Brown County, near the geographic center of Texas, is named for Capt. Henry Stevenson Brown, a company commander in the battle of Velasco, a delegate to the Convention of 1832 and one of the fi rst Anglo-Americans in the area. Th e fi rst whites in the area were Spanish soldiers under Capt. nicolás Flores y Valdez, who in 1723 pursued Apaches to recover stolen horses and captives. After a similar Spanish expedition in 1759, a group of Anglo- Americans, led by Capt. Henry Stevenson Brown, entered the region in 1828 to recover livestock stolen by Comanches. Th e county was formed on the western frontier in 1856 from Comanche and Travis counties and organized in 1858, with Brownwood designated as the county seat; the town was also awarded the county’s fi rst post offi ce that year with Wiley B. Brown as postmaster. In 1860 the united States census found 244 people living in the county, none of them slaveholders. Th e county developed slowly between its founding and the 1870s, primarily because conditions were not secure for settlement until the late 1870s or early 1880s, as settlers were harassed by Indians and white predators for twenty years after the county was formed. White desperados caused problems too; in 1875 the Fort Worth- Brownwood stage was robbed fi ve times in two months. Much of the criminal activity during the 1870s was attributed to John Wesley Hardin’s gang; in 1874 Brown County citizens were among those who lynched suspected gang members at Comanche, and Hardin himself was forced to flee.

Th ough increasing numbers of farmers moved into the area in the 1870s, 1880s, and 1890s, the county’s economy was dominated by cattle ranching throughout most of the nineteenth century. Th e number of cattle in the county rose from 2,070 in 1860 to 40,000 in 1880 and remained at about the same level until 1900. County ranchers joined the main cattle trail to Abilene and Dodge City in north Coleman County and fought with local farmers attempting to fence off their lands. Strife between ranchers and farmers over the fencing of open range raged for several years until 1886, when the Texas Rangers killed two fence cutters. Development of the county was accelerated in the 1890s and early 1900s when two railroads built tracks into the area.

Political aff airs were volatile in Brown County in the 1880s and 1890s. Th e Greenback party was active there during the 1880s and was championed by two newspapers, the Investigator, published by Judge Charles H. Jenkins, and the Age of Reason, published by the Mikel brothers. In the late 1880s and early 1890s the Populists were supported by the Brownwood Bulletin, fi rst published by J. H. Byrd and later by William H. Mayes. Most residents during this period, however, were Democrats and read the Pecan Valley News, fi rst published in 1894 (a weekly newspaper named after this one was published in the 1970s by Tevis Clyde Smith). Prohibition caused discord until the county voted itself dry in 1903. It remained dry until the late 1950s, when the sale of beer for off -premises consumption was made legal. Between 1870 and 1900 citizens of the county also developed a school system and centers of higher education. Th e fi rst school in the county opened in 1860, when Judge Greenleaf Fisk, a large landowner, volunteered to teach the children. In 1888 the Presbyterians established Daniel Baker College, the county’s fi rst center of higher learning, and in 1890 a group of Baptists established Howard Payne College. Daniel Baker struggled fi - nancially until 1894, when it passed to the Southern Synod of the Presbyterian Church. Howard Payne granted degrees until 1897, then operated as a junior college until 1913, when it was again upgraded to senior college status. In 1953 the two schools were combined under the name of Howard Payne College (now Howard Payne university).

Th e county’s agricultural economy boomed during the fi rst ten years of the twentieth century, primarily because of a rapid expansion of cotton culture. Th e boll weevil appeared in the county about 1909, however, and production of cotton quickly declined. oil was discovered in Brown County in 1879, but the Great Depression of the 1930s ended the oil boom, as prices dropped and production fell off .

Th e beginning of America’s involvement in World War II helped to resurrect the local economy. Between 1941 and 1943 military needs led to the construction of Camp Bowie, an infantry and cavalry training center that covered 122,000 acres south of Brownwood and cost $35 million to build. Th e facility aff ected the county both socially and economically; over 10,000 construction workers were hired to build the camp, and eventually 30,000 troops were assigned there; German prisoners of war were also confi ned there.

(The information above is excerpted from the Handbook of Texas, an encyclopedia published by the Texas State Historical Association. The Handbook can be accessed on-line at http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/handbook/ online/index.new.html. Copies of the two-volume set may be obtained by contacting the history organization at 512-232-1513.)