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"Houston: Where Seventeen Railroads Meet the Sea" by Jerome Hammond Farbar.

Early in the twentieth century, the city of Houston, Texas, was then a city focused on its burgeoning port and railroad industry, and yet one just starting to contend with oil discovery in 1901. This colour illustrated work, published in 1913, shows scenes of landscapes and buildings of local importance in a city starting to transition.

he City of Houston was one of the first products of the new Republic of Texas. Founded by the Allen family and General Sam Houston after the defeat of the Mexicans at San Jacinto, April 21, 1836, and named in honor of the illustrious Texan who won Texas' independence, the new town was destined to be the chief city in the new Republic and today it maintains the same position as the chief city of the State of Texas, with a population of 125,000 or more persons.

When Mexico was forced to relinquish claims to Texas in 1836 the victorious Texans threw off the mantle of warfare to face a much more stupendous task—that of governing a great undeveloped empire, twice the size of Japan and 825 miles in length from north to south and 740 miles wide from east to west.
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Featured December 2010