Davilla ( ) is an
unincorporated community
An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...
in
Milam County,
Texas
Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...
, United States.
According to the
Handbook of Texas
The Texas State Historical Association (TSHA) is an American nonprofit educational and research organization dedicated to documenting the history of Texas. It was founded in Austin, Texas, United States, on March 2, 1897. In November 2008, the ...
, the community had a population of 200 in 2000.
History
In honor of Miguel Davila, who had obtained the original concession for the land in 1833, the community was established in the 1860s. The property was acquired from the Davila estate by a surveyor by the name of Chamberlin, who then sold town lots with the proviso that no alcoholic beverages should ever be served in the village. A post office was established in 1871. Davilla maintained some level of prosperity even after the
Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway
The Gulf, Colorado and Santa Fe Railway (GC&SF) was chartered in Texas in 1873 to build a railroad from Galveston, Texas, to Santa Fe, New Mexico. By 1886, it had built from Galveston to a junction in Temple, Texas, which was founded by the co ...
bypassed the town by a distance of several miles in 1881, driving some of the inhabitants elsewhere. Three hundred fifty people lived in the area in the middle of the 1880s, while Davilla had three churches, three
gristmill
A gristmill (also: grist mill, corn mill, flour mill, feed mill or feedmill) grinds cereal grain into flour and Wheat middlings, middlings. The term can refer to either the grinding mechanism or the building that holds it. Grist is grain that h ...
s, three
cotton gin
A cotton gin—meaning "cotton engine"—is a machine that quickly and easily separates cotton fibers from their seeds, enabling much greater productivity than manual cotton separation.. Reprinted by McGraw-Hill, New York and London, 1926 (); ...
s, and a steam
sawmill
A sawmill (saw mill, saw-mill) or lumber mill is a facility where logging, logs are cut into lumber. Modern sawmills use a motorized saw to cut logs lengthwise to make long pieces, and crosswise to length depending on standard or custom sizes ...
. From 500 in 1896 to 400 in the 1920s to 300 in the mid-1940s, Davilla's population slowly decreased, starting in the late 1890s. There were only 72 people living there as of the early 1970s, but this decline reversed itself in the 1980s. Five churches and many businesses could be seen on the county highway map from 1988, and the village had 200 residents at the time. Through 2000, Davilla's population was still listed as 200.
2.8% of Davilla's residents were
German Americans
German Americans (, ) are Americans who have full or partial German ancestry.
According to the United States Census Bureau's figures from 2022, German Americans make up roughly 41 million people in the US, which is approximately 12% of the pop ...
.
On November 23, 2004, an F0 tornado struck Davilla, damaging a house and another building.
Geography
Davilla is located on
Farm to Market Road 487
A farm (also called an agricultural holding) is an area of land that is devoted primarily to agricultural processes with the primary objective of producing food and other crops; it is the basic facility in food production. The name is used fo ...
, west of
Cameron
Cameron may refer to:
People
* Clan Cameron, a Scottish clan
* Cameron (given name), a given name (including a list of people with the name)
* Cameron (surname), a surname (including a list of people with the name)
;Mononym
* Cam'ron (born 19 ...
and northwest of
Rockdale in western Milam County.
Education
Davilla had its own school in the mid-1880s. In 1903, the community had two schools; one had three teachers and 161 White students, while the other had one teacher and 38 Black students. They even became a school district. It joined the
Bartlett Independent School District in June 1964.
Notable people
*
Erbie Bowser,
Blues
Blues is a music genre and musical form that originated among African Americans in the Deep South of the United States around the 1860s. Blues has incorporated spiritual (music), spirituals, work songs, field hollers, Ring shout, shouts, cha ...
pianist and singer.
* William F. Sharp, who served in the
20th Texas Legislature
The 20th Texas Legislature met from January 11 to April 4, 1887, in regular session, and from April 16 to May 15, 1888, in a called session. All members of the House of Representatives and a portion of the members of the Senate were elected in the ...
in 1887.
See also
*
U.S. Route 190
*
Texas State Highway 36
State Highway 36 (SH 36) runs from Freeport to Abilene. It was designated as the 36th Division Memorial Highway between Cameron and Sealy by the Texas Legislature in 1985.
History
SH 36 was originally proposed on November 21, 1917, as a rou ...
*
Texas State Highway 95
State Highway 95 (SH 95) is a state highway which connects the cities of Yoakum and Temple in the U.S. state of Texas.
Route description
The southern terminus of SH 95 is in Lavaca County at US 77 Alt. along the northern edge of ...
*
List of Farm to Market Roads in Texas (1300–1399)
References
{{authority control
Unincorporated communities in Milam County, Texas
Unincorporated communities in Texas