![]() ![]() Its decision reflected a recommendation made three years earlier by a special board of engineers to build an eastward extension of the Seawall, with the aim of protecting the East End Flats. In July 1916, Congress authorized the construction of a Seawall extension, beginning at Sixth Street and proceeding east to Fort San Jacinto. The East End Flats, which were unprotected, were subject to erosion by waves from the Gulf of Mexico, thus posing a potential threat to the Galveston channel. University of Texas Medical Branch and East End Flats, ca. He recommended the city hire a night watchman. These people tended to leave their garbage closer to the city and the hospitals at the medical school. Trueheart reported a problem with individuals who deposited their own trash. A roadway was built to enable wagons to enter the area and dump trash. Trueheart, city health physician, reported to the board of commissioners that the Flats were the ‘least objectionable’ site for disposal of garbage. Local officials and residents thus perceived the East End Flats as a thorn in Galveston’s side, as well as boon to its future expansion.īeginning in 1909, the East End Flats became the city’s trash dump, linking them in the public’s mind with filth and disease. During the late teens, another perception emerged that the Flats were property that could in fact be developed. This perception continued into the 1940s. In the early 1900s, it perceived the Flats as unsightly and worthless because the marshy land attracted garbage and vermin. The land transferred by quit-claim deed amounted to thousand acres.ĭuring the first half of the twentieth century, Galveston’s populace held two opposing views of the East End Flats. The Galveston City Company stipulated that the federal government had to use the land “for fortifications, posts or other military purposes… for the defense of Galveston harbor.” If the government failed to develop the property in accordance with this stipulation, then the land would revert to the Galveston City Company’s ownership. The government needed land for Fort San Jacinto. On March 12, 1898, the Galveston City Company’s directors voted to approve the federal government’s request for their organization to grant land on the east end of Galveston Island. In 1898, the federal government sought to build a fort on the eastern end of Galveston Island. The company began selling its first lots that April. McKinney, and others also established the Galveston City Company in 1838. Sam Houston, the Republic’s President, signed the deed, January 25, 1838, granting the land to Menard. This the first Congress of the Republic of Texas did in an act approved December 9, 1836, granting Menard a league and labor of land on the east end of Galveston Island in exchange for a $50,000 payment. Menard needed to have the land grant confirmed under the new government of the Republic of Texas. Menard, an adopted citizen of Mexico, acquired title to Seguín’s land in July 1834. Menard, his attorney and the future founder of the city of Galveston. Seguín did this at the behest of Michel B. Seguín, a citizen of San Antonio, applied to Veremendi, governor of the State of Coahuila and Texas, for a grant of one league and one labor of land (approximately 4,600 acres) on the east end of Galveston Island. ![]() To understand its history, attention must first be focused on the changes in land ownership that occurred during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The East End Flats, the low, marshy lands that lay to the east of Sixth Street in Galveston, have a fascinating history that goes back to Mexican Texas. G_25_5_FF2_11, Galveston Photographic Subject Files: General City Views. View of the East End Flats from Elevator A. ![]()
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