Cuero

Cuero, Texas

Cuero, Texas

City of Cuero and County Seat of DeWitt County, Texas. Photograph by Renelibrary.
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Map of DeWitt County

Cuero is at the convergence of U.S. highways 183, 77A, and 87, in central DeWitt County. It is the largest city in the county and the county seat. The first post office in DeWitt County was established in May 1846 in Daniel Boone Friar's store, four miles north of the present site; it was also called Cuero (later Old Cuero). Cuero is named after Cuero Creek, which the Spanish had called Arroyo del Cuero, or Creek of the Rawhide, in reference to the Indians' practice of killing wild cattle that got stuck in the mud of the creekbed. When the Gulf, Western Texas and Pacific Railway was extended from Indianola to San Antonio, the Cuero site was chosen as a midway stopping point in the construction of the line. Although the tracks were not completed to Cuero until January 1873, construction of business establishments and homes was begun as early as November 1872. Among the first residents were Benjamin McCulloch and Gustav Schleicher. Schleicher, who surveyed the railroad, platted the new town for his Cuero Land and Immigration Company, and Robert J. Kleberg surveyed the site in January 1873.

The city government was organized in the summer of 1873; the town was incorporated on April 23, 1875, and it replaced Clinton as county seat in 1876. Cuero grew as Clinton declined, and after the great hurricanes of 1875 and 1886 people came from Indianola. Among the significant early businesses were Otto Buchel's bank, J. R. Nagel's hardware, and H. Runge and Company, a branch of Henry Runge's Indianola-based store and bank, which was operated in Cuero by Edward Mugge, Sr. Mugge was joined by William Frobese, Sr., and Emil Reiffert, Sr., when the firm moved its operating base to Cuero after the hurricane that destroyed Indianola in 1886. These men are credited with much of Cuero's early expansion. Rudolph Kleberg began publishing the weekly Cuero Star in June 1873. Other Cuero newspapers were the Deutsche Rundschau, a German-language paper established by William T. Eichholz in 1880; Lee Chaddock's Cuero Sun, in operation by the early 1890s; the Cuero Bulletin, established in the 1880s by Samuel L. Kyle and later absorbed by the Star; the Constitution, a populist paper published in the 1890s by Fay Carothers; the Daily Hustler, issued by James C. Howerton from July to November 1894; and the Cuero Daily Record, founded in November 1894 by Howerton, H. G. Woods, and B. S. Wright. Howerton became sole owner of the Record, which absorbed the Star and Deutsche Rundschau, and is Cuero's longest running newspaper.

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Craig H. Roell | © TSHA

Handbook of Texas Logo

Adapted from the official Handbook of Texas, a state encyclopedia developed by Texas State Historical Association (TSHA). It is an authoritative source of trusted historical records.

Belongs to

Cuero is part of or belongs to the following places:

Currently Exists

Yes

Place type

Cuero is classified as a Town

Associated Names

  • (Blair's)
  • (Quaro)

Location

Latitude: 29.09459530
Longitude: -97.28750500

Has Post Office

Yes

Is Incorporated

Yes

Population Count, 2021 View more »

8,235