Mapping Texas: From Frontier to the Lone Star State— A New Map of Texas with the Contiguous American & Mexican States, 1835
In the nearly four hundred years that it took for Texas to take its current shape the space changed from an extensive, unexplored and sparsely settled frontier under the Spanish Crown to its iconic and easily recognizable outline. Mapping Texas: From Frontier to the Lone Star State traces the cartographic history of Texas from the sixteenth to the twentieth century. Over fifty rare maps from the collections of the Texas General Land Office and the personal collection of Frank and Carol Holcomb, of Houston, are on display. Additional maps are on loan from The Bryan Museum in Galveston and the Witte Museum in San Antonio. This exhibit runs at the Houston Museum of Natural Science through October 8, 2017.
J.H. Young, A New Map of Texas with the Contiguous American & Mexican States, 1835
Modeled after Stephen F. Austin’s 1830 map, Young shows Texas in relation to the neighboring American and Mexican states. Like many mapmakers of the period, he incorporated the various empresario grants. He includes a description of the land grant process, notes features like “Immense Level Prairies,” “Droves of Wild Cattle & Horses,” and “Large Groups of Buffalo,” and depicts the lands claimed by indigenous groups.
Young’s colorful map of Texas breaks the territory down by the boundaries of the various empresario grants that had been contracted by the Mexican government. An informative text block in the lower-left corner explains this system, noting that “The divisions represented on the Map in Texas, and denominated grants, are tracts of country granted by the Legislature of Coahuila and Texas, to persons of influence and respectability styled Empresarios or Undertakers, who engage to settle or locate on their Grants, within the time specified thereby, the required number of settlers.” Further details are provided regarding the specific steps in the land granting process, closing with one last motivation for immigrants to come to Texas: “New settlers are exempted from the payment of the usual taxes for the term of 10 years.”
Geographical and natural features are named and noted throughout the territory. Rivers, creeks, mountains, and topographical features are complemented by the notations for “Droves of Wild Cattle & Horses,” “Mustang or Wild Horse Desert,” and “Immense Level Prairies.” Another block of text at the lower right provides additional information on the rivers of Texas, declaring that the “R. Brazos is considered the best navigable stream in Texas” and that “The lands on this river and on all the streams from hence to the Colorado inclusive, are the richest and deepest in Texas, and are considered equal in fertility to any in the world.”
Indigenous groups, including the Comanches, Choctaws, Kiowas, Pawnees, Cherokees, and Creeks are prominently labeled throughout northern Texas and into the Indian Territory on Texas’ northern border. What eventually became the panhandle is labeled Santa Fe, Formerly New Mexico. The region between the Nueces and the Rio Grande belongs to the states of Tamaulipas and Coahuila which, despite being part of the conjoined state of Coahuila y Tejas, is depicted separately from Texas’ territory north of the Nueces. Some west Texas territory, including El Paso (“Paso del Norte”), is shown as part of the state of Santa Fe, north of Chihuahua. The Sabine River forms a portion of Texas’ familiar eastern border with Louisiana.
Combining large blocks of informative text with a detailed, descriptive representation of Texas, Young’s 1835 New Map of Texas provides an excellent glimpse of Texas in its final days as a Mexican territory.
This map is part of the Frank and Carol Holcomb Digital Collection.
Can’t make it to Houston? You can view the majority of the maps in this exhibit in high definition on the GLO’s website where you can also purchase reproductions and support the Save Texas History Program.
