Meyersville Quadrangle

Topographic map of a portion of Texas from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) project. The map includes towns, historic or notable sites, bodies of water, and other geologic features. Scale 1:24,000
Date: 1987
Creator: Geological Survey (U.S.)
Object Type: Map
System: The Portal to Texas History

Yorktown East Quadrangle

Topographic map of a portion of Texas from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) project. The map includes towns, historic or notable sites, bodies of water, and other geologic features. Scale 1:24,000
Date: 1987
Creator: Geological Survey (U.S.)
Object Type: Map
System: The Portal to Texas History

Yorktown West Quadrangle

Topographic map of a portion of Texas from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) project. The map includes towns, historic or notable sites, bodies of water, and other geologic features. Scale 1:24,000
Date: 1987
Creator: Geological Survey (U.S.)
Object Type: Map
System: The Portal to Texas History

Runge Quadrangle

Topographic map of a portion of Texas from the United States Geological Survey (USGS) project. The map includes towns, historic or notable sites, bodies of water, and other geologic features. Scale 1:24,000
Date: 1987
Creator: Geological Survey (U.S.)
Object Type: Map
System: The Portal to Texas History
80th Texas Legislature, Regular Session, Senate Bill 1180, Chapter 1317 (open access)

80th Texas Legislature, Regular Session, Senate Bill 1180, Chapter 1317

Bill introduced by the Texas Senate relating to the powers and duties of the DeWitt Medical District.
Date: June 15, 2007
Creator: Texas. Legislature. Senate.
Object Type: Legislative Document
System: The Portal to Texas History
Improved Mode of Regulating the Velocity and Furling the Sails of Wind-Wheels. (open access)

Improved Mode of Regulating the Velocity and Furling the Sails of Wind-Wheels.

Patent for a new windmill using different parts to help regulate the sails and for folding and unfolding the sails, including illustration.
Date: March 24, 1857
Creator: Witting, F. W.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Improvement in Cotton-Presses. (open access)

Improvement in Cotton-Presses.

Patent for the improvement of the cotton press using a cam-lever for operating the side of the press-box with two different application of power, including illustration.
Date: February 16, 1858
Creator: Witting, F. W.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Improvement in Wheels for Vehicles. (open access)

Improvement in Wheels for Vehicles.

Patent for "an improved hub for buggy and other vehicle wheels, which shall be simple in construction, strong, and durable, and which will run with little friction." (Lines 10-13) Includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: December 23, 1873
Creator: Brown, David
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Improvement in Cultivators. (open access)

Improvement in Cultivators.

Patent for an improvement in the design of corn cultivators, including illustrations.
Date: April 22, 1873
Creator: Helm, Jack
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Washing-Machines. (open access)

Washing-Machines.

Patent for an improvement in washing machines. The shaping and components are meticulously detailed and indicate they play a part in the said improvement.
Date: January 20, 1874
Creator: Eberhardt, T. C.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Improvement in Bale-Tie Buckles. (open access)

Improvement in Bale-Tie Buckles.

Patent for an improved bale-tie buckle which will not slip or break under great strain.
Date: September 5, 1876
Creator: Bunker, Thaddeus
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Improvement in Ant-Destroying Apparatus. (open access)

Improvement in Ant-Destroying Apparatus.

Patent for "a new and Improved Apparatus for Destroying Ants" (lines 4-5) including illustrations.
Date: July 27, 1875
Creator: Grafton, William
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Improvement in Cotton-Worm Destroyers. (open access)

Improvement in Cotton-Worm Destroyers.

Patent for "a new machine for removing the destructive cotton-worms from the cotton-plants without injury to the plants, and for destroying the worms," which "consists in the arrangement of a movable frame, which is by animals drawn over the fields to straddle the rows of cotton, and which is provided with brushes for sweeping the worms from the plants, and with jointed bottom pieces or slides, which crush them on the ground." (Lines 15-25) Includes instructions and illustrations.
Date: May 20, 1873
Creator: Helm, Jackson
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Combined Cotton Chopper and Scraper. (open access)

Combined Cotton Chopper and Scraper.

Patent for a new and improved cotton chopper and scraper. This design consists in "the combination of a central beam having a slot at its rear end and a hook at its front end, the laterally-adjustable bars connected with said beam, the scraper-standards pivoted to the adjustable bars, the front clevis for the beam, and rear yoke or support having a transverse pin, and the suspension-chains with a supporting-frame" (lines 101-108).
Date: November 1, 1881
Creator: McCaskill, John C.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Combined Safety Hook and Buckle. (open access)

Combined Safety Hook and Buckle.

