Sam Houston may have written that “Texas is the finest portion of the globe that has ever blessed my vision,” but Texans were slow to embrace and preserve the natural beauty that so impressed Houston. It was not until 1923 that Texas created a true state park system, and even then, government leaders have been hesitant to provide adequate funding. Much progress has been made in this regard, and today—in the state park system’s centenary—the system can boast more than 800,000 acres of preserved land, within which every Texan can experience the state’s diverse regions, natural beauty, rich history, marvelous and sometimes eccentric wildlife, and unique geologic features.
The concept of a state park system did not come easily to Texans. For the most part, citizens of the Lone Star State are averse to the idea of public regulation, public management, or public ownership, so the notion of setting aside public lands for the common good wasn’t an easy sell. And when the idea did come, it did so in fits and starts, always beset by challenges.
By the end of the 19th century, however, national trends, at least, were favorable. A nostalgia for a pre-industrial America was emerging as the country’s western frontier was closing. Yellowstone was established as a National Park in 1872, the first such designation in the country—and the world. Yosemite, Sequoia, and Mount Rainier followed, all in the 19th century. Theodore Roosevelt employed the “Antiquities Act” to expand preservation efforts, and in 1916, the National Park System was created. “National Parks,” Wallace Stegner noted, “are the best idea we ever had.”
In Texas, this trend manifested itself in greater support for historical sites rather than in a simple regard for the preservation of nature. In 1891, the Daughters of the Republic of Texas (DRT) was formed, in part, to preserve historical sites. In 1897, the legislature allocated $10,000 for the purchase of the San Jacinto Battlefield—where General Sam Houston won Texas’ independence as a nation—and it became the first “park” owned by the State of Texas. Similar efforts were made to preserve the Alamo, Gonzales, Washington-on-the-Brazos, and other historical sites over the next decade.
To develop a full-fledged park system, however, Texas needed a politician with the will and zeal to go “beyond historical monuments” and, as author Cynthia Brandimarte has noted, “to showcase the diversity of Texas’ landscape, encourage tourism, and promote conservation.” That politician was Pat Morris Neff.
According to contemporary accounts, Neff “was not like other boys.” As Stephen Harrigan recounts, Neff, “though Texas born,” had “never shot a gun, baited a fishhook, used tobacco in any form, nor drunk anything stronger than Brazos water.”
He did, however, have a vision for Texas’ future, which he laid out in a series of reelection speeches between 1922-1923, as well as calls for legislative action. According to authors Dan Utley and James Steely, Neff called on the state to “establish parks, both large and small, throughout her borders. The people should have the breathing spots where they can enjoy nature in stream and tree, in rock and rill.” He proposed such a bill, enjoining the legislature to create a state parks board and to fund a new parks system.
The legislature was recalcitrant, and while it approved a parks board, it provided only a bare minimum of funding. Indeed, its annual budget in the early years was only $375, with no funding for staff, the acquisition of land, or the improvement and maintenance of such land.
With no funds, the Board pushed for donations, often having to beg the donors to provide additional funding for improvements and maintenance. What followed, according to former Parks Director Carter Smith, were “grueling political battles, eleventh-hour land saves, go-for-broke land deals, extraordinary feats of civic pride, [and] boundless displays of generosity from citizens across the state…”
One of the citizens who spearheaded the campaign for donations was Huntsville native Marian Rather Powell, whom author Jennifer Bristol described as “brilliant” and “fiercely organized.” These qualities would serve her well as she led a letter-writing campaign; attended and spoke up at meetings; and lobbied legislators on behalf of Texas parks.
Powell’s efforts were successful. In 1927, the legislature agreed to accept the donation of 24 parcels of land, each of which would serve as a State Park. Without real funding, however, the supervision and maintenance of the parks was left to local municipalities. But as Representative W. R. Chambers noted at the time, “It requires more than a cow pasture and an excited Chamber of Commerce to make a park go.”
Pat Neff regarded all these sites as more than cow pastures, but one had a particular place in his heart. Shortly after he was elected governor, Neff’s mother passed away at the age of 91. “Mother Neff,” according to Utley and Steely, “bequeathed a small part of [her] homestead ‘as a park for the public, for religious, educational, fraternal and political purposes.’”
Although Texas had previously designated public lands as “parks,” such sites had been selected for their historic importance. Mother Neff, at least in Pat Neff’s mind, was the first State Park to be established in the National Park mold, a land of natural beauty, with support for diverse activities and rich wildlife. This land, on which he had reached maturity, was his inspiration of what a park system could provide.
In its earliest iteration, the Park was only six acres, but even today, at 259 acres, Mother Neff State Park is one of the state’s smaller recreational parks. It lacks the desolate grandeur of Big Bend Ranch, the brooding beauty of Caddo Lake, and the towering spires of Palo Duro. But, as Utley and Steely note, “Mother Neff State Park is everything a park should be.”
Nestled in Texas’ hill country, Mother Neff State Park is approximately 30 minutes from Waco. Such placement is consistent with the original concept of the park system, which sought to provide city dwellers quick access to rustic environments.
Mother Neff’s “parkitecture” themed visitor’s center and xeriscape grounds provide an attractive gateway to the park—and a home for a diverse number of butterflies and birds.
Its modern look, however, belies its claim to being one of the oldest parks in the system. But the Park’s rich history is easily discovered in its interior. A short trail from the main road, for example, takes visitors to a “rock cave” occupied by the Tonkawa Indians hundreds of years ago. Another short trail offers access to “Wash Pond,” a small, spring-fed body of water used by Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) workers in the 1930s.
The CCC was central to the development of Mother Neff State Park, but the Park is not unique in this regard. More than 50,000 men worked for the CCC in Texas alone, with approximately 30 Texas parks housing CCC camps. In Mother Neff State Park, there are several CCC structures, most of which reflect the distinctive stone construction favored by the Corps. In typical fashion, the construction materials were locally sourced, allowing the structures to blend with their surroundings.
The Park also features more than three miles of hiking trails—many developed by CCC—which wend through prairies, rocky landscapes, and along the Leon River. Given its four distinct habitats and proximity to the river and other water sources, the Park features an abundance of wildlife, with deer, armadillos, and rabbits, particularly visible. Perhaps its most striking feature, at least in the spring, is its wildflowers, which bloom across the Park’s prairies, at the visitor center, and at the entrance portal, the latter also constructed by the CCC.
Mother Neff State Park is not the State’s most dramatic park, but it is to an unusual degree, a successful representation of what it was meant to be: a rural oasis, that, as Governor Neff hoped, enhances the “health, welfare, and happiness” of Texans, by providing them with “leisure periods…for rest, recreation, and relaxation.”
This is the first of two pieces celebrating the State Park System’s centenary. Next month, Postcards will highlight some of the State’s most dramatic and unusual parks.
Postcards Magazine
936-293-1188
PO Box 690
Huntsville, TX 77342
