Alto Springs

Alto Springs is on Farm Road 2745 thirteen miles east of Marlin in eastern Falls County. The settlement began as a relay point for an early Central Texas stage route and a supply station for area settlers. Local tradition has it that Sam Houston gave an address at the Alto Springs station in 1842 in an effort to increase the Texas army. Cynthia Ann Parker is also said to have stayed there after she had been recovered from the American Indians. A post office was established at the stage stop in 1846. Alto Springs had a church, a school, and a brush arbor that was used as a community center; it served for several years as a gathering place for political rallies and stump speeches. Alto Springs was considered a possible county seat when residents of Falls County were deciding on a location in 1851. The possibility faded, however, when it became clear that the Houston and Texas Central Railway would bypass the town by about three miles. The Alto Springs post office was discontinued in 1868, and when the railroad was completed two years later, the community lost its function as a supply station. Shortly after the turn of the century Alto Springs had a one-teacher school for forty-nine White students and two one-teacher schools for 140 black students. The community had at least one school, a church, and several residences in the 1940s. The Alto Springs schools were consolidated with the Marlin Independent School District in 1949. By the 1980s only a church marked the community on county highway maps.