DUANE
Duane's take
The official marker's the word on this one, and here's how I tell it. Picture an island off the Texas Gulf Coast — owned by none other than Stephen F. Austin himself, back in 1832.
That's where somebody decided to build a town. San Luis, they called it, and by the early 1830s it was up and running. In 1836, the Follett family arrived and got right to business — opened a boardinghouse, strung a ferry service between Galveston and Brazoria County, and suddenly this little island had the feel of somewhere going places.
A developer named George L. Hammeken laid off town lots and started drawing grand plans: a major rail and canal connection to the local plantations, a highway for cotton and whatever else the land produced. By 1840, San Luis wasn't a dream anymore.
Two thousand people called it home. Two thousand. On an island.
There were serious talks about a bridge to the mainland. Then in 1841, somebody filed a plat with the county clerk — a full city plan, more than fifty blocks mapped out neat as you please. San Luis was going to be something.
Here's where the story takes its turn, and Texas weather is involved, so you already know. Storms rolled in. The harbor started sanding up.
The economy went south. Each one of those forces alone might've been survivable, but together they worked on San Luis the way the Gulf always works on things it wants back. Short-lived, the marker calls it.
That's a gentle way to put it. By the end of the twentieth century, most of the original townsite was sitting under water — swallowed by shoreline erosion, slow and steady and final. Two thousand people, fifty blocks, a ferry, a plat filed with the county clerk — all of it gone beneath the Gulf.
San Luis didn't fade. It sank.
What the marker says
Located on an island owned by Stephen F. Austin in 1832, the town of San Luis was established by the early 1830s. In 1836 the Follett family opened a boardinghouse and established a ferry service between Galveston and Brazoria County. Developers such as George L. Hammeken laid off town lots and planned for a major rail and canal connection to local plantations for shipping cotton and other local products. By 1840 San Luis was a thriving community with a population of 2,000. There were plans to build a bridge to the mainland, and a plat filed with the county clerk in 1841 outlined a city with more than fifty blocks. Storms, harbor sanding and a depressed economy made San Luis a short-lived community. By the end of the 20th century, most of the original townsite was under water due to shoreline erosion. (2000)