Real County

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and it's a story worth tellin'. Sit back, because Real County didn't come easy. Not by a long shot.

The land itself sets the stage. The southern edge of the Edwards Plateau, right where it drops off along the Balcones Escarpment, rugged mountains, deep canyons, rivers cutting through the rock. The Frio, the Sabinal, the Nueces.

Country that doesn't apologize for itself. Now, right in the heart of that Frio Canyon sat a settlement that would come to be called Leakey. And here's the thing about Leakey, the county line between Edwards County and Bandera County ran directly through the center of it.

Right through the middle of town. That's the kind of detail that sounds like a punchline until you realize what it meant for the people living there. When Edwards County organized in 1883, Leakey was elected the county seat.

A moment of civic pride. A moment of arrival. And then, eight years later, the county seat was moved.

Moved to Rocksprings. And just like that, the citizens of Leakey found themselves makin' long, hard journeys over mountains and canyons and rivers just to file a piece of paper. Official documents don't file themselves, and those were not gentle roads.

So in 1895, the citizens of the Frio Canyon did what Texans do, they petitioned. They went to the Texas Legislature and asked for their own county, carved out of parts of Uvalde, Bandera, and Edwards counties. They even had a name picked out: Bulah.

The Legislature said no. That rejection sat for nearly two decades. But the canyon has a long memory.

In 1913, a new bill was introduced. This time the proposed county would be drawn from parts of Edwards, Kerr, and Bandera counties, and it would be called Murphy. The bill moved.

It passed. On April 3, 1913, but not before an amendment came through that changed the name. The county would not be called Murphy.

It would be named for a rancher and Texas state senator by the name of Julius Real. The first election was held on July 26, 1913, to elect county officers and settle once and for all where the county seat would sit. Now, the marker doesn't let you off easy here, it calls that election disputed.

After all that, after everything, a disputed election. But when the dust settled, Leakey was declared the county seat. The town that had been split by a county line, that had lost its seat, that had been told no in 1895.

Leakey finally had what it had been reaching for. By 1918, a limestone courthouse was standing in that seat, jail included. Pioneers built their lives on farming and ranching, and Real County stayed largely rural all the way into the 1930s, when the highway system began to change things.

By the time this marker was placed in 2013, the centennial of the county's creation, Real County had built an economy around tourism, wild game hunting, and the businesses that support them. Mountains and canyons that once made life hard had become the reason people come. Funny how that works.

What the marker says

The location of Real County lies at the southern edge of the Edwards Plateau along the Balcones Escarpment, an area of rugged mountains and canyons named for the Frio, Sabinal and Nueces rivers. The county line between Edwards County and Bandera County ran directly through the center of a settlement in the Frio Canyon later called Leakey. When Edwards County organized in 1883, Leakey was elected as the county seat. Eight years later, however, the county seat was moved to Rocksprings, forcing the citizens of Leakey to travel great distances over mountains, canyons and rivers to file official documents. In 1895, the citizens of the Frio Canyon petitioned the Texas Legislature to organize a county to be called Bulah from parts of Uvalde, Bandera and Edwards counties but the petition was rejected. In 1913, a bill was introduced to create a new county from parts of Edwards, Kerr and Bandera counties to be called Murphy. The bill passed on April 3, 1913 with an amendment to name the county for rancher and Texas state senator Julius Real. The first election was held on July 26, 1913 to elect county officers and the location of the county seat. After a disputed election, Leakey was declared the county seat and in 1918 a limestone courthouse including a jail was erected. Pioneers subsisted on farming and ranching, and Real County remained primarily rural until the highway system emerged in the 1930s. Now commemorating the centennial of its creation, Real County boasts an economy largely based on tourism, wild game hunting and businesses which support these industries. (2013)