Townsite of Zella

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll do my best to do it justice. Now, out here in McMullen County, some stories are about what rose up. This one's about what almost did.

The townsite of Zella. Pull up a chair. In 1913, somebody had a vision.

A real honest-to-goodness vision, the kind that comes with graph paper and big dreams. They organized a townsite, laid off a hundred and eighty-nine city blocks right along the San Antonio, Uvalde and Gulf Railroad. A hundred and eighty-nine.

That's not a hamlet, friend. That's ambition with a surveyor's chain. They weren't just dreamin' either.

They built. A depot went up. A store and post office.

A schoolhouse. A hotel. They even drilled a water well, which out in this part of Texas is not a small thing.

Zella had the bones of a real town. You could almost hear the future arrivals stepping off that railroad, looking around, saying, yes, this is the place. But then the world had other plans.

War came. And right behind it, in 1917, came the drouth. Not a dry spell.

A drouth. The kind that doesn't ask permission and doesn't apologize when it leaves. Growth didn't slow down in Zella.

It stifled. That's the word the marker uses, and it's the right one. Stifled.

Few lots were sold. The land stayed in the hands of the founders. All those hundred and eighty-nine blocks, platted and ready, waiting on a population that never quite arrived.

Zella had a depot, a hotel, a school, a post office, and a whole lot of empty lots. Sometimes the land just holds the memory of what was intended. And out here on this road, that's worth knowing.

What the marker says

Organized 1913, with 189 city blocks laid off along San Antonio, Uvalde & Gulf Railroad. Structures built included depot, store-post office, schoolhouse, hotel. A water well was drilled. War and the 1917 drouth stifled growth. Few lots were sold; land ownership was retained by founders. (1968)