Burr Texas

Burr Texas

  • Also known as Lawson and Kriegel.
  • 1859 Burr Albert Harrison and a family named Callaway established plantations in the area.
  • 1859 Harrison arrived iand set up sugar, syrup, and grist mills on Caney Creek.
  • 1860 census recorded eighty-three slaves belonging to Harrison and a total of ninety slaves belonging to four Callaways.
  • The Callaway children were taught by the Harrisons' governess.
  • Took its first name from Dick Lawson, who built a general store, Lawson's Corner, on the border of the Lawson and Harrison plantations.
  • 1881 Harrison died
  • 1889 his son, Gerard Alexander Harrison, managed the plantation and established a mercantile business that was at one time larger than any general store in Wharton
  • Local plantation owners contributed to a church, which was destroyed by fire soon after the Civil War.
  • Isam Davenport, a black justice of the peace, was in office during Reconstruction and also served as county commissioner.
  • According to residents he used his position to get free labor by arresting other black men for drinking or shooting craps and then sentencing them to "ten days hard labor in Isam Davenport's cotton patch."
  • The first of two Baptist churches at Burr was built about 1892, and the other a few yearsBurr Texas Sign later.
  • First Lawson school was established sometime after 1889. A second school, which was subsequently moved to a better location, was built after 1893 on land also to be used for a church and cemetery.
  • Because of limited white enrollment in a largely black community, the white Lawson school began with a term that lasted only four months; in 1905 it had twenty-one pupils and one teacher.
  • 1896 Charles Kriegel, a native of Germany, came to the area and, leased the Lawson Store, 
  • 1897  Charles Kriegel took over the store, the community and postal station came to be known as Kriegel.
  • Kriegel became a real estate promoter in the area about 1900, when the New York, Texas and Mexican Railway was built from Wharton through Lawson and Van Vleck to Sargent.
  • Switch for loading cane and other products built in front of the school was known as Kriegel Switch.
  • A mile up the road was Dinsmore, and a mile south was Burr.
  • 1902 only five residents were reported.
  • By 1907 the Lawson school had thirty-one white pupils and a teacher, and the Kriegel school, across the street from the store, had 358 black pupils and nine teachers.
  • 1899 A post office named Kriegel was established in 1899 and discontinued in
  • 1910 Kriegel post office discontinued when Kriegel gave up his store and Gerard Harrison moved the post office to his store.
  • Harrison gave the office the new name Burr in honor of his father.
  • 1918 Post office was discontinued  and mail was sent to Wharton.

Burr  Churches






Burr Community




Burr Country Store and Grill
5203 FM 1301 RD
WHARTON TX  77488-7062
(979) 532-8783
Map









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