Monday, June 21, 2021

Trinity River Trail: Highlights and History

 
The Uniqueness of the River Dallas has Struggled to Understand

  • The Trinity’s watershed constitutes the largest urban forest in the United States.
  • Empties near Galveston
  • Dries up and floods (“untamable”)
  • “Pins” poor communities and especially communities of color against its boundaries and interstates (creating food deserts, etc.)

What’s in a Name?


The Caddo of North Texas called it the Arkikosa; closer to the coast, it was called the Daycoa. French explorers called it, “The River of Canoes.” 1690 Spanish explorer Alfonso De León names the river La Santisima Trinidad - the Most Holy Trinity.


Becoming Big D


1830 President Andrew Jackson signs the Indian Removal Act

1836 First steamboat attempts

1841 General Tarrant leads massacre of Caddo Indians on the banks of the Trinity.

1841 Dallas is established.


After the Civil War


1873 Freeman’s town of Joppa is established - between the Trinity River / Great Trinity Forest and railroad tracks (now also flanked by dumps, wastewater treatment facilities, shingle mtn)

About this same time, the thriving black community of Glen Hill was founded in Rockwall. The community’s cemetery, which you can still see today, is among the oldest African-American cemeteries in North Texas.

1893 Steamboat Harvey completes trip from Galveston to Dallas

1896 Church founded in Forney


20th Century Developments


1908 Flood of 1908

1919 Beginnings of Bonton neighborhood

1930s/40s Canal and steamboat ambitions fade

1968 Lake Ray Hubbard (a dammed portion of the Trinity) is completed.

1973 HTbtL moves to Heath




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