The Sunday Gazetteer
Sunday, December 9, 1888 pg. 2 DENISON: from 1872 to the Present Day Chronological Record of Local Events An Epitome that will be interesting to Old-Timers The compilation of the following chronology of events in the history of the Gate City was conceived at a date too late to admit of its being made as full and comprehensive as the management could have desired, but with such facilities as were at their command they have endeavored to make it measureably interesting and satisfactory. In it compliation we had to depend upon the memory of old inhabitants and newspaper files, and the work of compressing this data has necessarily been tedious and time-consuming. We submit it with the consciousness that it possesses many imperfections but in the hope that by those who are interested in the town it will at least be enjoyed: 1872 Aug. 29 - P. McGreevy the pioneer merchant of Denison Sept. 5 - P. McGreevy opened the first stock of merchandist offered for sale in Denison, in a board shanty just east and south of the present site of the Lone Star Mills. Sept. 23 - First sale of lots by Denison Town Company. The first lot sold was southwest corner of Main Street and Austin avenue, which was bought by S.A. Cook for $250. Thirty-one lots sold at an average price of $154 each. Sept. 23 - Fred Muller bought a lot on Main Street at public sale about 2 p.m., and before night had lumber on the ground and was at work erecting a store house. He had previously purchased a stock of groceries and crockery in St. Louis, which arrived in a few days. This was the first building put up Main Street, and stood on the ground now occupied by his new brick block. Sept 24 - Articles of incorporation of Denison Town Company filed at Austin with Secretary of State Sept 25 - Geo. A Cutler established the Red River Journal at Denison, or as it was then called Red River City. Nov 5 - Postoffice established and rated fifth-class with a salary of $12 per annum. C.W. Nelson, Postmaster, H. Tone, deputy Dec 25 - First train of cars arrived in Denison over the M.K. & T. Railway Dec 27 - Denison Weekly News, B.C. Murray editor and proprietor, established NOTES Previous to the completion of the railroad bridge spanning the Red River our pioneer merchants were put to great inconvenience by the tardy receipt of freights, all of which had to be brought from Colbert Station by wagon. Although the road between Colbert and Denison was lined with loaded wagons, and the ferry was worked to its full capacity, ten times as much wagon transportation could have been utilized to advantage. At Colbert Station hundreds of car loads of freight that the Denison merchants waited and and watched for was detained for weeks for want of transportation, and while their freight remained immovable at Colbert, the frantic merchant in his tents, on what is now known as Skiddy street, howled and cursed as he almost every minute turned away valuable customers. The writer was employed at this time by the Overland Transportation Company, working in connection with the M.K. & T., having the contract to remove freight by wagon from the end of the track to its destination, and remembers the coming to Colbert of numerous Denison merchants in the vain endeavor to secure special assistance in their individual behalf. Christmas was approaching, the town of tents was a regular bee-hive. The demand for merchandise of all kinds was immense, but alas, a big river lay between the merchant and his wares. If money could have raised the blockade it would have been freely poured out, but money, entreaty, tears, coaxing, and cursing were alike unavailing. The great want was more teams and better ferry facilities. By well developed system a generous supply of all varieties of goods were landed in Denison for the Christmas festivities, except that the liquors gave out too soon. Jim Leonard, of the Nelson House, saw he was running short and mounted a swift steed, reached Colbert, besought assistance in finding a consignment of liquors, which was given him. The car containing his goods was unlocked, his whiskey unloaded on the prairie, in such location, that no wagon could get within 300 yards of it. James, with his well-known energy threw off his coat, and rolled those barrells through four inches of mud to the wagon, and reached Denison after dark Christmas eve with his valuable load just as his bar-keepers were dealing out to a thirsty mob the last drink in the house. For the courtesy and assistance given Mr. Leonard at that time, the writer secured his eternal gratitude and good will. Another gentleman was in the same fix as Mr. Leonard, and that was Harry Mamlock, but his cry was for champagne. After a deal of trouble he got it, and was mad happy, and on that Christmas day more champagne was drunk in Mamlock's tent than perhaps in any building in Denison since. At last the great bridge was completed, and the first train, a passenger, crossed on Christmas day, 1872. The accumulated freight cars on all the sidings north of the bridge were quickly rushed across on the now world-renowned terminus of the M.K. & T., "Denison." Hundreds of men were employed to unload cars into the spacious depot, but although the largest freight depot on the line of the M.K. & T., it was found to be entirely too small to accomodate one-tenth part of the freight to be unloaded, so out on what was then a prairie was dumped all the Denison freight, and such other consignments that would not be damaged by exposure to the weather. It must be taken into consideration that at this time the whole of North Texas was receiving freight over the M.K.&T., thus making Denison the distributing point for a vast quantity of all description of merchandise. From Main to Gandy, and from Austin avenue to the depot, was at this time an open space where hundreds upon hundreds of teams and wagons were huddled in a tangled mass, the driver of each vehicle striving to fill up with his outfit the vacancy caused by the pulling out from the platform a loaded wagon or wagon train. The festive bullwhacker, the amiable mule-skinner, the country hauler with special orders from some country storekeeper, the bewildered farmer, all howling, swearing, or praying, was a grand and exhiliarating pantomine never to be forgotten. Above all the din and confusion, the most conspicuous and most envied of all, was here and there to be seen one of those indomitable spirits, a wild and wooly trainmaster, with ruddy cheeks and flashing eyes, dressed more in the garb of an Indian than a white man, the plume of his wide-rimmed sombrero waving above his towering form, as he galloped furiously from point to point giving orders to his men in clarion notes, and in the choicest Sunday-school terms of endearment. To hear him at this late day would make the stoutest heart tremble. In order to give a faint idea of the magnitude of the forwarding business done here at that time of which we write, it will be well to state that Denison was the distributing point for government supplies consigned to Forts Richardson, Griffin, Concho, McKavitt, and, in some cases, to points still farther west. Besides the government business, Denison handled freight to Honey Grove, Dodd City and Bonham in this State, although Caddo got most of these points, merchants in Sherman, Fort Worth, Denton, Pilot Point, Jacksboro, Weatherford, and in fact all points west for hundreds of miles ordered their goods marked and shipped from Northern and Eastern cities via Denison. In those days our forwarding and commission houses done a land-office business. While Denison and Texas were receiving this vast business from the North over the M.K. & T., the State amply returned the compliment in the shipment of cattle and sheep, Denison still being the point from which all shipments were made.... 
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