The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 47, July 1943 - April, 1944 Page: 370

Southwestern Historical Quarterly

Harrisburg Rail Road and Trading Companies shade into the
Buffalo Bayou, Brazos and Colorado Railway Company.
The Harrisburg Town Company was unable to make Harris-
burg the commercial city of Buffalo Bayou, and the Harrisburg
Rail Road and Trading Company failed in its attempt to build
a railroad by which the trade of the Brazos valley would enrich
Harrisburg at the expense of Houston, but the two for some
time were ceaseless in their search for means by which to pro-
mote their ends. The Harrisburg railroad company was the
only one of the four railroads promoted during the period of
the Republic of Texas that actually began construction; it pur-
chased ties and threw up embankments on which to lay track.
Unlike the others, the Harrisburg railroad company was the
lineal predecessor of a railroad that was actually built and op-
erated. While the Houston and Texas Central roughly used the
survey made for the Houston and Brazos company and the Hous-
ton Tap and Brazoria touched the Brazos at nearly the same
point the Brazos and Galveston company had first selected, the
Boston promoters of the Buffalo Bayou, Brazos and Colorado
Railway Company not only adopted the survey made for the
Harrisburg company but its tactics as well: they purchased the
property of both the town and railroad companies and created
a real estate company under a trust deed and a railroad company
under a charter. DeWitt Clinton Harris and others played im-
portant parts in both the Harrisburg and Boston companies.
More active than its competitors, the Harrisburg railroad also
had a more lasting influence.

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