INCORPORATION OF MANOR

Part One - The Petition 

Although James Manor took possession of the land that is now the City of Manor in 1841, it remained wide-open prairie land until about 1850 when he moved his family from Webberville (known then as Webber's Prairie) to his land and built a cabin near Gilleland Creek. Over the next few years others began to move into the area and slowly formed a recognized community. The 1870 U. S. census listed them merely as residents living in 
Travis County Justice Precinct No. 2. 

Even when they began to establish churches, schools, a post office, a cemetery, etc., they didn’t plat or consider themselves to be a town until 1872. When James Manor donated land to the Houston and Texas Central Railroad on which to build their tracks running from Houston to Austin in 1871, the residents of the area officially platted a roughly square area, containing 80 blocks divided into lots, and named the new townsite Manor.

Still considered a community or village, the area began to grow. The 1890 census showed a population of over 400 people and according to the Austin History Center, by 1901 there were almost 500 households, and Manor was considered to be the “second largest city in 
Travis County”.

Even so, it would be 12 more years before Manor would seek to become an incorporated city with the ability to elect its own officials and make its own rules and regulations. On February 4, 1913 a petition signed by forty-three of the citizens of Manor was presented to the County Court of Travis County requesting that the necessary steps be taken to allow Manor to become an officially incorporated city.  The signers of the petition were: Nelson Houser, James T. Harrell, J. S. Mayfield, A.P. Hansen, H. C. Allison, S. A. Sellstrom, H. C. Johns, O. W. Anderson, A. N. Anderson, C. H. Eva, W. H. Wendland, Frank C. Gregg, S. E. Smart, J. O. Watt, J. E. Hickman, W. M. Allison, W. P. Rowe, J. H. Allison, W. R. Wray, C. A. Johnson, A. F. Loftis, J. R. Keltner, I. N. Mayfield, Joe Dupree, O. T. Johnson, J. H. Empie, S. M. Jester, A. G. Sandberg, H. P. Lockwood, W. E. Ware, D. C. Ashmore, D. H. Williams, H. B. Howse, Henry Gregg, J. P. Lockwood, Pat Lockwood, W. J. Wilde, Louis Klein, W. A. Marcuse, J. W. Swenson, Charles W. Houser, Louis Hoffman and B. Pledger. (names spelled as shown on court documents)

The petition read as follows;

“Now come your petitioners who reside in the town of Manor, Travis County, Texas, and who are inhabitants and resident citizens of the hereinafter described and proposed incorporation of the town of Manor, Travis County, Texas, and who are qualified voters under the Constitution and laws of the State of Texas, and respectfully file this our application for the incorporation of the proposed said town of Manor, Texas, and represents that the territory of the proposed town contains more than 500 and less than 10,000 inhabitants. And your petitioners respectfully ask that your honor make an order that an election be held in compliance with the Statutes of the State of Texas, in such cases made and provided.” 

Included in the petition were details of a survey that had been conducted by H. G. Lee, County Surveyor, Travis County, Texas, giving the boundaries of the territory that was desired to become the incorporated town, along with a plat map of the area surveyed.

After determining that he signers of the petition were qualified voters of the area requesting to be incorporated and that the area contained the number of residents required by law, Judge William Von Rosenberg, Jr. ordered that an election be held on March 4, 1913 at the William Roesle office building in Manor to decide whether or not the citizens wanted to become incorporated. Shown below is his signature as it appeared in the court records.

William Roesle was born in Switzerland in 1867. He came to Manor in 1889 and became a naturalized citizen in 1914. He owned a blacksmith shop in Manor in the early 1900’s and advertised as a Kadette radio salesman in 1936. He ran for mayor of Manor in 1939 and for Justice of the Peace in 1940. After living in Manor for 60 years, he died of a heart attack in 1949 and is buried in the Oakwood Cemetery Annex in Austin. His death certificate erroneously lists his birthplace as Sugarland, Texas.

William Von Rosenberg, Jr. was born in Austin in 1859. He served as Justice of the Peace from 1882 to 1886, was Assistant Fire Chief of Austin Fire Dept. in 1886 and 1887, and was elected Travis County Judge from 1891 to 1894. He then held the position of city recorder for Austin for two terms and was County Judge again from 1913 to 1916. He was very active and involved in many road and bridge improvements in Travis County and had a long and distinguished military career. He died, alone in his back yard in 1919 at the age of 59 years, 11 months and 21 days as a result of an accidental self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head. He is buried in Oakwood Cemetery in Austin.

Nelson Houser (Hauser) (Howser) was one of two clerks responsible for recording the details of the election to incorporate Manor on March 4, 1913. He replaced J. P. Lockwood as presiding officer responsible for a future election held on April 15th of that same year. A street in Presidential Meadows appears to be named for him. 

H. G. (Horatio Grooms) Lee was born in 1848 in Austin. In 1859 he was among a group of boys who “set fire to Congress Avenue” in Austin. He served as a member of the Frontier Battalion, Company D of the Texas Rangers in 1874. He was elected on the ninth ballot as City Marshal of Austin from 1883 to 1885. Elected as Travis County surveyor from 1899 to 1903, he then served as City Engineer of Austin from 1903 to 1905. After this, he was again elected Travis County surveyor, a position he held until the time of his death in 1923. Never married, at the age of 75 he was said to be Austin’s oldest bachelor and was still considered to be an eligible catch. In 1922 a newspaper headline said this about him;