Lyford

Lyford

(Severin)

Biographies Alf. L. Scott and T. J. Westerberg

Located in Cameron County, Lyford is the youngest Swedish community in the State of Texas. This area and the neighboring county is generally referred to as the Brownsville area and also as the Rio Grande Valley. Since the beginning of the century, the exotic, delightful climate and abundant natural resources of the area have resulted in many speculative undertakings. The area’s location has played an important role in Texas’ history. It constituted part of the borderline between the Nueces River and the Rio Grande River, which was declared as the border between Mexico and the Republic of Texas following the end of the war between Mexico and the United States from 1846 to 1848. Texas insisted on the ownership of all land up to the Rio Grande River. Mexico protested and wished the make the boundary a hundred and fifty miles from the river on the Texas side. As time went by, it was agreed that the Rio Grande River would be the border between Texas and Mexico.

The oldest city in Cameron County is Brownsville. At the beginning of the Mexican War of 1846, General Taylor marched his troops from the city of Corpus Christi to the Rio Grande River. He stationed his troops immediately next to the Mexican city of Matamoros, and named the encampment Fort Brown, which was the beginning of the city of Brownsville. There is historical debate whether this occurred further north around Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma. General Taylor’s headquarters at Point Isabel on the bay of Brazos Santiago was isolated from his troops. Lack of communications between headquarters and troops allowed the Mexican army to engage the Americans in hand to hand combat.

Lack of communications with the interior isolated the Cameron County-Mexico border area, which was not fully established until about 1900.

The immense prairies, actually enormous cattle grazing ranches, were accessible only to the settlements of Brownsville, Point Isabel and Santa Maria. The St. Louis-Brownsville and Mexico Railroad was begun in 1903 and became the first thoroughfare between Houston and Brownsville in 1905. The opening of the railroad united this isolated part of Texas with the civilized world and marked the beginning of an important and speculative era for the Rio Grande Valley. Enthusiastic capitalists introduced and laid excellent irrigation systems capable of irrigating thousands of acres of this fertile land. By 1913, 50,000 acres of the 80,000 acres, with the system were under irrigation, which cost $3,000,000. Big sugar factories had arranged with the sugar farmers to handle the raw materials. Later, among the noteworthy cities and communities, Harlingen was the most successful in competing with Brownsville. San Benito is an important center with the irrigation district and the out-going point for the electric rail-line along the river. Raymondville, La Feria and Lyford are among the youngest cities.

The successful Swedish community development of Lyford was organized in 1913-1914 by a Swedish company from Minneapolis, Minnesota. Their agents in Austin, Texas sold land to many central Texas Swedes who colonized the area. This became a considerably larger settlement with the main crops being cotton, corn, Kaffir corn and dairy products, all grown with an irrigation system. Several churches in the community share their work activities among various church associations in Texas.

Extracted from: Swedes In Texas In Words and Pictures,

English Translation, 1838 - 1918