The Padre Island beach facing the Gulf provides a beautiful scenic drive during normal tides at both the north and south ends. It is impossible, however, to drive the full length of the island because of a channel near the center that divides the island into two parts.
“Where the wind blows, the oil flows, the cotton grows, and it never snows,” is the colorful slogan of CORPUS CHRISTI, famous for its booming industry, beautiful Ocean Circle Drive, airfields, and mansion-studded beaches. A United States Naval Air Station, one of the largest in the world, is here, as are Del Mar College and the University of Corpus Christi.
As a cultural center, Corpus Christi frequently assumes a Parisian air when writers and artists convene in this sunny city. The CORPUS CHRISTI JUNIOR MUSEUM is fun for children. Here for the children is a colorful collection of Indian relics and Padre Island shells. There are also many other fine museums.
Only an hour’s drive from Corpus Christi is the ARANSAS NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE at Austwell, which offers sights of the nation’s wildlife in its own habitat; birds and game abound. Even the whooping crane sleeps here during the months from November to April.
ROCKPORT and FULTON BEACH, in the Corpus Christi area, are famous resort cities, aristocratically adorned with lovely wind-bent oak trees. In nearby GOOSE ISLAND STATE PARK is a MARINE LABORATORY and AQUARIUM.
The Annual Tarpon Rodeo has made nearby PORT ARANSAS famous, and visitors have been introduced to its fine restaurants, noted for their seafood.
Leaving Corpus Christi, Highway 77 cuts through Kingsville, headquarters of the fabulous KING RANCH of nearly a million acres, where roam eighty-five thousand head of cattle. The acquisition of this huge acreage was begun in 1853 by Richard King, one of the early steamboat captains who navigated the Rio Grande. Here was developed the only breed of cattle originated in the Western Hemisphere—the King Ranch Santa Gertrudis breed. Inside the fifteen hundred miles of fencing are some three hundred windmills. The ranch is famous, also, for breeding thoroughbred horses, two of which, Assault and Middleground, have been Kentucky Derby winners. The Texas College of Arts and Industries, one of Texas’ finest, is in Kingsville, too.
Settlement of the lush Rio Grande Valley was first undertaken in the late eighteenth century, when the Count of Sierra Gorda, Escondon, brought settlers into this then semi-desert region of the Rio Grande delta. These were the first Europeans to attempt permanent settlement in the region. In 1767 Spain confirmed their endeavors.
From then until well into the nineteenth century, the Valley was left pretty much alone. It was the spreading empires of the cattle barons that brought the next burst of activity. In 1872 the Rio Grande Railroad, a rambling, narrow-gauge line, was completed from Port Isabel to Brownsville, and promptly put most of the river steamboats out of business, although steamers were used to take goods to Mier as late as 1886.
The coming of the main railroad from the North—the International and Great Northern—really opened the Valley up to its present prosperity. This was in 1904, and ever since the Valley has been prospering. Port Isabel became a deep water port in 1930; Brownsville followed. Harlingen was made a port with the lengthening of the Intracoastal Canal in 1951.