Refuge on the Rio Grande: A Regional History of Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park Page: I

                                
A REGIONAL HISTORY OF BENTSEN-RIO GRANDE VALLEY STATE PARK

Introduction
Bentsen-Rio Grande Valley State Park encompasses 760 acres of brushy
woodlands along the Rio Grande just south of Mission in Hidalgo County,
Texas. The park is best known today'as a nature preserve, one of the few places
where the unique riparian woodlands native to the Rio Grande Valley can still
be found. Stands of cedar elm, Rio Grande ash, Texas ebony, black willow,
anacua, huisache and other species attract an incredible variety of birds. Some
340 different species of birds have been sighted in the park, including the green
jay, Altamira oriole, white-tipped dove, plain chachalaca, hook-billed kite,
groove-billed ani, common paraque and ringed kingfisher.'
Approximately 24,000 visitors travel to the park every year, usually to
admire its flora and fauna, but most are probably unaware of the human history
connected to the park and the area around it. Some of the earliest Spanish
settlements in Texas were established in the vicinity of the park area, part of
a Spanish land grant issued in 1767, and were probably being ranched by the
late 1700s. The first roads in the region, including a "path" from old Reynosa,
Mexico, and the Military Road used by General Zachary Taylor during the
Mexican-American War, passed through or adjacent to the park. And a small
ranching village known as "Las Nuebas" (or "Las Nuevas"), established by 1850,
still existed into the 1930s at the site of the park's La Familia Nature Center.
Nothing of it remains today.
During the late 1 9th and early 20th centuries the park area and the
immediate vicinity were directly connected to some of the most significant
people and events in South Texas history. For much of the late 1 9th century the
park property was owned by Dr. Alexander Headley, the colorful Confederate
veteran and soldier-of-fortune who once attempted to overthrow the Hidalgo
County government by force. Much of the area around the current park was
then shaped by prominent South Texas figures such as Abraham Dillard and
William S. and Eloisa Vela Dougherty. "El Jardin de Flores," the Dougherty's
ranch home that still stands about a mile east of the park, earned an almost
mythical reputation in the county for the entertainments held there.
During the last decades of the 1 9th century a dramatic shift occurred in
the landholding patterns in the lower Rio Grande Valley, as more and more
land moved into the hands of Anglo-Americans and Europeans. Nevertheless,
old social and cultural norms persisted in many parts of the Valley, including
Hidalgo County, which remained isolated from economic and social trends that
were already shaping other parts of Texas and the nation. Few Anglo-Americans
moved into the area before 1900, and most of those who did melded into its

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