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Monday, February 25, 2008
Traveling thru Burton and Round Top, Texas
Located near Brenham (the tour to take is Blue Bell..) just off of Hwy
290, the small town of Burton has some interesting places. We visited
the Cotton Gin Museum, home of the oldest cotton gin still in operation.
One interesting fact learned was that cotton comprises 75 percent of our
U.S. paper money. If in the area, a fun event coming April 18-20 is the Burton
Cotton Gin Festival, which will include a parade, cotton gin tours,
antique tractors, auctions, and entertainment.
We
stopped in at Henry's Grocery to grab a snack. We asked how old it was
and got the reply "We don't know, but it's old." It appeared to date to
at least the early 1920s. In our journeys we'll be exploring more
general stores around the state in our search for hoop cheese, which
used to be commonly found but is now rare as general stores have become.
We
also visited the art colony of Round
Top, which we'll be having a segment on in the future, and heading
back to around the first of April for the huge antiques show. This area
has some of the most friendly people you will find. A music institute is
housed there. In fact, there was a large polka festival going on, with
dancers from all over the country there to hear several polka bands play
during the day. One of the most interesting buildings in Round Top is
the "new" library, which was moved to the new location in several
pieces, and renovated due to a generous donation of $700,000. It was an
old church building that had been sitting in a field, formerly Hope
Lutheran Church built in the 1920's.
In
our travels this spring and summer, we will be highlighting unique small
towns of Texas. Look for more of small town Texas places to see soon.
Know
of an old general store, soda fountain, or diner still in operation like
times of old in Texas that we need to know about?
The older the
better.
Let
us know their history and hours of operation and we may stop in and
feature in our travels.