Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1892-02-07
VELASCO PROGRESS.
SOLID IMPROVEMENTS NOW uN-
DER WAY AT THAT PORT.
A Fine Hotel To Go Up at Surf sids-shlps
in Port and to Como-Daily Trains
to be Run to Houston.
special to the Gazette.

VELAsco, TEX, Feb. 5.-The steamers Hi
awatha, Alice Blair and Whitewater yester-
day brought in ABOUT fifty passen-
gers, nearly all of whom come to
reside permanently. Agents have
letters directing them to secure
houses or rooms for eight families to
arrive within the next ten or twelve days.
Intelligence has also been received OF ten
farmers and their families en- route TO
Brazeria county in wagons from North
Texas. Several of these were here month
ago and arranged to buy or rent land near.
Velasco suitable for orchards and laPge
market gardens. The schooner Moorathas
arrived from Corpus Christi and s6ther.
points down the coast with party az set
tiers, one merchant, who brought SiSgshd-
tire stock of goods, rented a storaknnd
moved in next day. The crew of tks betss
Stacy Clark of Boston were so mueRpIeased
with this coast that when orders came for
the vessel to proceed to Tampico and other
Mexican ports, they took advantage of their
contract, which was for the voyage to and
from this city, and with two exceptions
walked ashore and declined to take the
Clark out. The captain had to go to Gal
weston and hire another crew. This brig
will load in Mexico with mahogany for
New York, after discharging which she
will take cargo of general merchandise
for Velasco. the Mason will get her 40
tons of Alabama coal OF his
week and sail to Pensacola flor.
another cargo. The Louisiana and kIase
Texas lumber feet of fourteen scbSoRefs
and sloops is daily expected with ~, coo
feet of lumber for the seven yards here and
the 150-room hotel to be built between dsfe
and the last of April on the beach at Surf
Side.
Within the next fifteen days world: yysH
also begin on North wharf, 1000 feet long
and ninety feet wide. This will give We
-rn
built by the Deger and M. 7. Jones lumber
companies, T. e. Howell, Sol Larsen,
Smith Bros. and SiddaIl & Patillo for theif
own use. The contract for the VelaSeo
real estate exchange building will be lss on
the 18th of the present month. 1t is 10 be-
of pressed brick, three stories hiSh, ajF6n
front, size 27x75. ~
Among the eight large two-stsfy build
ings Just completed are t. L. Smith S.
seven stores in the lower story, and tie
City Arcade, six stores; Schneider's b{5ck, Z
five stores, has a large force of Ten e
work on it, and the two new atfhrcltes,
Baptist and Methodist, will h. fgfshed
and, better still, paid for insisssof two
weeks.
In the residence part of the city nineteen
houses are going up or being enlarged, and
considerable Improvement in putting down
sidewalks, and laying sewer mains is under
full Roadway. The excellent arrangement
OF tue SLfeeb eleClflc lamps, DgnG the DuS1-
ness part of the city and the wharf per-
fectly, and the immense arc on the dome of
the Hotel Velasco can be seen fifty miles to
sea.
Downey Bros, contractors, have forty
six scraper teams at work on the street
railway grade, and if the weather continues
good will finish the Job by the Goth of
March. This includes maoadamized road
forty feet wide and three feet high from
the city to Surf Side, over two-thirds of
which is completed.
The first ballasting of beach sand has
been put upon the greater part of the We
lasco terminal railway, and the contractors
say they will soon put on the second layer
of shells. President w. NJ d. Lee of the
Brazos river channel and dock company in
tends having daily trains between Velasco
and Houston as soon as the roadbed is in
condition TO permit speed over it that will
bring Houston within three or four hours
of this port.
The weather is most delightfully."- cool and
pleasant, and crowds of pleasure-seekers
visit the seashore daily. THE GAZETTE
correspondent engaged photographer last
Sabbath and had pictures taken of some of
the old houses on the coast, built in 1S22-'23-
'4, and still in good state of preserva-
ton, though some of them stand within a
stones throw of tide water 1t seems a
pity that these old landmarks of early set
tiers should be removed even for the more
handsome and modern edifices soon destined
to take their places, for they are standing
evidence of the security of this coast from
ocean storms.