Oakland

Duane's take

Here's the story as the official marker tells it — and it's a good one. A town that had to give up its own name just to get a post office, and still found a way to matter. Now, this place was not always called Oakland.

Back in 1856, a man named A. C. Hereford laid out a town right here and called it Prairie Point.

Hereford was a Virginia native, a veteran of the Mexican War, and he'd made his way to this part of Colorado County in the early 1850s. He platted the town on part of the original James Bowie Survey — and that is not nothing, because the community that grew up here became the second oldest in all of Colorado County. Things were moving along just fine.

A school went in by 1859. Churches, stores, businesses, fraternal organizations — Prairie Point was turning into a real hub for the farm families of western Colorado County. A stop on the Old Gonzales Road, that important early route running from San Felipe all the way to Gonzales.

People were moving through. People were staying. Then came 1861, and Hereford did what any ambitious town founder would do — he applied for a post office.

A post office means legitimacy. It means permanence. It means you are on the map.

Request denied. The reason? Prairie Point sat too close — too close — to an existing post office already operating over on the plantation of one Amasa Turner, who lived from 1800 to 1877.

Now, Turner could've just dug in. He had the established post office. He had the leverage.

But instead, Turner made a deal: he would relocate his post office to Prairie Point — on one condition. The name Oakland had to stay. And that was that.

Hereford's Prairie Point became Oakland, and Oakland it has been ever since. For a good while, Oakland delivered on its promise. Major trading center.

Social center. The kind of place western Colorado County families counted on. But then the 1870s arrived, and with them came the railroad — and the railroad did not come through Oakland.

It went to Weimar instead. And when the railroad bypasses you, the people tend to follow the railroad. The population started to decline.

The momentum shifted. Oakland never became what it might have been. Some towns get to write their own names.

Some towns don't even get to keep them. Oakland got the post office, kept somebody else's name, built something real, and then watched the iron rails go the other way. That's a lot of story for one piece of Colorado County ground.

What the marker says

Originally known as Prairie Point, a town was platted at this site in 1856 by A. C. Hereford. A native of Virginia, Hereford was a veteran of the Mexican War who had arrived in this area in the early 1850s. Located on part of the original James Bowie Survey, the community is the second oldest in Colorado County. When Hereford applied for a post office for Prairie Point in 1861, his request was denied because of the settlement's close proximity to an existing post office on the plantation of Amasa Turner (1800-1877). Turner agreed to relocate his post office to Prairie Point upon the condition that its name, Oakland, be retained. The town was thereafter known as Oakland. Oakland was a stop on the Old Gonzales Road, an important early route form San Felipe to Gonzales. As settlement in the town increased, a school was established in 1859. Soon churches, stores, business, and fraternal organizations were also in operation. The town became a major trading and social center for the farm families of western Colorado County. The population of Oakland began to decline in the 1870s when the railroad bypassed the community in favor of Weimar.