Anahuac

History

File:General Thomas Jefferson Chambers House, Anahuac, Texas.jpg|House of General Thomas Jefferson Chambers The Mexican term Anahuac comes from Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs. The name means "place beside the waters." Anáhuac is the pre-Columbian name of the Valley of Mexico and its former lake basins around Mexico City, often including the Lerma and Pánuco river systems. Despite the name, neither the city of Anahuac, Texas, nor the immediate region were ever part of the Aztec Empire. The first dwellers in this area were the Atakapan people as well as the Caddo. The first colonist settlers arrived in 1715, The Burkhalter and Morehead families. They established a small settlement near what is now Lake Anahuac. In 1721, Frenchman Jean Baptiste de La Harpe reached this area. In the 19th century the area became known as "Perry's Point", after Colonel Harry Perry, who erected a military post here in 1816. Two major events in 1832 and 1835, known as the Anahuac Disturbances (caused mainly by rogue bandits termed "Texians" from the Brazos Valley area), helped to precipitate the Texas Revolution that led to the separation of Texas from Mexico. One of these events was the jailing by Mexican authorities of William Travis for illegal slave importation, and the other was unfair taxation and duties on river traffic to the settlers by the Mexican authorities. In October 1830, Mexican Colonel Juan Davis Bradburn established a customs post atop the same bluff where Perry had camped. Bradburn's orders specified that the new post be named Fort Anahuac. The soldiers erected two large kilns to produce bricks to build a more permanent fort. Fort Anahuac would still be intact today had it not been for the locals using the bricks for their own home construction soon after the Texas…

Geography

Anahuac is located near the center of Chambers County at the northeastern end of Trinity Bay and the southern end of Lake Anahuac. The mouth of the Trinity River into Trinity Bay is just west of the city. Lake Anahuac is approximately 33,348 acre-feet it was constructed by the Burkhalter family in 1953. Texas State Highway 61 follows Washington Avenue and Miller Street in Anahuac and leads east and north to Interstate 10 at a point east of Houston and southwest of Beaumont. According to the United States Census Bureau, the city of Anahuac has a total area of , all land.

Race & ethnicity

Most-observed species

• Red-winged Blackbird

  Agelaius phoeniceus (Linnaeus, 1766) · Aves
  3,023
• Northern Cardinal

  Cardinalis cardinalis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  2,510
• Great Egret

  Ardea alba Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  2,359
• Turkey Vulture

  Cathartes aura (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  2,323
• Northern Mockingbird

  Mimus polyglottos (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  2,301
• Mourning Dove

  Zenaida macroura (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  2,111
• Killdeer

  Charadrius vociferus Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  2,083
• Black Vulture

  Coragyps atratus (Bechstein, 1793) · Aves
  1,809

Largest nearby schools

• ANAHUAC EL
  Elementary · ANAHUAC · 713 students · 14.6:1 ratio
• ANAHUAC H S
  High · ANAHUAC · 454 students · 15.7:1 ratio
• ANAHUAC MIDDLE
  Middle · ANAHUAC · 326 students · 13.6:1 ratio