Littig is a small

unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a region that is not governed by a local municipal corporation. Widespread unincorporated communities and areas are a distinguishing feature of the United States and Canada. Most other countries of the world either have ...

in eastern

Travis County Travis County is located in south central Texas. As of the 2020 census, the population was 1,290,188. It is the fifth-most populous county in Texas. Its county seat is Austin, the capital of Texas. The county was established in 1840 and is n ...

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

, United States established in 1883. Littig is on the

Southern Pacific The Southern Pacific (or Espee from the railroad initials- SP) was an American Class I railroad network that existed from 1865 to 1996 and operated largely in the Western United States. The system was operated by various companies under the ...

line two miles (3 km) south of

U.S. Highway 290 U.S. Route 290 (US 290) is an east–west U.S. Highway located entirely within the state of Texas. Its western terminus is at Interstate 10 southeast of Segovia, and its eastern terminus is at Interstate 610 in northwest Houston. It is the m ...

and eighteen miles (29 km) northeast of the state capital, Austin, in eastern Travis County. It began with one of the oldest black communities in the state, and now has a diverse population. The Littig Cemetery is located nearby.

Geography

Littig is located east-northeast of the state capital, Austin, and west of Elgin. The community is in easternmost Travis County. Littig is on the Southern Pacific line, south of

. Littig is surrounded by blackland prairie soil, appropriate for growing

cotton Cotton is a soft, fluffy staple fiber that grows in a boll, or protective case, around the seeds of the cotton plants of the genus '' Gossypium'' in the mallow family Malvaceae. The fiber is almost pure cellulose, and can contain minor pe ...

maize Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. The ...

and corn. An important creek, part of the watershed, meanders along the Southern Pacific right-of-way with numerous wooden trestles near Littig.

History

The townsite was laid out in 1883 on land donated by Jackson Morrow, a former slave. The original plat placed the train depot in the center of a one square mile area. The town was named for A. B. Littig, former general division agent of the

Houston and Texas Central Railway The Houston and Texas Central Railway (H&TC), was an 872-mile (1403-km) railway system chartered in Texas in 1848, with construction beginning in 1856. The line eventually stretched from Houston northward to Dallas and Denison, Texas. with branc ...

, who surveyed the townsite, following the practice of naming new railroad towns after officers of the company. It had a railroad depot and locomotive water tank. A church and school were built in 1887 on land donated by J. W. Bitting. In 1889 a post office was established there with Thomas B. Fowler as postmaster. (The Houston and Texas Central Railway was succeeded by the Southern Pacific Transportation Company). By 1900 Littig had a general store, two cotton gins, three churches, and 168 residents. In 1907 the Littig common school district had three one-teacher schools for 185 black students and a one-teacher school for 33 white students. The population of Littig and many other small Texas communities such as nearby Kimbro,

Manda Manda may refer to: Places * Kafr Manda, Arab town in the Lower Galilee * Manda Upazila, an upazila in the Division of Rajshahi, Bangladesh * Manda, Kale, a village in Burma * Manda, Guinea, a town in the Labé Region * Manda, Jammu, India, ...

and Lund began to decline during the 1930s due to advances in automobile transportation and mechanized agriculture; its population fell from an estimated 150 in 1936 to 35 by the 1940s. The Littig schools were consolidated with the Manda Common School District in 1952. The post office at Littig was discontinued in 1954, and mail for the community was sent via Elgin in Bastrop County. A church and several houses marked the community's location on topographic maps of the area in the 1980s. The population of Littig was reported as 37 from the late 1960s through 2000.

References

External links

* {{authority control Unincorporated communities in Texas Unincorporated communities in Travis County, Texas