Patent for a new and improved combined hook and buckle. This design "is especially adapted for use upon the back-bands, whether of leather or canvas, of harnesses, and for receiving and holding the leather trace or trace-chains of the harness; but it may be attached to various other parts of the harness, and used for various other purposes. The buckle part of the device is composed of a suitable frame . . . and a bar formed or provided with points or small tongues for holding the strap or canvas adapted to slide in the frame" (lines 9-21).
Date: July 18, 1882
Creator: Hake, Francis A.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Coupling for Wagon Tires. (open access)

Coupling for Wagon Tires.

Patent for a new and improved tire tightener. This design consists in "[t]he combination, with the wheel-fellies, one of which has a longitudinal socket, of the overlapping sections secured to the contiguous ends of the tire, and having projecting lugs, an adjusting-bolt carried by one of the lugs and bearing against the other lug, and a protecting-plate having a threaded opening for the passage of the bolt and interposed between the end of the felly in which [a] socket is formed, and the lug adjacent thereto" (lines 80-90).
Date: June 15, 1886
Creator: Simon, Henry Joseph
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Apparatus for the Treatment of Cotton. (open access)

Apparatus for the Treatment of Cotton.

Patent for a machine that puts gins and condensers in a line, which sit over a flue. "The lint cotton in bat form being delivered from all of the condensers in independent bats to a common conveyer, the bat cotton increasing in thickness upon the common conveyer and in its travel to a press, compress or other receptacle, receiving the different bats from the different condensers, one bat lying smoothly upon the other, until at the discharge end of the common conveyer, the bat in which the lint is evenly distributed and which is of considerable thickness, will be conveniently discharged" (lines 13-24).
Date: May 22, 1894
Creator: Zedler, Friedrich
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Car-Replacer. (open access)

Car-Replacer.

Patent for a car-replacer that is simple and inexpensive and can be easily set and removed. The replacer has two blocks shaped like triangles and tie rods connecting the blocks.
Date: February 13, 1894
Creator: Debose, Albert S.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Combined Cultivator and Corn-Planter (open access)

Combined Cultivator and Corn-Planter

Patent for "a planter that shall be self-covering and adjustable as to the transverse and longitudinal space between the hills and rows, and which at the same time may be regulated as to the amount of material fed at each throw of the seed-slide, and which will also mark off the adjacent row as the machine advances" (lines 10-16).
Date: August 23, 1887
Creator: Westhoff, Emil
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Apparatus for Handling Cotton. (open access)

Apparatus for Handling Cotton.

Patent for an apparatus for handling seed-cotton. This apparatus is designed to move seed-cotton to gin-feeders, then from the condenser to the press, and also for conveying seeds and motes to an area of deposit.
Date: June 19, 1890
Creator: Eberhardt, Theophilus Charles.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Earth-Auger (open access)

Earth-Auger

Patent for structural improvement in machines used for boring post holes and wells with illustrations and instructions included.
Date: April 13, 1880
Creator: Cudd, Decater P.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
BED-BOTTOM (open access)

BED-BOTTOM

Patent for "a new and useful improvement in bed bottoms". The bed bottom fits any bedstead and it is cheap, portable, and durable.
Date: July 13, 1880
Creator: Pafford, John R.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Ant Trap. (open access)

Ant Trap.

Patent for a new and improved ant trap. This design "has for its object the production of a simple, cheap, and effective device whereby the ants are confined to a space within the circle of the trap, speedily captured, and exterminated. It consists in a trap constructed with a circular flanged pit provided with tubes leading therefrom to a central ant-receptacle; also, in the details of construction of the trap" (lines 8-16).
Date: November 9, 1886
Creator: Barnes, Robert Hanson & Salles, George Camiel
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History
Vehicle-Seat. (open access)

Vehicle-Seat.

Patent for an improvement in vehicle-seats, intended especially for uses in wagon-seats, by constructing a supporting frame consist of two shafts, each having two cranks with two springs connected with the wrists of the cranks. The seat is supported upon these springs which are secured to the underside of the seat-board by employing two blocks that are safely attached beneath the seat. The movements of the springs preserve the horizontal position of the seat even when weight is unequally disposed. Illustration is included.
Date: February 17, 1891
Creator: Johnson, James M.
Object Type: Patent
System: The Portal to Texas History