DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about Sam Houston and his long ties to Liberty County. Now, most folks hear the name Sam Houston and their minds go straight to San Jacinto — that one shining moment when the general led Texas to victory over Mexico and changed the map of the continent. And fair enough.
But the marker standing in Liberty County wants you to know there's a whole other chapter, one that stretched across decades and acres and courthouse steps and Sunday mornings in the pines. So settle in. This one's got range.
Sam Houston — pioneer, lawyer, statesman — began a relationship with Liberty County in 1833, and that relationship was rooted in something Texans have always understood: land. He kept at it, acquiring and transacting, all the way until his death in 1863. In those years he concluded nine land transactions involving nearly twenty thousand acres.
Nine. Nearly twenty thousand. The man wasn't dabbling.
He established a family home at Cedar Point in 1840 — Cedar Point being what's now part of Chambers County — and then another at Grand Cane, twenty-two miles north of here, in 1842. Two homes, two counties, one very busy man. And here's the part that tends to surprise people: from 1838 to 1855, Sam Houston practiced law in Liberty, maintaining an office on this very site, right across from the Courthouse Square.
While he was President of the Republic of Texas — 1836 to 1838, then again 1841 to 1844 — and while he was serving as the first United States Senator for the newly-annexed state of Texas from 1846 to 1859, he was also keeping an office right here, taking cases, standing before judges, doing the ordinary work of a lawyer in a courthouse town. There's something almost quietly remarkable about that. His life in Liberty County wasn't only his own, either.
His wife, Margaret Lea Houston, was one of the founders of the Concord Baptist Church at Grand Cane, in 1845, and Houston attended worship services there. Liberty County honored all of this the way places do when they mean it — with names that stick. Sam Houston Avenue.
The Sam Houston Regional Library and Research Center. Not a battlefield monument, not a capitol rotunda — a library. A place for records and research and the long, patient work of remembering.
Which, when you think about nearly twenty thousand acres and nine land deals and seventeen years of practicing law across from that courthouse square, seems just about right.
What the marker says
Pioneer, lawyer, statesman, and leader of the Texas victory over Mexico at San Jacinto, General Sam Houston began a relationship with Liberty County in 1833 that was based on land ownership which continued until his death in 1863. During those years he concluded nine land transactions involving nearly 20,000 acres. He established family homes at Cedar Point (now part of Chambers County) in 1840 and at Grand Cane (22 mi. N) in 1842. From 1838 to 1855, Sam Houston practiced law in Liberty, maintaining an office on this site across from the Courthouse Square. Houston's other activities in Liberty County included his attendance at worship services of the Concord Baptist Church (Grand Cane), of which his wife, Margaret Lea Houston, was one of the founders in 1845. Sam Houston's activities in Liberty County took place while he was serving in various leadership roles for Texas, including President of the Republic of Texas (1836-1838, 1841-1844) and as the first United States Senator for the newly-annexed state of Texas (1846-1859). He has been honored in Liberty County by the naming of Sam Houston Avenue and the Sam Houston Regional Library and Research Center.