McFaddin

McFaddin is near the San Antonio River two miles east of U.S. Highway 77 and eighteen miles southwest of Victoria in Victoria County. It was named for Capt. James A. McFaddin, a Civil War veteran and prominent Refugio County cattleman who began ranching at the fork of the Guadalupe and San Antonio rivers in Victoria County in 1876. Until they moved into Victoria the family lived on Bell Lake, a mile southwest of Kemper's Bluff. The ranch settlement was located at the townsite and was called McFaddin Ranch. In 1906 the St. Louis, Brownsville and Mexico Railway established a station there but changed its name to Marianna. A post office, also called Marianna, was secured the following year, and soon the depot also had a Western Union station, a Wells Fargo office, and a general store that the McFaddins operated. The population grew to 124 by 1920. Three years later Al McFaddin, son of the founder, changed the name of the ranch community back to McFaddin. In 1931 the first oil well in Victoria County was brought in at McFaddin. The town's population remained seventy-five for thirty years; it was estimated at 250 in 1964 and 320 in 1974. The eight-grade McFaddin School was one of the two remaining common school districts in the county, and the store was still active, as were several oil and gas companies in 1990. The population remained an estimated 320. In 2000 the population dropped to 175.