Education outreach in Victoria, TX

On March 24, 2016, students from DeLeon Elementary School in Victoria, TX (led by Assistant Principal Carl Frisch) donned mid 19th century clothing to re-enact José María de Jesús Carbajal's historic survey work, complete with presenting the settlers an arrival oath and petition in writing to the Commissioner.

Stephen F. Austin sponsored Carbajal and helped him obtain employment as the official surveyor for empresario Martín De León to plat the town of Victoria, Texas. His bilingual abilities gave him an advantage when communicating, to Anglo settlers, the complex legal documents written in Spanish. Each settler received one league of land, in which was included one labor, or 177 acres of arable land. Each colonist also received a building lot in town with the commissioner issuing titles to both after being properly surveyed. 

Carbajal was one of the original "forty-one families" that settled in the De Leon land grant.

Submitted by David Klotz, RPLS, LSLS