In 1982, my husband, Bill, and I moved a truckload of furniture and plants, along with two babies to Tehuacana, Texas. I am positive that one of my promises and vows when we married in 1979 was to make a fast track to Texas where we would raise our children and "live 'til dirt".
So after Bill had worked shift work long enough in a chemical plant in Baton Rouge to have $10,000 in savings, we found a home in downtown Tehuacana to rent with no employment in tow. The ancestral home of John Bounds towered among the other decaying houses in the downtown area. At that time, a few visionaries bought the remains of the old downtown buildings, and a small store was open across the street.
Bill secured a small part time job on the work team to restore the prominent building and grounds of the original Trinity University campus. I never take for granted that without my husband's natural mind to understand structure, landscaping, and overall basic maintenance, we would not have survived in the community we chose for our "forever".
Products of the 1970 education systems in our nation, getting a basic degree was all we needed to set in motion security for job employment. In a few years' time, and after establishing a family of five, our degrees in musical performance guided us into church musicianship, youth corrdinator positions, early education planning, and a music studio entreprenuership.
We raised our children with a music background, piano, strings, and vocal while building and renovating small structures to improve our declining residences in our town.
The population has maintained a close to 300 in the 38 years we have moved here. The town continues to cast "magic" to the persons who live in Tehuacana. We have seen the older, once grander homes, be purchased and rented by persons with no roots to the college, but see generations and descendents still claim the town as their home.
Tehuacana continues to be the only township in Limestone County with septic systems in place. Folks wanting to build on original property find that current laws require half an acre to install an updated or new system to build or renovate. Therefore, installing or improving broken systems is not possible to the older, smaller homes.
We have managed to purchase surrounding properties to our original home, yes we were after five years able to purchase it, enabling installilng upgraded and newer systems with drain fields that do not encroach on others' properties. We are seeing old homes failing "brick-built" systems fall in and drain fields compromised. Therefore, newer neighbors, and most definitely ill-informed residents move in these law-breaking structures.
And so the cycle continues.....buy scarce available land, spend money on the difficult to install new septic systems in place (limestone rock), monies available making some homes somewhat less safe structurally...or....placing the old homes on an endangered list.
Every Day in Tehuacana remains beautiful to many. Quiet and wooded, bird and squirrel inhabited, zoning open to most. It is a sanctuary for the 300 who live here. Wildflowers, little traffic, non-threatening inhabitants. The 1869-1902 Trinity University's Texas Hall stand without its tower needing so much attention. The limestone monolith is dear to us as its history.
There is so much to talk about with our small town, Tehuacana, its Native American and pioneer past, an original stagecoach and postoffice location, the historic cemetery, its history in education, agriculture, and farming, and of course, our ancestors.
Please let us know your ideas, insights, feelings about Tehuacana. Linda Ferris