Birthright

Birthright, also known as Lone Star, on Farm Road 71 ten miles northeast of Sulphur Springs in north central Hopkins County, began about 1870 as a store in the ranchhouse of E. C. Birthright. A post office was established in 1871 in the store with Edward McLaughlin as postmaster. Lone Star School was a mile west of the store; the Lone Star Methodist Church met in the school until its building was erected in 1892. In 1885 the widely dispersed town, by then known as Birthright, had four steam mill-gins, three churches, a school, and an estimated population of 150. In 1890 the population had grown to 250, and a weekly paper named the Lone Star Appeal was being published. By 1893 the post office had been moved to the farm home of G. C. McCauley, a half mile northwest of the school. Around 1894 Randolph Reed opened a store 1½ miles west of the original site and became postmaster. In 1925 the community reported eighty-five residents. During the mid-1930s Birthright had a post office, a school, two churches, and four stores. By 1948 only the post office, a church, and a store remained. The post office and the stores later closed, and in the early 1960s the town had two churches and a few scattered houses. In the late 1980s Birthright was a dispersed rural farming community. The population in 1990 and 2000 was forty.

Adapted from the official Handbook of Texas, a state encyclopedia developed by the Texas State Historical Association (TSHA). It is an authoritative source of trusted historical records.