Bruce

Texla is at the junction of State Highway 62 and Farm Road 2802, twenty miles northeast of Beaumont in northern Orange County. The first post office, established in 1905, was named Bruce, after postmaster Charles G. Bruce. By that time the Harrell-Votaw Lumber Company had established a sawmill at the site, on the Orange and Northwestern Railway. In 1906 the R. W. Wier Lumber Company purchased the mill and changed the name of the post office to Texla, for its proximity to Louisiana. Several firms, including the Orange Lumber Company and the Peavy-Moore Lumber Company, operated sawmills there between the 1910 and 1929. The community had a peak population of some 600. Eventually, however, the depletion of local timber led operators to abandon the site; Peavy-Moore sold its remaining buildings at Texla in 1929. The post office closed the same year. Scattered buildings and residences marked the area in 1975, when most services were located at nearby Mauriceville.