, Augusta, Texas.