Site of San Augustine University

Duane's take

The way the marker tells it, here's what happened on this ground in San Augustine County. San Augustine University. Incorporated June 5, 1837.

Granted four leagues of land for its support. Those are the facts the stone gives you, and they are worth sitting with for a moment, because what comes next is the kind of story Texas has told more than once. A thing built with ambition, fed with land, opened with hope, and then undone from the inside.

The university opened its doors on September 5, 1842. Marcus A. Montrose served as president from 1842 to 1845.

Then came James Russell, a man with a Master of Arts from the University of Edinburgh, who held the presidency from 1845 to 1847. A university with an Edinburgh-trained president, out here in East Texas, in the 1840s. That is not nothing.

That is somebody reaching. But here is where the story turns, and the marker does not soften it one bit. Bitter sectarianism, those are the exact words, wrought its downfall.

Not hard times. Not lack of money. Not the frontier.

Bitter sectarianism. The fighting over religious faction and doctrine, the kind of quarrel that poisons a well from the inside. In 1847, San Augustine University merged with Wesleyan College into something called the University of Eastern Texas.

And after that came the San Augustine Masonic Institute, which succeeded it. A university with Edinburgh credentials and four leagues of land behind it, and what brought it down was people who could not stop arguing long enough to let a school live. The State of Texas put up a marker here in 1936 so nobody would forget what stood on this ground, and what was lost on it.

What the marker says

Site of SAN AUGUSTINE UNIVERSITY Incorporated June 5, 1837 Granted for leagues of land for its support Opened September 5, 1842 Marcus A. Montrose, President, 1842-1845 James Russell, M. A. University of Edinburgh, President, 1845-1847 Bitter sectarianism wrought its downfall Merged with Wesleyan College into the University of Eastern Texas in 1847 Succeeded by the San Augustine Masonic Institute Erected by the State of Texas 1936