DUANE
Duane's take
The official marker tells it this way, and I'm just the one passing it along. Now, if you're rollin' through Guadalupe County with the windows down and that river glimmering off to the side, let me tell you — you are keeping company with one of the oldest explored rivers in all of Texas. This isn't some newcomer creek that stumbled onto the map.
The Guadalupe has been drawing people to its banks for a long, long time. A Spaniard named Alonso de Leon gave it the name it carries to this day — named it for Our Lady of Guadalupe, back in 1689. And that name stuck.
It has stuck through every chapter that followed. Not long after, during 1691 to 1693, a man named Domingo Teran de Los Rios — Spanish Governor of Texas — maintained a colony right here along the Guadalupe. Think about that.
A colonial settlement, on this very river, while most of the continent was still being mapped from rumors and guesswork. Then came the Anglo-American settlers. Thirty or forty families found their way to these banks, and that shoreline formed an actual boundary — a living, geographic border — of the Power-Hewetson Irish Colony.
The river wasn't just scenery. It was a line on the map that mattered. Near the mouth of the Guadalupe, historic Victoria was founded.
And sixty miles upstream sat Gonzales. Now — Gonzales. You feel that name land?
Because on October 2, 1835, the first shot for Texas freedom was fired there. The Guadalupe was running right alongside history when that trigger was pulled. Two hundred and fifty miles long, this river.
Two hundred and fifty miles of story, from Alonso de Leon naming it in 1689 to the shot at Gonzales to the families who staked their futures on its banks. The Guadalupe doesn't just flow through Texas. In a lot of ways, it flows through everything Texas became.
What the marker says
One of the earliest explored rivers in Texas. Named for Our Lady of Guadalupe by Spaniard Alonso de Leon in 1689. During 1691-1693, Domingo Teran de Los Rios, Spanish Governor of Texas, maintained a colony on the Guadalupe. In early Anglo-American settlement, 30 or 40 families located along its bank, which formed a boundary of the Power-Hewetson Irish Colony. Near the mouth of the river, historic Victoria was founded, and 60 miles above was Gonzales, where the first shot for Texas freedom was fired, Oct. 2, 1835. The Guadalupe is 250 miles long. (1969)