Green Lake

Green Lake, at the junction of State Highway 35 and Farm Road 404, twelve miles southwest of Port Lavaca in western Calhoun County, was settled as early as 1850 by Kentucky cotton planters. A contemporary observed: "Green Lake was once the locality of a neighborhood characterized by [the] wealth and social standing of the residents." At the beginning of the Civil War, federal troops under Gen. David E. Twiggs mustered at nearby Green Lake (after which the community was named) to await ships to return to the north. After the war local planters found themselves without horses, mules, farming equipment, money, or slaves. Consequently, Green Lake was almost entirely abandoned. By 1900, however, the fertile soil near the lake drew people back to the area and to the community. The influx of residents was encouraged by the arrival of the St. Louis, Brownsville and Mexico Railway by 1910. In 1914 Green Lake had a general store, a telephone connection, and an estimated population of 300. A post office opened there in 1912, but it closed in 1916. It reopened in 1929 but was discontinued after 1930. By 1933 Green Lake had dwindled to twenty-five inhabitants and four businesses. In 1936 the community had one seasonal industry, three other businesses, and several surrounding farms; the population was still estimated at twenty-five and continued to be reported at that level until 1970, when it was fifty-one. In 1947 oil was discovered in the Green Lake oilfield, a mile east of the community. In 1984 there were twenty wells in the field, but only one of them was still producing oil. That year the total yield for the Green Lake oilfield was 981 barrels of hydrocarbon and 76,329 thousand cubic feet of natural gas. In the early 1990s Green Lake still had a population of fifty-one, but no businesses. The population remained the same in 2000.